November Journal

[Maple Man 85]

Finished walking roughly 80,000 feet of tubing only found 1 squirrel chew but had 2 main lines taken down by trees (don't get mad get even they're going in the fire box this spring :cool:). Flagging the next 40 and putting up more line in November!

[maple flats]

I just bottled another SS barrel worth of jugs. My bourbon barrel aged syrup is doing well. I will have another batch ready in about 4-5 weeks.
We are getting started getting ready for '19 season. Putting a new bigger Honda on an Alamo 75 so we can turn it a little faster. Might try to get it to a 100 so it should work better. We are adding more, but no new mains, just picking up some more trees with 3/16. Might get to 950, maybe 1000. That's about 50 more reds around the sugarhouse and 50 more sugars at the lease. Will also increase the vacuum at the lease from 19" thru a vacuum tank to 23-24 with a releaser. Then the following year maybe even get a better vacuum pump and add 3-4 more inches of vacuum.

[spud]

Been working in the woods cutting branches off lines. I also rewire tied some of my older saddles. I also rewire tied all mainlines where it was needed. New pump and releaser room is looking good and I am almost done with that. I will make one more pass through the woods in December and then plan to tap the 3rd and 4th week of January.

Spud

[Russell Lampron]

Been working on filling the woodshed, I've got less than a cord to go. I'm going to be burning all hardwood this year for the first time in a long time. I haven't had a chance to get into the woods yet and I'm hoping that I didn't lose any trees. We've had a lot of strong winds at times and had a real bad wind storm early last month.

[maple flats]

I likely have enough wood for the season, but I'm still putting more up. At this point I have just 1 log to process (correction I have a pile of logs which contains at least 30 full cord, but I'm only planning to process one). That one was cut just over a year ago, is about 13-14' long and is about 26-28" diameter. It was put where only the last few inches of the log are touching the ground. I will carry it out this next week, buck and split it wrist sized.
If I was to have a need in season for more firewood I have that big stack which is between 3 and 7 years old, much is ash and cherry. Plus I have likely 4-6 cords of hemlock slabwood off the sawmill.

[buckeye gold]

I have a ton of work in my woods. I have 4 runs broken from trees falling and will have to reroute 1 line. I lost 4 sugar maples and one red. All them are firewood now. I will still cut wood, but I have two years worth cut, split and stacked. A local producer has quit due to health and is wanting to sell his equipment, so I'm going to see if he has anything I want. He has a used evaporator if anyone is looking for one. I'm not sure of the size, it may be a 3x8. I know it is leader drop flue and probably 15 years old. It has not been used for 3 years at least. I think I'm going to make a supply run in a couple weeks as I need tubing and fittings, so I'll buy everything I need for the season. It is about to get busy as I want to be ready to tap by Christmas or new years.

[BAP]

Been working on filling the woodshed, I've got less than a cord to go. I'm going to be burning all hardwood this year for the first time in a long time. I haven't had a chance to get into the woods yet and I'm hoping that I didn't lose any trees. We've had a lot of strong winds at times and had a real bad wind storm early last month.
Russ, no sense of checking lines today, with the way the wind is screaming and rain pouring, odds are the sugarbush is going to take a beating.

[heus]

Got my new Smoky Lake silver plate arch set up and stack installed. Need to brick it sometime in the next month or so. Just got a new Wes Fab short bank press. When all the leaves are off I will be fixing lines and replacing all drops. This is all part of my downsizing from 1000 taps to around 200-300.

[Sunday Rock Maple]

Been working in the woods cutting branches off lines. I also rewire tied some of my older saddles. I also rewire tied all mainlines where it was needed. New pump and releaser room is looking good and I am almost done with that. I will make one more pass through the woods in December and then plan to tap the 3rd and 4th week of January.

Spud

What did you decide on for the new pump?

[spud]

What did you decide on for the new pump?

I bought a Air Tech Liquid ring pump.

Spud

[Russell Lampron]

Russ, no sense of checking lines today, with the way the wind is screaming and rain pouring, odds are the sugarbush is going to take a beating.

It turned out to be a good day to sit inside and play clash of clans. When the rain finally did stop the wind picked up so it wasn't safe to be in the woods anyway.

[minehart gap]

Finished with my soffit and fascia this morning. Received my Auber Instrument auto draw-off panel the other day and am ordering the valve this week. I decided to turn my cupola doors around and open them out so I can screen the inside instead of the outside. Next is countertops and 100 other little things.

