Buds and when to pull a tap?

[MJFlores]

Hi everyone, I see a lot of maple trees around starting to change up in the canopy. I'm not sure you could call them buds just yet, but that's just it...I just don't know. I'm wondering if someone could post a picture of what the "buds" would need to look like in order for you to stop collecting syrup from a given tree. I'm betting it would help out a lot of us new sap collectors.

[Mark]

Peepers peeping yet? When I hear them it is done for me.

[Ed R]

The only way to know for sure is to do a test boil on the stove . Perfectly good looking clear sap can be buddy and milky or mountain dew looking sap can make great but dark syrup. Its just if you want to make that dark syrup. I doubt that any one is done yet in Michigan due to the trees being buddy, maybe due to taphole drying and bacterial action in the taphole, bucket or tubing. I'm still making syrup at the Ohio state line on red maples and the syrup is no where near being buddy, a few have dryed up and I've pulled those. The buds are swollen but they always look that way on red maples.

[PerryW]

I see little change in the sugar maple buds until a couple weeks after the bud run. (and the red maples looked budded back in December)

Go by the peepers, or boil a test batch.