Tree Size-tapping

[the old guy]

My Partner Has Been Doing Some Ag Work For A Neighbor And Discovered Some Gigantic Sugar Maples (4-5 Feet In Diameter) All Out In The Open Around An Old Home Site. There Appears To Be About A Dozen Trees There. What Is The Rule Of Thumb For The Number Of Taps Per Tree? We Have Done Several Two Tap Trees Before But Nothing Even Close To This Size Tree. This Home Site Sits Right On The Edge Of A River Plain And Consists Of A Slightly Rolling Hill With A Sandy Loam Soil. No One Has Lived There For What Appears To Be At Least 50+ Years. Any Ideas???

[Sugarmaker]

Old guy,
I don't feel that I am over tapping when I put 4 taps on this size tree. I have moved to the 5/16 plastic spiles and these are easier on the trees too. We have a lot of roadside trees that are at least 2 feet across and several are 30 inches to 3 feet in diameter.
A good way to find out how they run is to use buckets then you can see how each tap and each tree does. Wish I had a couple hundred of those old giants.
By the way, how OLD is the old guy?;)

Regards,
Chris

[PATheron]

Chris- We have a huge maple tree next to one of my substations in a town built right along a river so I think the trees always have real good water. Theres several large trees along the road but this one is unreal. It appears totally healthy and I measured it the other day at breast hidth and it measures 14' exactly. If you guys want ill get a pic but youll have to tell me how to put it here. The only way I know how to do it is on my photobucket. My guess is it must be 300 years old. I dont know if they live that long but you dont get that size over night. Theron

[royalmaple]

Theron-

Load it up in your photobucket, then come here and make a post.

In the post you link to the picture by typing:
http: //i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc309/patheron/SD530378.jpg
I intentionally left two spaces between the : and // so you could see the text to write, don't put the spaces in and you get what you see below. This will work for anyone, just change the location of where your file is stored.

http://i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc309/patheron/SD530378.jpg

[maplecrest]

there was a study done at vt. tech college, with a big tree like yours they put ten buckets on it. on year and three the next. the same amount of sap from three as ten. on my big trees i put three. but usually put two

[the old guy]

Chris

I Am As Old As Dirt The Kids At My High School Tell Me--63. I Took Early Retirement And Do Some Subbing There.

I Was Offered A One Time Shot At Early Retirement That Paid Very Close To What My Teaching Salary Was. With That Freedom I Can Now Devote More Time To "making Maple Syrup". Royal Maple Has Given Me Several Helpful Tips And Guided Me From The Dark Ages Of Syrup Making. I Use His "you-tube" Presentation Often When I Speak To Different Groups About Maple Syrup. It Is A Great Hobby And This Is A Great Site Too.

The Old Guy

[Sugarmaker]

Old Guy,
I'm not that far behind, glad you can spend more time on this hobby.:)



Chris

[Mark-NH]

Old Guy,

I had a set up just like that several years ago, before the farm was sold and converted to a private golf course. The 6-8 trees in the door yard had to be 150 years old. We hung 4 buckets per tree, evenly spaced. The only challenge was getting there before they ran over. We too use all health spouts now, buckets and lines. I feel they run as good as 7/16th on the buckets.

As mentioned earlier, buckets are the only way to see what is running and how much. There is that excitement of looking in each bucket to see how well she did for you that day.

[maplehound]

when deciding how many taps to put on a tree, you need to take into consideration how fast the tree is groing. If you put to many taps on a tree you will tap clear around it before it grows enough over the original tap hole to retap in that spot. You need to stay several inches to the side and then high or low of an exsiting tap hole. If you tap clear around the tree beore if grows over hole you need to stay off the tree for a couple years. Now that being said, Large, mature trees don't grow very fast anymore. Tapping more than 3 ( maybe 4) in the tree only shortens the # of years you can tap it and still get full amount of sap from it.

[3% Solution]

Hi Old Guy,
Well as far as how many taps to put on a tree, we always use the rule of thumb "a tap every 17" is good and you are not over tapping".
Now for real life, we very seldom go with more than 4 taps per tree, however we have one tree (and it's branchy with a large crown) with 5 taps and those taps are about 24" apart.
When we first started my grandson asked "how many taps per tree?" which I replied with a question "How many years do you want to sugar with these trees?"
I think we under tap if anything, but that makes us feel good.
Hope this helps a bit.
From another "Old Guy"

Dave

[FLB maple syrup]

Old Guy:

We tap 30 to 40 big sugar maples in town every year. Most times

we use 3 or 4 taps per tree. South facing taps do best early in season,other taps catch up as the sugarin season progress. These tress
are at least 3 feet in diameter and between sidewalk and the street. Biggest problem in tapping is snow build-up from street and sidewalk
plowing. Here in NW Pa. we get lake effect snow from 100 to 200
inches every winter. Just changed to 5/16 taps.

