View Full Version : The Maine maple season has started!!!!!
We have definitely started now. We boiled on Sunday and have all our tubing fixed up and tapped. Saturday we'll tap some buckets with kids and then the season will have started for real.
It's fun, and hectic, and we love it. How about you?
We're getting some sap now! I think we'll have an all day boil on Saturday, and Sunday will be in the 40's, so maybe we'll boil in the afternoon as well.
We boiled on Saturday, but Sunday was too cold still. Today it's pouring in for sure, however. We'll boil tomorrow, and then it looks pretty chilly until the end of next weekend.
Maple Ridge
02-29-2016, 02:19 PM
Collected 400 gal last week, boiled it off last weekend and ended up with 5 gal of syrup.
Nice! We are hoping to pour off soon. Still sweetening the pan. We're boiling today, and we'll see what happens. If it gets thick enough we'll draw off tonight, but if not, maybe on Saturday...
West Sumner Sugar
03-01-2016, 07:25 PM
Took us over 300 gallons to pull off for the first time. Got our first pull this afternoon. Should be in the syrup business this weekend for sure.
Mitchman
03-02-2016, 01:34 AM
Sweet !! Glad to hear everyone is getting some action. I am not getting great runs, enough to keep me happy, our temps are barely hitting 32 degree's. But the week coming looks promising.
Not a great run on Monday, but we boiled it down before the slush started to fall from the skies! It is good to have it all boiled off, and I hope we have a little for this weekend. If not, we'll tap some trees and have a little simulated boil with some finishing some syrup. It will smell mapley and will be fun!
Everything is frozen up until Sunday. I wish the sap would show up on the weekends so we could boil then, but c'est la vie! We visited Tessier's Farm and saw his ingenious inventions, and he was boiling on Thursday. We'll try to simulate a boil tomorrow just to pour off and finish something. We'll see...
boondocker
03-04-2016, 06:13 PM
Had a major freeze up in the sugar house from the past 2 days. Everything in the evaporator was frozen solid....SOLID! Even the sweet in the front pans where almost rock hard. Float boxes where bricks......wasent pretty. I started at 7:15am and by 11 I was able to light a fire. I only ran @ 235 gallons through today and made 13 quarts and 15 pints of medium. Everything I have made this year so far has been light, but today started to darken up. The sap I boiled today has been sitting since Wednesday so I figured it was going to darken up. Gonna give it another go In the morning, I have another 255 gal. To knock out tomorrow, I loaded up the woodstove in the sugar house before I left tonight so hopefully I have no suprises in the morning. Looks like no sap until Monday, then the whole week looks spot on!
Looks like today may be a sap day. It's supposed to get warm later. I wonder if it will get warm up on the hill where our sugarhouse is? It is the coldest spot around, so we'll see. Tomorrow we're boiling for sure! I am going to start right after school and boil until nightfall. That will get the sap down a bit. We are going to have above freezing temps on Wednesday night, so that will end the run for sure.
hambone
03-08-2016, 11:25 AM
Finally, the sap, she made it to Central Maine. It's running real good. 42 degrees and sunny, clouds moving in though.
Great! It did nothing yesterday! I thought it would be running, but no such luck. We're going to boil it all off today. Maybe we'll have a run tomorrow, but hard to tell. It might not freeze enough tonight. We'll see....
western mainer
03-08-2016, 01:08 PM
You will have sap tomorrow with out a freeze your trees are still froze from the end of last week. My trees just started here about 1:00
Brian
hambone
03-08-2016, 02:37 PM
Let it flow all night long, right into tomorrow.
ToddyKioti
03-08-2016, 07:02 PM
I hope Western Mainer is right, very disappointing flow here today, and yesterday, and the day before...lol. 5 gallons bottled and we went from 100 taps to 225+ and we are making less than last year (which I thought could not get any worse). I Still have hope that something will happen, we will just have to wait and see. I can say this, the syrup we have bottled is much lighter than last year so at least we have something positive going for us.
bagpiper
03-08-2016, 07:08 PM
It's running tonight here in southern Maine. The trees started to thaw around noon today and late this afternoon, they were really starting to go. I just went out with a flashlight and they are going strong. I'll be dumping buckets into the barrel tomorrow.
We boiled from about 3:30 until 7 yesterday, and it looks like around the same tonight, or more. It was running at 7 this morning, so I think we'll have some sap to boil. We'll see...
At least we're getting sap. We made our first syrup for the year yesterday. It took a while to finish, but it was sweet!
WillowLaneFarm
03-09-2016, 10:18 AM
First post here. I hug the border with Maine over in Wakefield, NH. First year trying this. Have boiled twice already - first time was about 40gals down to almost a gal. Second time was on the icy day last week, 20 frozen gals down to about a 1/2 gal.