[Russell Lampron]

The sap suckers had girdled the top of a big red maple near my sugar house. I cut it down and cut it up this morning. Some of the wood will go into the evaporator and the rest will go into the OWB.

[maple flats]

I worked more on the power to my shop. The last thing I did was drive 2 ground rods. Then I need to string the #4 copper ground from the ground bar to stake #1, then stake #2 and then back into the same ground bar in the panel. Then I tie the wires into the panel in the sugarhouswe and I can energize the shop panel. The rest will be done in spare time after a task is finished with a little time left to work. Then this week I've got 2 tasks in mind, bottle more syrup and process that 1 more big sugar maple log I spoke of a few days ago into firewood.
Then I might put the woodstove I have into the shop and run the chimney, it will soon be cold enough to want some heat in the shop, while I do more wiring.

[phil-t]

Been working on cleaning things up in the sugar house, doing some firebrick work, door gasket and pan seals replaced. Firewood all split and stacked (I use the leftover stuff from my home heating stash and split it up small for the half-pint) along with some slab wood from a local Amish mill. Also, my woodlot has a 2.5 acre stand of Black Locust. Managed time to cut and split about 5 face cord for the 2020 season. Hope this stuff works out OK, never burned any of it before.
Looking forward to the coming season with hopes of making some great syrup.

[johnallin]

Also, my woodlot has a 2.5 acre stand of Black Locust. Managed time to cut and split about 5 face cord for the 2020 season. Hope this stuff works out OK, never burned any of it before.
Looking forward to the coming season with hopes of making some great syrup.


Each year I have one or two dead standing locust over here that I cut up and split. It's my favorite wood and burns like rocket fuel. You're going to like it, trust me.

[buckeye gold]

yup that locust is going to rock that half pint

[Sugarmaker]

Folks,
Looking forward to LEME. Hope to see some of you there too.
I haven't done much maple related lately except jug up the last of the syrup from this past spring. Will make some value added maple products from some dark syrup and get ready for one more sales event in mid December.
Have considered stopping this yearly maple madness. Only been making syrup for about 60 years.:)
Still working on restoring old iron.
Regards,
Chris

[heus]

Chris, 60 years that's it? :) You have a couple more decades in you. You could always scale back like what I'm doing.

[maple flats]

In Eastern hardwoods there are only 3 that rate higher than black locust (26.8 million BTU/cord), they are Osage Orange 32.9, Shagbark Hickory 27.7 and Eastern hornbeam 27.1. Then 3 others tie with black locust at 26.8

[wnybassman]

Over the last 20 years of making syrup 80% of the wood I have used has been black locust. The last couple years I have introduced more pine however, mainly to keep coal build-up to a minimum. What's nice is locust doesn't rot in the woodpile :D

Have not done too much this month. Made some sugar for the first time a few days ago and it turned out pretty good.

[maple flats]

Yesterday I packed another barrel worth of Dark. Trying to keep ahead of demand leading up to Christmas. Today we cleaned all of the equipment to be ready for the next barrel.
Then I made 2 trips to my one local retail outlet to restock. Among other things I had to wax seal more bourbon barrel aged maple syrup for that store (I seal all of those bottles in wax). They are now fully stocked but from now thru Christmas I'll need to restock every week and last year a couple of weeks I got an email notice that they were very low on bourbon barrel aged maple syrup and I had to restock 2x those weeks. This year their new location has done at least 5x the volume since they first opened in the neww location 7/1/18.
I love this season's great sales!

[collinsmapleman2012]

Dave,
Where do you get your sealing wax from?

[maple flats]

I bought mine from LD Carlson online. It comes in 1# packs. I bought 4# in July of 2017, have sealed almost 2000 bottles, and I still have 1# un-opened.
I heat it on a small sauce pan I bought specifically for the wax and that pan will not need to be filled more until maybe 5-600 more bottles. A little goes a long ways.
I heat it very slowly on our gas stove and turn the burner to about the lowest it can go. I have been thinking I may look into getting an electric melting pot with a thermostat, but have not yet.
While it is not needed to seal the bottle, I just think it looks nice for an upscale value added product. Besides, customers know nobody has opened it either!

