Sap Color

[twigbender]

We just got a small run today. So far it's been a bust. Most of the pails had a dark sap in them. It was about the color of iced tea. Tasted OK. What's the scoop? Does anyone know what causes this and if it's OK to use?

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Sounds like you got rain water in them. Rain will run down the tree and take on the color of the bark. Won't hurt much, just more to boil off and darker syrup. :?

[sweetwoodmaple]

Yes, fighting the tannins in the bark with rain and buckets is difficult. Even with lids, it somehow finds a way to trickle in there.

If it is very dark, you probably have mostly rain water and should dump it.

This is an advantage of having a bucket and lid on the ground, and using a short tubing run to connect the spile and bucket.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

It runs down the tree and catches on the spout which runs it into the bucket. Just a few ounces can significantly darken an entire bucket.

[royalmaple]

I had a similar ice tea in some buckets as well the other day when I checked. All had covers and no rain for weeks. Unless bird piss or something.

Many buckets were bone dry but couple had some ice tea in them. Still tasted fine and was running about 2 1/2 sugar.

Talked to a guy last year when I saw some of this and he told me end of the season indicator. I don't know enough to say exactly what it is, but I can say you can get this with no rain, at least I have.

[Russell Lampron]

Twigbender,

You didn't mention if it had rained there recently but here in NH where it hasn't rained it means the season is over. If you boil it the syrup will most likely be very dark and have an off flavor. I pulled the taps on my buckets yesterday and about 1/3 of them had yellow sap and the others were cloudy.

Russ

[markcasper]

Heres one for you guys. I have one binch of trees....275 on vacuum to be exact and the sap started to turn yellow as soon as we lost alot of the snow, more than 1 week ago. My other 2 bunches were not yellow, a little cloudy, but definately not yellow. It is NOT coming form the trees this way as /i have a glass releaser jar and it is not yellow. It seams if this sap gets more than a day old it turns yellow in the tank. I sanitized the line last Thursday that brings it across the field from the releaser. The pickup after this was a little cloudy, but noit yellow. The 2 nd pickup after the line sanitation baffled me, yellower than yellow. Anyone know whats causing this???? Now someone will say that I hit some heartwood when tapping.

Why did the yellowness not appear on the scene before when we had snow on the ground?
Mark

[mountainvan]

I had the same with buckets yesterday. one side of the tree cloudy, other side yellow. my best guess is bacteria, a lot of bacteria and high temps. yellow sap was direct sunlight.

[maplehound]

Mark
Try filling a glass jar with it and see if it is still Yellow. I have noticed that my sap often looks yellow and cloudy in the tank but in a glass jar it looks clear. I think that the more bacteria in the lines and tank the yellower the sap looks in bulk quantites. If it doesn't smell bad, there really isn't anything wrong with it. Even if it does smell (like hard cider) go ahead and boil it. It can only make darker syrup.

Ron