Operation extreme tapoff 2016

[PATheron]

This years extreme tapoff operation coming pretty good. Started tapping yesterday afternoon boy and me. Then today buddy came and we tapped and the boys tunked in spiles and I think we came within about 50 taps of having the house bush tapped in. Which is pretty good becouse I think its something around 3000 taps. Tomarrow heading up to the reds and going to try to tap that one in If we can. Thats around 3000 too. Last night it seeped ran some sap into the tank rinsing some stuff out of the mainline and then it got cold quick and stopped. Today cold and not running so nice to tap. Looks like could be a short warm up mid next week but who knows. If its cold going to try to tap everything in this next week. If it warms up well try to make sap. Whatever be will be. Getting ready in case its a warm year. If it isnt got to get ready anyway. Keep posted if it runs. Theron

[PATheron]

Real cold here today. Tapping as much as possible. Calling for 40s end of the week. Two nights look like wont freeze at night. Thats got me pretty excited. Broke truck last night had to get it trucked to the shop to be fixed. Tomarrow need to get water to two of my vacuum pumps and do some finishing touches on them. Hoping to be warm enough to work on vac wednesday and thursday and get 48 hours of sap running time. Taking bets on if we make some syrup. One buddy says 160 gallons and the other one says 13. Big spread, Usally early runs like this dont turn out too big. It generally just warms up enough to start running and then freezes right back up. Going back out tonight to tap I think if I can bring myself to leave the warm house. Think were at around 7500 taps. Hoping to hit 9000 by wednesday but have to wait and see. Once it warms up well find just how bad our vac is and that will probly take all our time. Theron

[PATheron]

Working on vacuum pumps today and putting together mainlines that are down across roads here and there. Supposed to be sunny in the 30s today and tomarrow. Friday, Saturday and Sunday in the low 40s cloudy and rainy.. South wind too. Not sure what if anything we will get for sap. Think the tap count is around 8000. Im optimistic but past experiance on early runs like this is that you usually get less than you think you would get. Going to try to have all the pumps running today and start working on vacuum as things thaw out. If its cold Ill go back to tapping. Guess wait and see. Hope we do make something. Would like the money and also kind of just looking foreward to smelling boiling sap in the sugarhouse. The one thing that has me pretty pumped is that friday and Saturday night no freeze. That might make for some sap Im hoping. Theron

[Mark-NH]

Theron,

Are you running all Check Valves?

[PATheron]

Mark- Not so much this year. I did quite a few drop extensions with new tubing and a clear regular tap like the checkvalve. Some are checkvalves though even in the same woods so be interesting to see how things compare. This is time of year I always tap. Ill make sure to have the vacuum on anytime there is sap running from here on out. They should stop running about time the mersh syrup starts. Theron

[PATheron]

No real sap yet. Hasnt been warm enough long enough. Got all three woods on vac now though at least and yesterday had sap in each releaser. Checked the sap at the sugarhouse and looks to be just under 2 percent. Need to plumb up some home made coolant radiators for two of my vac pumps this morning than should be able to concentrate on vac leaks. Wont freeze tonight so hoping it will start running tomarrow. Wait and see. Theron

[PATheron]

Sap started running this morning and is running pretty good now. Worked all day on leaks and got the vac pretty good everywhere. Made sure everything has plenty of tank and calling it a night. Looks like sugar is between 1.5 and 2 percent but havent checked the reds yet. My refractometers are pretty beat up too so hard to tell exactly. Theron

[spud]

Your sap might run all night. Will you boil in the morning? I plan to tap in a few weeks.

Spud

[Parker]

Boil all night?

[PATheron]

We did finally get our run that we were hoping for. Some good and bad which is typical for us getting started. Started running a little friday and tried to fix leaks and still too froze up. Then sat morning it was all thawed out and the boys and I got the vac up good by end of the day. Remote vac setups that I had been working on worked real good. I worked more on them sat night. Ran all night sat night and we had quite a bit of sap. Im going to guess maybe 15000 gallons but Im not really sure. I think the sugar was much worse than I thought. I checked the sugars at the house and I thought they were between one and half and two but sat night it rained all night and sunday everywhere I checked it it was only one. I think it started better while it was running and we were fixing all the leaks and then went down after all the rain maybe? Then ro'd sunday and boiled sunday night. Had troubles with the evaporator and by the time we were done it was like three in the morning. Ended up we made three fifty five gallon drums. Im happy with that for an early run, real happy. Thought it would be more but If the sap was one percent like it looks like a lot of it was takes a lot of sap to make syrup. Have to fill every tank you own to make a 100 gallons. Anyway three quarters of my taps are in. Vac systems are dialed in. My ro machines and evaporator are all working good. Need to put membranes in one machine and will be 100 percent. Syrup tasted good and was dark in color. Not real dark just like dark amber Id say. Froze up hard now and going to go turn the remote vac pumps off tonight and then tomarrow go back to tapping nights and weekends. Gotta wannnnnnnnnnnn it! Theron

[spud]

Sounds like your on your way now. My sugar is always low the first run or two so no need to worry. We are in a freeze up here in Northern Vermont. I am hoping for ( me )the sap will not come until mid March. How is your 5-10 day forecast looking? Love ready your post so keep them coming. Your full of energy.