[the old guy]

Sounds Good You Guys, Tell Me This, Then--i Know There Are Many Factors In Maple Sap Production, But Why Does One Tree Run Like Crazy And 25ft Away The Next Tree Just Trickles? Case In Point, We Have A Relatively Small Tree (15"), It Is Hollow 3/4 Of The Way Up And Runs Sap Like You Wouldn't Believe. It Out Produces Trees Around It Almost 2 To 1. I Am Hoping The "giants" Run Like This One.

The Old Guy

[TapME]

I had a number of these kind of trees this past year, I wish that they would just run as the average says they should and I would be happy. 7 gallons from 80 taps is less than half of a normal year. This is one of the reasons that a vac pump is in the future.

[Sugarmaker]

TapME ,
Sounds like you should have gotten 15-20 gallons of syrup from the 80 taps.
Have you checked the sugar content of these? Are they hard maple or soft? I am sure the vacuum will help. Do you have the option of finding different trees?
I hung 300 buckets in a road side bush that was just great to gather (but they were almost all big soft maples), A neighbor tapped 100 taps on hard maples and out produced the quantity and the quality of my sap. I moved from that bush to other trees to increase production.

Regards,
Chris

[TapME]

They are all except 2 or 3 sugar maples. I will this year tap into a few more reds but of the 200 that we will have most will be sugars and a lot of planted trees at least 100 yrs. or better. The 80 were here where we live and going to add at least 40 more here. All is not lost for the syrup is just as sweet.

[royalmaple]

If I was hanging buckets I'd really consider if I wanted to tap reds. But if you are running tubing and vacuum, I wouldn't pass a single one of them along the way. They can run very well in fact. They just seem to need a little help outside natural dripping.

Maplecrest-you've got some impressive results with reds on vacuum.

[TapME]

Hoping to put up some tubing on the east side of the land. The tubing if I get the chance will be set up for a vac. My list is long and my heart is strong but my body sing another song. And I will not pass by any tree that will give the sweetness.........

[andyp]

old guy
We have trees of many differant sizes up to 3 feet in dia. mostly all sugar maple. The smaller trees always seem to produce more sap per tap. Last year was a bad year we had 60 more taps and got less syrup than the year before.

Andyp

[the old guy]

Andyp
Last Year Was A Slow Year For Us Too. The Syrup We Made Was Almost All Medium To Light. But Sap Production Was Way Down. We Collected, More Sap The Previous Year From 12o Taps Than We Did From The 180 Last Year. You Know Royal Maple Told Me To Take Whatever The Maple Gives To You--some Years A Lot Of Sap, Others
Not So Much And That Is What Helps To Make "sugaring"...well, Sugaring--i Guess We Can Twist Forest Gump's Quote A Little "sugaring" Is Like A Box Of Chocolates, You Never Know What Your'e Gonna Get. And That Is What Makes "just Sugaring" So Rewarding.

The Old Guy

[smalltownguy]

Can anyone tell me how to find a vein so, to get the most sap?

[maplekid]

i was told to always tap under a large healthy branch or above a larg root. welcome to the trader

[smalltownguy]

That's what I thought, but I wasn't sure. Thanks for the welcome

[TapME]

Welcome to the trader smalltownguy. hope all your taps drip one per second.

maplekid: good to see you posting again. How was football?

[maplekid]

i wouldnt mark it as a good season.i finally got my deer its a doe 154 pounds. tell me does that sound like an odd wieght.

[TapME]

My first doe was a little larger. weighed in at 186 dressed some years ago. Nice job in getting your deer maplekid.

[royalmaple]

Maple kid any deer hanging is a nice one. A 150 pound doe is something to be proud of. Nice size one for sure.

[maplekid]

it is better than nothing. the 2 things i didnt like was how short my hunt
was (45 minutes) and having to lug it back to my house witch is probably a mile away. i blew a part one of the back straps so thats lost meat. have a good holiday to all

[Breezy Lane Sugarworks]

On Sat. the 17th I got a 137 lb. 7 pointer. The deer in this area weren't moving as much as normal in the fist week of the season. Then 3/4 of the way through the first week, we started to see more sign and movement. Congradulations to everyone who has got any deer, and Good Luck to all who still have some season left!

[Sugarmaker]

Maplekid,
Congratulations. I have had some very memorable "short" hunts also.
The year I started the sugarhouse I had only a half day to hunt and connected on a nice doe and before we got it loaded in the truck I was able to drop a running 6 point buck. Enjoy the venison! We just had venison meat loaf tonight from Eric's 8 point this archery season. I will be bear hunting close to home tomorrow, since a bear was sighted here within the last few days. I need to project the bees;)

Regards,
Chris

[rschoo]

Wow, I think we got a little off topic. My high school puts on a maple syrup festival thats been going on for 50 years. http://www.shepherdmaplesyrupfestival.org/index.html They tap all the large trees in town with 4 or more taps and you can really see all the old tap locations. You wouldn't believe how scarred up these trees are and they still get good runs. If I can remember I'll get some pics & post them. My point is that these trees are tapped harder than any guidelines I have ever heard or seen and they still flow. I'd never tap mine that hard but the trees look healthy and flow in the spring.