Anybody gearing up yet?

[HAHA I 1]

I am building a new sugarhouse and have it to the point where I can at least have a covered boil, but it is far from complete. We tapped 150 trees last year and hope to get closer to 200 this year. We will be building a new evaporator for next year so we can really expand. Weather is incredibly cold right now, but we are usually tapped by January 20, so its right around the corner.....

[red maples]

Ha I was talking to my wife yesterday and she kinda looked at me with a weird smile and said hmmmm sound like maple fever is setting in then started making fun of me.

[shane hickey]

I should be but still working on hay equipment from last year after working in a heated shop Dont have much ambition to be out it the woods freezing. Maybe this year I'll let the boys whoop it up

[morningstarfarm]

We are all running wild trying to get ready..it must be getting close...my drill made its first appearance last night...went to bed and got thunked in the head...darn kids...they always enjoy hiding it when it's getting close...this time it was under my pillow...

[kiteflyingeek]

That is funny! Can't imagine finding a tool in the bed -- my wife would not find that to be funny AT ALL.

--andrew

[kiteflyingeek]

Matt,

I should be but my there are two problems:
1) my arch isn't quite done
2) my family is headed to Wisconsin for a ski vacation the last week of Jan

I'm expanding quite a bit this year so I'm working I some of those things (water jacketed bottler and collection pump bucket). But with the temp forecast for Sat-Wed, I'm wishing I had buckets on the trees.

Next year, I plan to tap mid-Jan to try and catch some of this early flow.

BTW, we are just under 2 hours apart so our tapping time should be pretty close.

--andrew

[Tapping Wolf]

We are getting geared up here near Westville...I'm hoping to be able to tap the first week or so of Feb....maybe later if these cold temps hang around... I know we have a little thaw coming up but I'll be holding off 'till a little late...expanding to 70 taps this year, and up grading from my concrete homemade arch to an arch I purchased from sugar bush supplies...using the same pans

[DougM]

We are trying to get the rest of our pre-season work done this weekend. We really aren't changing anything except for adding a pressure filter, so basically we just need to clean up, get a few things out of storage and set up...oh yeah, and tap trees.

There is a warmup coming the next few days but every time we've tapped before the last week in January we get about two good days, then everything freezes solid for a week. And with temps lower than -10 in the last week it will take a bit for the trees to thaw. But I'd say we're definitely ready to get going.

[Shawn]

Just have to do last minute checks and tap, will hold on until next month at least keep track of weather coming, have seen warm up's for a couple of days and then temps drop back down, not worried yet

[Fishgill]

I'm starting to get the itch. We're getting close to that time.

[morningstarfarm]

It's getting close...drill appeared in the refrigerator tonight...boys think they are Soo funny

[Sugarmaker]

Replaced 200 spiles and drops on 1/3 of the taps. Used Leader health spouts and Leader max flow tubing. Will see if this improves sap volume on those locations. Weather is warming. Just about ready to get the tubing in place, takes a couple days. Then actual tapping is a couple weeks out.
Regards,
Chris

[shane hickey]

Starting tomorrow working in the rain fix in lines. A month away and a lot to do

[rayi]

Never really geared down. New evaporator. new lines new vacuum same old me

[Sugarmaker]

Funny, That's the way my wife looks at it:) She believes I think about maple all the time. That's not exactly true! That is why I got some bees and started restoring tractors too. Now I have several things to dwell on. It is almost time to get the tubing up and get the sugarhouse ready:)
Regards,
Chris

Never really geared down. New evaporator. new lines new vacuum same old me

[Mark72]

Just waiting for this last hard cold snap to pass this week. I've got a pile of soda machine bags to get ready yet but mostly ready.

Mark