Spud

[PATheron]

Spud- Looks like were froze up here now for good long time which Im great with. This is how it usually goes, well try to tap as soon as it gets cold and catch an early run and then get everything else ready and then wait for it to warm up. Im kind of in heaven it froze. Dad and I pretty pooped from boiling. Im very proud of my boys. Sat morning we started fixing leaks and in six hours we had roughly 8000 taps to 23 inches or better everywhere. Fixed a lot of them. That's the boys favorite job. If Im busy now I can just sick them on a woods and in a few minutes my vac gage will be going up. Now is the fun tapping where I can just go along nice and easy and tap and enjoy the woods. Ill probly do quite a lot of it now alone at night. Tapping is my favorite part. Ill still try to tap the rest right away in case of an early warm up with this being an el nino year Im not sure what will happen. If I get all tapped there is no end to the fine tuning that can be done. Pitched mainlines that aren't right and stuff as basic as that can cost a lot of money. Plus that's fun too if have time because when you look at it after its very rewarding. Hope everyone has a great season. Keep me posted too. Its great when you here about anyone getting a lot of sap. Exciting after all the work you have to do. Hows the big producers coming in your area? Are they all tapping? Theron

[unc23win]

Awesome news Theron it sure was a pretty good weekend weather wise to get stuff done. I was glad it didn't rain more on Sunday. Like you I am also happy about the cold we are getting now gives us more time to get things ready. I always enjoy reading about your progress.

[Butcher]

i put out some test taps on thursday last week on a Woods we are looking at piping up, had 25" on 20 taps and got three gallons per tap, not bad considering of didnt thaw out until friday afternoon, and froze up sunday early in the morning, sap tested just short of 2% pretty good for Silver maples. alot of people wont tap them because of crap they read or have been told, we usualy make 3 to 4.5 # per tap when there on vacuüm.

[mountainvan]

Next flow is Friday and Saturday. Think you and I are going to have a bumper crop.

[PATheron]

I saw that too Van. I was going to go turn the remote pumps off but decided to leave them on. Got real cold here so don't know if it will run but have to wait and see I guess. I want them running any time above freezing anyway it would be awesome if it ran. Theron

[Maplewalnut]

Spud- Looks like were froze up here now for good long time which Im great with. This is how it usually goes, well try to tap as soon as it gets cold and catch an early run and then get everything else ready and then wait for it to warm up. Im kind of in heaven it froze. Dad and I pretty pooped from boiling. Im very proud of my boys. Sat morning we started fixing leaks and in six hours we had roughly 8000 taps to 23 inches or better everywhere. Fixed a lot of them. That's the boys favorite job. If Im busy now I can just sick them on a woods and in a few minutes my vac gage will be going up. Now is the fun tapping where I can just go along nice and easy and tap and enjoy the woods. Ill probly do quite a lot of it now alone at night. Tapping is my favorite part. Ill still try to tap the rest right away in case of an early warm up with this being an el nino year Im not sure what will happen. If I get all tapped there is no end to the fine tuning that can be done. Pitched mainlines that aren't right and stuff as basic as that can cost a lot of money. Plus that's fun too if have time because when you look at it after its very rewarding. Hope everyone has a great season. Keep me posted too. Its great when you here about anyone getting a lot of sap. Exciting after all the work you have to do. Hows the big producers coming in your area? Are they all tapping? Theron

That's my kids favorite job also Theron. They always take a .22 along for squirrel patrol also. Sometimes I wonder how they can hear any leak with all the shooting going on!

[PATheron]