[Parker]

Ohh boy i have been slackin this summer filling the sugarhouse woodshed....i have had a good 30 cords cut and split in half outside the shed.....fine splitting and stacking inside now....we have been getting alot of rain...yesterday when i was picking the wood up (a year old wood (pine)) with the crane water was running right out of the wood.....splitting the wood...wet right thru.....ha ha.......mabey it will freeze dry....
Im gonna keep after it full time till im out of wood here then start trucking wood back here....burn 40 cords a year most years

[buckeye gold]

I finally have all the trees and tops off my lines and have rerouted some. Bought up my materials today and went over to my buddies shop and we made a two handed tubing tool for 3/16th (yeah no more cussing trying to hand mount fittings). Now I just need to fix animal chews and re-tension lines. I want to run one new line before December. Then make drops and I'm ready.

[minehart gap]

I was finally able to make it up the hill with concrete (just as it started to rain again). My cousin and I got the concrete mixed and poured for the root cellar footer. I'm going to try to get the block laid over the next week. Building a float box this evening. And I got my drawoff valve ordered.

[Chicopee Sap Shack]

Pulled a stupid when cutting a blow down off a new 1 in pipe with the chain saw. In a hurry I was cutting over the wire and pipe when it sprang up and cut both. So needless to say I had to splice new pipe and run new wire yesterday. I got it all tied and finished tying about 1500 feet of new wet line. Tomorrow I am going to finish plumbing the RO in the new RO room in the rain and maybe change drops in the afternoon.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Parker]

Amazing how fast that old pine dries out....i should be able to finish filling the shed this week when it warms up a bit...we have 10 inches of snow and it 0 out...going to walk some lines today...
Good luck everyone

[maple flats]

We were at 2 F at 7:00, up to 5 F now. Forecast to be 20F by noon and 29 F for a high. That's better than yesterday when 18 F was our high. Today I'll split more wood ahead.
Sales are going great, both locally and off my website.

[jmayerl]

Just a word of advise....don’t wait until summer is over and winter is back in full swing to clean your pans. Spent 5 hours with the pressure washer, oven off, and frozen hands.

[maple flats]

Yesterday I got an email from my retail vender, best day ever, my fully stocked shelves totally sold out of pints and almost out of qts plus several half gal. and most of my BB syrup. Today I'll be restocking again. That was great news for sure. Most sales of regular syrup are still in jugs, but some glass is moving too. This may well end up my best Christmas tally ever (Nov+Dec sales) by quite a margin!
Also, I had some good days with online sales too. I will need to pack more syrup again this week or maybe next and in a week or 2 my next batch of bourbon barrel aged syrup should be ready. Getting busy, and I haven't even taken time to go hunting yet.

[ennismaple]

This early start to the winter has really messed with my plans to get work done in the bush!

Saturday we got about 400ft of the 1200 foot vacuum line installed that we need to run from the new vacuum pump to the releaser. Sunday I stretched 6200 feet of lateral line tubing to replace some 10-year old tubing we ripped out during the summer. Had we not run out of pre-made droplines it would have been over 400 taps. I definitely lay out my mainlines much differently now because we needed to cut in a lot of new manifolds to hook the lines up to the mainline. It will be nice to get that finished this weekend.

The To Do list is getting smaller and smaller! It would be nice to spend a few weekends in the woods doing some thinning rather than panicking right up to tapping time to get things cleaned up.

[phil-t]

Got all my wood, for this coming season and the 2020 season all set. I will be cutting and blocking wood this winter for the 2021 season. Did some work on the half pint, was able to get a door gasket on that I think will do the job. Thinking about remaking the latch mechanism for that door. Also giving some though to an AOF system. Been reading and studying some UVM documents - http://www.uvm.edu/~pmrc/Combustion.pdf interesting stuff.
Also dreaming of a Smokey Lake Full Pint pan conversion. Put it on my XMAS list! :)

[buckeye gold]

I ordered all my tubing and fittings to start repairing my lines and re-routing some. I need to have everything done by Mid December. I want to work some on the arch and AOF system as well. I have all my wood cut and dry, but need to move more to the shack. I will probably put some early taps out in mid to late December.

Phil-T
I ran a half pint for 6 years and spent many many hours boiling.

