Running Hard!

[Dropflue]

One hell of a run yesterday. Sap at 1.7%. Collected 252 gallons. Started boiling at 6:00PM, finished at 2:30 AM. Made 6 more gallons. Bottled 3.5 gallons from Sunday’s run. Still light amber. Had to do a triple take with the grading kit, but yep still lighter than fancy.

[jason loper]

That sounds just like my night except my dad started the evaporator earlier for us. I bottled sundays and last nights and it also was all very light 7 gallons worth. Today dad called and its running like crazy but he is drawing off darker syrup already.

[backyardsugarer]

Monday was great, Tuesday they were shutting down. I am collecting for the last time today. I am making medium now but not long before it will be dark. Clean up Thurdsday and call it a year.
Good luck to the rest of you hanging in there for the long haul.
Chris

[maple flats]

My great runs were last Fri, Sat and Sunday. Been making med but so far each canner worth I finish has gotten lighter. On Monday the flow slowed a little, tues about the same flow and yesterday rather light flow. I also had to pull my taps on the reds and the 2 silvers I had tapped, buds looked like ready to break. Last night I had to store some sap in a metal stock tank used in the woods. It looked good before pumping into it but right after pumping it looked like I picked up a little rust from the bottom. Is there a way to filter out real fine rust that looks like a cloud? Will this come out as I do the syrup? I have time to pump it thru the uv and into my main tank but do not want to mix it with the 200 gal in the tank that is clear, any suggestions appreciated. I got behind Tues because my wife had surgery for cancer and I only had time to collect and no boil, Wed was only slightly better.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

If you have a good sap filter, it should filter about all of it out. I keep an extra 100 gallon tank at the sugarhouse so I can put lower quality sap in it and not have to mix it with good sap and boil it at the end of the day or at the start, depending what the quality of sap was in the evaporator when I finished the last boil. :)

[maple flats]

Thanks Brandon, I will try that. Unfortunately the temp got too warm and I had to dump it before I could try as i was boiling good sap before I lost that too. I might get an estimate to hook up my bulk tank for the compressor to keep it cool before next year. The farmer I bought it from was using it until a few months before I got it. He sold a med size farm and was going to get a smaller "retirement farm" and milk again but then he died and I bought the tank from his son who wanted nothing to do with milking.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

No need for that at all. I have 10 quart aluminum sap buckets and put two of those full in a freezer every day and then throw them in the sap. This way you have it ice cold all the time. If it only takes one, then use one or 3 if it is warmer! :D Well, you get the pic!