How high to tap

[Kyle M]

Running tubing down to five gallon buckets, how high in the tree can my tap be and still be effective?

[tcross]

as high as you'd like it! 10' or 10"... both will work fine!

[ennismaple]

Dr Tim has posted on this in the past. You get slightly lower yield the higher up the tree you tap. Consider the tree a straw full of water. Poke a hole halfway up and you've only got half the volume of water that can drain into your bucket. Poke a hole in the bottom of the straw (tree) and you have much more volume available.

For 5 gallon buckets I would vary my taps between thigh and chest high and move the taps around the circumference from year to year. No need to put them in at 8 feet if they are draining straight down.

[Kyle M]

Thanks for the replies, I would prefer to keep them lower but some of my trees are on the smaller side and I just wanted to make sure my holes are spread out adequetly