I purchased a full pint pan in the spring of 2014. I like it, but the first year I had trouble keeping a hard boil in the front section. I have a float box on mine and consider it a must. If it were me I would get the custom hybrid pro pan in a 2x3 or 2x4 and modify the old half pint arch. I extended my arch and it made a big difference as I can keep a hot fire under all my pan. I average 12-15 GPH depending on my attention to firing ( I'm not real disciplined with my firing ). On slow days ( 40-50 gallons of sap) I will not burn my best wood or fire consistently I will get 8-10 GPH. I do have air over fire but I need to modify it for better spread. It was a huge upgrade from the old flat divided half pint and 4-6 GPH. You might look at leader's new pans to fit the half pint arch. Just offering a few thoughts that may help you decide. I have had good customer service from Jim and Angela.

[tcross]

i've only been in my bush to asses all the damage from wind and snow storms over the past 6 months. a few big poplar trees did quite a bit of damage. i wont' be getting to all that until our Muzzleloader season ends on the 9th. but when i do get to it, i'm not looking forward to the 24" - 30" of snow we currently have with a LOT more coming in the forecast! I've never seen this much weather and snow come in November in the 35 years of my existence! Nothing like old Ma nature to give you a challenge.

[phil-t]

Phil-T
I ran a half pint for 6 years and spent many many hours boiling.

I purchased a full pint pan in the spring of 2014. I like it, but the first year I had trouble keeping a hard boil in the front section. I have a float box on mine and consider it a must. If it were me I would get the custom hybrid pro pan in a 2x3 or 2x4 and modify the old half pint arch. I extended my arch and it made a big difference as I can keep a hot fire under all my pan. I average 12-15 GPH depending on my attention to firing ( I'm not real disciplined with my firing ). On slow days ( 40-50 gallons of sap) I will not burn my best wood or fire consistently I will get 8-10 GPH. I do have air over fire but I need to modify it for better spread. It was a huge upgrade from the old flat divided half pint and 4-6 GPH. You might look at leader's new pans to fit the half pint arch. Just offering a few thoughts that may help you decide. I have had good customer service from Jim and Angela.

Thanks for the input - I've been looking at the Leader Supreme Pan for my half pint as well. Decisions, decisions. If I can get a bit over 10 gph I'd be pretty satisfied. 5 or 6 hours of boiling is my goal. I'm in it for the enjoyment, not selling anything, so I just limit the taps and sap to my desires.

Why do you think you had problems getting heat to the front of the pan? That seems to be where I have the most boiling action,there and at the brick wall towards the back.
The guy I bought this from had built a frame and open top steel plate box that the half pint flue elbows up into and the stack exits the side. The half pint preheat pan sits on top of the box (like a small arch extention, if you will. I gravity my sap into this pan and use a float control to keep it full. So the sap I add is very near 200 F. I seem to get 8 gph now, with good wood and attentive firing (with a timer).

[buckeye gold]

Why do you think you had problems getting heat to the front of the pan? Because of the cross sections and the standard half pint firebox was too difficult to keep the heat across the front edge. The old half pint pan with lengthwise channels heated along the entire length and it was hotter to start. Your doing pretty good to get 8gph out of a standard half pint. I never had preheated sap. I did fix a blower on it once and could do 6 to 7 GPH, but I had to stay on the firing. However with the full pint the flue section rips. If your preheating I bet you could an easily maintain 15 GPH

[VTnewguy]

i've only been in my bush to asses all the damage from wind and snow storms over the past 6 months. a few big poplar trees did quite a bit of damage. i wont' be getting to all that until our Muzzleloader season ends on the 9th. but when i do get to it, i'm not looking forward to the 24" - 30" of snow we currently have with a LOT more coming in the forecast! I've never seen this much weather and snow come in November in the 35 years of my existence! Nothing like old Ma nature to give you a challenge.
I hear you on the mother nature challenges! 3ft of snow already and it's not even December! Going to have to bust out the snowshoes. After mz season first. Hoping for a thaw.

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

I've managed to get our lines off the ground and all downed trees for our 375 or so taps. Only 5400 more to go in the big bush:o Spent part of a day in there so far, weather hasn't cooperated too good on weekends and we have deer to cut up. And yes, we are now dealing with 2-3' of snow in western Maine as well. I'm curious to see how a year with no frost in the ground may affect things. Things may change but I don't see all of this early snow disappearing before maple season. Most of the ground should stay pretty well insulated in the woods and we had absolutely no frost before the snow.