Tonight kind of my first more or less brake in last couple weeks. Seems like things are going pretty good. Got another small run this weekend. Now that things are going better had chance to really test the sugar and looks like sugarmaples are 1.2 percent roughly and reds are one percent. Made a good bit of syrup so must have gotten quite a bit of sap. We have four 55s capped and working on the fifth drum. Froze up now. Went and drained the vacuum pumps in the field tonight so don't have to worry about them. Looks like at least a week maybe two before next run. Syrup really tastes good. Usually it always tastes the same to me. Just good and sweet but seems to have a really great taste. Im not that good at telling because I only really taste my own syrup and don't usually pay much attention. Feel like things are finally kind of smoothing out. Got 500 more taps in but haven't had time to tap while making syrup. Now hopefully I can go at it and really tap. Going to finish the taps on the ring pumps then worry about the ones on pumps that have to be started and stopped. Sugarshed all clean and ro that I thought I had to buy membranes for might be allright after all. Filled an extra perm tank with 1500 gallons of perm and did some serious washing on it just because why not and the flows really came back a lot. So now when I get sap I should have all the ro machines running. That should have me running at at least 2000 gallons per hour to at least 15 percent I think they might do even more especially if the sugar is good. Still going to be a while finishing tapping and getting the rest of the systems operable. One of the woods has the 15 inch drop extensions and checkvalves on old drops in the same woods so will be interesting to see how they compare. Im hoping they will do about the same. Guess wait and see. Nice start to the season getting some early syrup. If everything runs until about the mersh starts Ill be very happy. Any syrup I make now is worth about the same money as three times the mersh. So if I make two hundred gallons of early syrup for instance that's like making 600 gallons of mersh at the end and its a lot nicer to make other than all the freeze problems in January. That's partly why I like to tap early. Other part is I just cant wait because I get all excited. Anyway having fun. Theron

[mountainvan]

Sap run the beginning of next week.

[unc23win]

Alright I have to ask Theron what was your last sap day last season? Or typical last day? Mine was April 14 last season.

[PATheron]

I can never remember but I usually figure on being done around the first of April. I think it was later last year because it was cold so long. Im thinking I usually go as long as everyone else but my sap probably slows down more at the end. Its usually when everyone starts making commercial syrup if they do. Theron

[Mark-NH]

Theron,

220 gallons of syrup mid January. Now I know why you tap early. Rock on.

[spud]

Theron your a BEAST. I don't know anyone that gets so excited to tap. I hope you have a great season.

Spud

[PATheron]

Appreciate the compliment Spud. Operation extreme tapoff going pretty good. Finished up my third bigger woods today. Started on a smaller one that I hope to finish tomarrow. That should put me pretty close to 10 tomorrow if all goes well. Then Saturday Im going to try to do another smaller woods thats really steep. Looks like first of next week theres two days that are warm enough Ill have to have the pumps on to protect the tapholes but I dont expect any real sap. Then accu shows the next week with 4 or 5 40 degree days but I dont hold much stock in that being that far out. Good thing is ground is not very frozen. Going to try to maybe finish tapping next week and then going to go around and fix and finetune anything that needs it. Still have two releasers to get hooked up and even one small vac pump so will be two more weeks anyway to be 100 percent. If its still not running then Im going to hook up any extra tree I can hook a tube to and thats that. Chips fall where they may. Whatever will be will be. Theron

[mellondome]

Theron your a BEAST. I don't know anyone that gets so excited to tap. I hope you have a great season.

Spud

Wait till you meet him...

Pumps running?

[PATheron]

Pumps on. Turned them off for a week and kind of wish I hadn't because it warmed back up now. I don't think Im turning them off again for the season now. Still tapping. One more little woods to do and Ill be at the taps I had last year. Then only thing left is a top secret mystery woods that Im not telling my buddy about in case I need to lie about my averages. I should have everything I had last year by the end of the week. Next week looks like could run pretty good but who knows. Going after a pickup load of diatomaceous earth and a bunch of filter papers tonight. Gearing up for BIGSAP. Theron

[pennslytucky]

It's running this morning here 4 hours west of you! Hope these winds blow your way theron! :)

[PATheron]

Looks like early run is over now here. Weather looks cold for next two weeks. Sugar has been low but is kind of normal for this time of year. Maybe some lower than usuall. Ended up with 14 drums plus the evaporator which is getting close to 25% of my low number I hope to make this year. Real happy so far. If it warms early Ill be glad I got this syrup. Have some finetuning to do but things are in pretty good shape. All done tapping. Bought a bunch of 3/16 tubing stuff and think Ill start running it today. Going to hook up trees until I have to make syrup again. Have a bunch of red maples that grow thick like goldenrod that will run into my current vacuum system. Going to work on hooking them up. Pretty good drop, should be able to get 30 foot of drop most everywhere and then hook them to a vac line. Good luck to all. Gotta wannnn it! Theron

[PATheron]

Got my 3/16 yesterday and started hooking up some trees. I really kind of like the stuff but worked out a little different than I was thinking. Lateralled in around 230 taps and hope to do that many today. Not getting as many taps per roll than was thinking because of trying to get the proper drop at the end of the runs uses up some tube. Averaging a little under 50 taps per roll Id say on 800 foot rolls. Hooking up nice big trees though. Was going to use it in the young stand and hook tons of trees up per lateral and hook it to my high vac lines but am told that really wont work good that I have to have the proper drop for it to work right. Anyway going to try to hook up 500 on it by end of weekend and look foreward to seeing how it works. Kind of running it on a flat spot for the taps and then dropping it off down the hill to create the vac. Anyway its froze so why not. Giving this maple 100 percent everyday until its over and just hoping it works out good. Guess we will know in a month.
Theron

[psparr]

You'll love it!

