July Journal

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Happy 4th of July to each of the trader members and let's remember all the sacrifices that were made for our freedom. This is still the greatest country in the World!!!

[lakeview maple]

Happy 4th to all , we all hope you all have a safe holiday , and lets not forget the men and women who have served and who are serving , God bless America!!!

[rayi]

Amen good time to reflect

[PATheron]

Lull in the action to some extent at Pierce and Sons Maple. Planning my next move for the year. Been working in the sugarhouse on R.O. machines some. Getting the itch to hit the woods. Think my strategy is going to be to sweep through each woods and make sure all my lines are dialed in real nice then I think going to hook up more trees. Wheelin and dealin and got a bunch of sap line rounded up. Been doing some thinning in a bunch of young red maples think gonna try to hook some of them up. Lots to improve. Five months till operation extreme tap off 2015. Theron

[unc23win]

One thing is for sure here in pa the temperatures have not been too hot for working in the woods if you can dodge the rain. I have been doing some thinning and getting ready to install some new line as well. I figure every little bit of time I can manage now will pay off in 2015.

[southfork]

Expanding taps to 5,500. Improving roadways, culverts and adding a larger R/O from LaPierre.

[maple flats]

I walked my woods checking for wind damage, so far, so good. Very few limbs down and nothing big.
I just connected a bigger tankless HW heater in the sugarhouse (the old one heated about 1 gpm to 130 degrees, this should heat about 2 gpm to that. Next comes a stack, the first one just vented into the sugarhouse, this one can be set up with a vent stack.
Yesterday I did the final pressure wash on the syrup pan. Rather than fill it with sap, I just added permeate to the unrinsed pan. It sat for about 10 weeks. After that time, things had fermented and it looked real nasty. I believe it came clean the easiest and fastest ever. I had never tried this method before. I'm sold on it now. With a cover on it, I had never gotten much smell from it, I will use this method again.
I'm changing the plumbing for my tanks to feed the RO. I used to need to move a suction hose from one tank to another as one tank emptied and another tank was started. Each time I was drawing with a suction tube with the hose entering over the top. This meant the feed pump had to self prime to get things moving. Next year the tanks will be plumbed together and I'll just close one valve and open another (yes, I know that's how I should have done it in the first place, it only took me 3 seasons to make the correction).
I will be adding more taps, will add 2 more mains in a few weeks and then put up the laterals just after gun season, when my help is on Christmas break. I may only have potential for about 250-300 more at that bush.
Might get another 150-175 at my sugarhouse bush, need to put in vacuum to get those. My 2 remote bushes have vacuum, but the sugarhouse bush was much smaller so I have not done the vac. there yet. That only has potential for about 300 taps, but being real flat I'd need sap ladders to get them. Another alternative is several small remote tanks and TF pumps. I don't think I'd ever get my investment back using that approach. While sap ladders should be avoided if possible, I think they're the best answer by far. Buckets or sap sacks are out.

[stewardsdairy]

Just finished hosting nys maple tour. Short boiling demo at my sugar house. Learned a lot at the other stops that I was able to get to. Hope if anyone attended they had a great time.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Got 15 rolls of 3/16" from CDL last week and about 1000 fittings. Hope to set up couple hundred new taps with it and change out 100 to 200 gravity taps to natural vac. Using a hot End system to install it with and will see how it works. So far using it works great. Got 3 rows of blocks laid inside sugarhouse for Kitchen, RO Room and Bathroom and hope to them framed up in next couple months and finally get water turned on inside of sugarhouse.

[Chicopee Sap Shack]

Finished the fire wood last week. Bought a vac pump and made a deal for a bender releaser this week. Maple rama next week. August starts main line instal.


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