Sap started flowing hard here around 2/3 yesterday. Setup with gallon jugs this year (cheapest and quickest food safe option was market basket water jugs.. 2 for a buck) so collected a few times yesterday. Between 6 and 10 last night, our 22 taps gave us about 8-9 gals. Another 8-9 waiting for us this morning.
Boiling about 25 gals (and counting so far) today. Fun times. No signs of buds popping yet, though my reds have a couple feelers out. I was worried that the warmth yesterday and today would wake the trees all up, but this noobie thinks we'll be okay here on all but maybe those reds for another week or so. Hoping I'm right :-) Mostly silvers/reds and a few sugars.
hambone
03-09-2016, 03:57 PM
Still running here in Central Maine. It ran all night and it continues into tonight. Boiling tomorrow!
donka
03-09-2016, 05:50 PM
Funny run the last couple of days in Raymond. I have some trees that are going gangbusters today and others that ran a little overnight then shut down. Sap seems a little sweeter then the last few runs so hoping for 3 gallons from this batch. Should put our season total at a little over 5 gallons. Hope the weather cooperates a little better then forecasted.
Mitchman
03-09-2016, 06:34 PM
Welcome aboard WillowLaneFarm sounds like your off to a good start.
We boiled and finished some off on Tuesday and Wednesday. We are actually making some syrup now! I think this weekend will be good, but it's not looking too good next week. We'll catch what we can and call it good!
West Sumner Sugar
03-10-2016, 01:28 PM
Long range forecast after the 20th is looking good. Temps dipping below freezing at night, daytime temps in the 40s. If the buds don't pop we might get another chance to pull some sap.
Cuttingedge
03-10-2016, 02:44 PM
We boiled last weekend and are planning to boil this Saturday. As a hobbyist I only boil about 100-200 gallons a year.
I have a question, do any of you filter sap before storage. My set-up right now is the taps go into 5 gallon buckets and some of those Sap Sak holders. I then transfer into 55 gallon drums for storage until I am ready to boil. Today when collecting, all of the Sap Sak holders were full of bugs. They all had like 4-5 big moths in them as well as smaller bugs. I ended up dumping them and not using the sap. I am wondering if filtering before storage is the norm and people just "forget" about the bugs and bug parts until boiling?
Maple Ridge
03-10-2016, 03:01 PM
Just filter them out, that is what I do.
We boiled last weekend and are planning to boil this Saturday. As a hobbyist I only boil about 100-200 gallons a year.
I have a question, do any of you filter sap before storage. My set-up right now is the taps go into 5 gallon buckets and some of those Sap Sak holders. I then transfer into 55 gallon drums for storage until I am ready to boil. Today when collecting, all of the Sap Sak holders were full of bugs. They all had like 4-5 big moths in them as well as smaller bugs. I ended up dumping them and not using the sap. I am wondering if filtering before storage is the norm and people just "forget" about the bugs and bug parts until boiling?
Mitchman
03-10-2016, 04:39 PM
If it doesn't go right into the barrel from the tree via the vacuum line, something open to the air I filter it. To many critters want our sap !! I have one ? Anybody ever had a gray squirrel, or chipmunk get a drink from your tap bucket ? I have seen both do it here ? Now that got dumped !! But I have to wonder if they are doing it to the others, and we are getting rain, The .22 is loaded.
donka
03-10-2016, 09:53 PM
We boiled last weekend and are planning to boil this Saturday. As a hobbyist I only boil about 100-200 gallons a year.
I have a question, do any of you filter sap before storage. My set-up right now is the taps go into 5 gallon buckets and some of those Sap Sak holders. I then transfer into 55 gallon drums for storage until I am ready to boil. Today when collecting, all of the Sap Sak holders were full of bugs. They all had like 4-5 big moths in them as well as smaller bugs. I ended up dumping them and not using the sap. I am wondering if filtering before storage is the norm and people just "forget" about the bugs and bug parts until boiling?
Cutting-edge
What's worked well for me is using a square of prefilter material. I put that over a colander which rests on top of 5 gallon bucket. Sap filters through fast and traps all debris. Works well until the wife decides to make pasta and can't find colander, lol.
RollinsOrchards
03-11-2016, 04:57 AM
We had enough storage so we didn't start boiling until Wednesday this week. Have managed to turn nearly 2000 gallons into steam in two days, and have another 1000 ready to run through today.
Here in this part of central Maine it looks like we have the right weather to run this weekend and Monday 3/14, then have a week without freezing. Some parts of our woods have snow still, so they may run again if the weather is right after 3/20
Mitchman
03-11-2016, 05:12 AM
Yes that's what I see also. With a different note did anyone go to the Augusta culinary show last week to show of their wares ? And if you did was there a decent crowd or a bust ??