[jimsudz]

Hey Theron, I think you'll be very happy with your results of the 3/16. I just set up a small bush and finally tapped last weekend. It ran Sunday and Monday in western ny . I got 930g on 324 taps. I think this was just a marginal run, can't wait to get a record run. Best of luck and keep us posted.

[Russell Lampron]

How many taps do you have now Theron? I'm tapped in and it looks like it could start running next week here. I missed the run at the end of January but it looks like you didn't. Get that BIGSAP now and make the good stuff. Mersh ain't bringing enough money to make it worth making.

[WestfordSugarworks]

Giving this maple 100 percent everyday until its over and just hoping it works out good.
Theron

I know the mentality that you have. I feel that way often. Sometimes I get so excited, I'll be out there by headlamp working as fast as possible feeling like a machine and it's the best place to be.

[PATheron]

Jimsudz- I think what I did will be real interesting. Basically I tapped the top of a hill where it is flat. I did hook up 500 taps and some are on the slope where it drops off of the hill but most are on top where it is flat. Im taking the ends of the laterals and adding 3/16 to them and running them down the hill so I get at least 30 foot drop and putting them in a mainline. Im counting on the drop to make vacuum on all the lines up top where it is flat. Im going to put vacuum gages up top at the end, middle and start of one of the laterals to see how it works. Some of the laterals up top even have a little up hill to them. If it works good Im going to do a lot more of it because it is very cheap and easy to install. Im not getting rid of any pump vacuum taps but am not apposed to trying the 3/16 for extra stuff. I pay pretty good per tap because I appreciate the right to fill peoples woods with tube so I need to get fairly good results or Im kind of screwing myself. Russ- Im calling my tapcount 11200 but Im lying because im competing with my buddy on averages and hes beating me consistently so the only way I can compete is to lie. Its a lot more. Westford- Its so addictive for some reason, I think its because you can make a ton of money really fast and so you want to get everything you can get but when you think about all that you spend all year its not quite as good as it seems. You forget about all that when the sap starts running. Ive been wearing out headlights for seven years and the excitement is no less now than it was then. Some times I think this maple is worse than drugs or something. Addictive. Theron

[Super Sapper]

If you have 5/16 on top and just hook up the 3/16 on the slope it can be hit or miss according to Dr. Tim on whether it will work. If it is all 3/16 it will work really good.

[Russell Lampron]

Russ- Im calling my tapcount 11200 but Im lying because im competing with my buddy on averages and hes beating me consistently so the only way I can compete is to lie. Its a lot more. Theron

How do you know that your buddy isn't lying about his tap count and averages? I don't lie about mine because most of my trees are reds and I know that they don't produce like sugars. I do know that a lot of people said my syrup was the best that they had tasted when they stopped here on maple weekend last year. I'm very proud of that because there are a lot of maple producers in Loudon.

[markcasper]

Ive been wearing out headlights for seven years and the excitement is no less now than it was then. Some times I think this maple is worse than drugs or something. Addictive. Theron

Do you wake all the neighborhood dogs up with the headlight in the woods at night? Happens to me every time and when porch lights start showing up I wonder what they think?

[PATheron]

Super- Its all 3/16 100 percent. All the top is the 3/16 and then its 3/16 down the hill until I have enough drop to make it work like they say. Russ- Im pretty honest but my friend and I are competitive and I know hes lying to me too. Were just having fun messing with each other. I just don't want him to know my exact tap count. I know hes buying sap and a bunch of different stuff but I think Im lying way more. Hes not made of the right stuff to beat me I never stop. I was hooking up more trees last year before the vacuum pumps quit spinning after I turned them off at the end of the season. I only sleep and eat enough to sustain life the rest of the time Im trying to get more sap 365 days a year. Mark I do hear a lot of dogs barking at night and coyotes too. I never worried about it and last year in middle of night I cought a coyote watching me in the woods. Freaked me out so I got myself a piece. Ruger single six 22 mag. Those stinkers try to slow down my production Im going to be standing ankle deep in brass. Going to saturate the area with small arms fire. Cap their asses. Theron

[PATheron]

Should be able to finish up my new 3/16 taps today. I think we got close to 600 all said and done. Really like how it looks in the woods. Very nonintrusive. The lines are small and kind of just disappear in the woods. Very inexpensive and quick to hook up. Now have a bunch of finetuning on pumps and releasers next. Weather looks off and on with marginal runs so it will be kind of a pain to keep everything working for little bits of sap but we will take it. Keep on keeping on and hoping for the best. Going to try to get everything now really a 100 percent before monkeying with hooking any more taps up. If it freezes and everything is good I might try to hook up a few more. Once it really starts running Im hoping the boys and dad can cover a lot of the processing work so I can kind of live in the woods chasing bubbles. Theron