RollinsOrchards
03-11-2016, 05:32 AM
I didn't go, but a vendor at one of the Farmers' Markets we attend went and thought it was a great crowd, that being said she came home with a lot of stuff she had baked special for it. She thought 3,000 people went through, although many were there for the boat show and wandered through not really interested.
The reports from last year were not strong enough to make me interested. $400 for a booth with an attendance of 300 people in 2015 doesn't pencil out to profit in my mind.
Mitchman
03-11-2016, 05:39 AM
Thanks !! That's where I was going, I didn't think I could sell my cedar grilling planks and syrup enough to cover all the cost and make a profit. The booth prices are way to high. Thanks Again for the info !!!!
billyinvt
03-11-2016, 08:05 AM
We boiled last weekend and are planning to boil this Saturday. As a hobbyist I only boil about 100-200 gallons a year.
I have a question, do any of you filter sap before storage. My set-up right now is the taps go into 5 gallon buckets and some of those Sap Sak holders. I then transfer into 55 gallon drums for storage until I am ready to boil. Today when collecting, all of the Sap Sak holders were full of bugs. They all had like 4-5 big moths in them as well as smaller bugs. I ended up dumping them and not using the sap. I am wondering if filtering before storage is the norm and people just "forget" about the bugs and bug parts until boiling?
A square of cheesecloth makes for a good cheap sap filter to get out most of the visible bark and bugs.
We use a filter on the sap as it comes into the tank, and one to filter out the bark from the buckets as well. It doesn't look too good in Central Maine next week. No freezes for a week after tonight. We'll make what we can, and see what happens.
Maineiac
03-11-2016, 10:53 AM
I have some on collection bags. I seal the top and make a small opening approx. 3" down and just slip a piece of tubing through it. No bugs.
We are going to have a few days of temps above freezing, but not too far above. We probably won't have enough to boil until Saturday, but that's okay.
We are catching up and it might be an ok season after all!
abbott
03-15-2016, 06:35 PM
We are going to have a few days of temps above freezing, but not too far above. We probably won't have enough to boil until Saturday, but that's okay.
We are catching up and it might be an ok season after all!
I dunno... looks like 50+ the next two days here. But I agree... with the cold at the end of the week, the season is looking up!
We got a little yesterday, so another day of sap and we'll have enough to boil. Our woodlot faces north, and we still have a little snow, so it stays cooler than anywhere else. We may have enough to boil this weekend after all! It's coming in slow, but it is coming in.
I spoke in haste. Almost all the snow was gone when I checked yesterday. It disappeared overnight! Sounds like more is coming Sunday into Monday! We'll see....We're boiling Saturday and maybe Sunday. Looks like good sugaring weather all next week. Make hay while the sun shines!
We boiled on Saturday, and since then we haven't gotten much. Maybe there is a possibility of sap today. We'll boil today if we need to, but we want to have a lot for Saturday.
Atgreene
03-23-2016, 07:46 AM
Ran yesterday, running good today thus far. Tapped 40 more buckets and some odds and ends on tubing the last few days, it's not over.
It ain't over until the fat lady sings. She's not singing until the middle of next week...
Maple Ridge
03-23-2016, 03:15 PM
She sang at my place. Sunday I could see the trees budding and the last batch was off flavor so I had to dump it. As we all know the weather just wasn't with some of us. Sugar Houses in the higher elevations are going strong from what I hear from the people who been there. O well hope for a better year next year.
gmcooper
03-24-2016, 08:51 AM
We are still going strong. Had 2 good runs last 2 days. Last nights syrup was lighter than past several days. Sugar content has slowly dropped. Sap has been crystal clear. Looks like we will make it thru the weekend no problem. looks like syrup total will be average.
We pulled the red maples, but the season doesn't look like it's quite over yet with the cold coming in next week. We are making some for ourselves now, and boiled off yesterday so that we wouldn't have any sap to spoil the last couple of days of warm weather. We are catching up to last year now, and it may be an okay year after all!
hambone
04-02-2016, 05:01 AM
We boiled off about 300 gallons of sap on Thursday to try and clean up the sap before the warm spell. It ran that night so we have about 40 gallons of sap with ice jugs in the tank. I agree probably time to pull the reds and gearing up for next week. Bring it on!
RollinsOrchards
04-04-2016, 09:08 PM
We have blown last years totals out of the water and should easily make as much as the last two years combined. We could flirt with a quart of syrup per tap yield if the next week runs as good as it could.
Currently 205 gallons of finished syrup from 1200 or so taps, mostly on gravity pipeline, and enough buckets to remind me to buy more pipeline.
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