I finally have a total

[maple flats]

I was down this year but not by much. I made 356 gal on 741 taps for a per tap average of .48 gal. That was my second best ever, beat only by last year when I got .52 gal/tap. The big surprise was how I did it. I had 314 taps around the sugarhouse on an old BB4 piston vacuum pump which gave me 27" most of the time, whenever it dropped to 25" or less we checked and fixed leaks.
On my lease I only had 427 taps and there the mechanical vacuum was only at 18". But then on top of that we had about 150 taps on 3/16 gravity vacuum, feeding into mains with the 18" vacuum on them. Those on 3/16 all had at least 20' elevation drop from the bottom tapped tree to the mainline, some had 30'+, so those taps all got the maximum vacuum possible for that day.
My sap this year averaged 2.04% at my lease and at the sugarhouse it was similar, but there I only get a random % reading, as sap just all runs to tanks at the sugarhouse. This was my highest sugar % in over 5 years, with the lowest 2 being 2017 and 2018.
I think next year I will likely sell the lease and expand at the sugarhouse. Last year, because of cancer I only had 225 taps, this year I had 314 there. I think I can get to 400 maybe even 450, with all sap going right to the sugarhouse. I will then buy sap from other local producers and will likely need to buy some local bulk syrup also to meet my retail demand
In 2018 I sold a total of just over 440 gal of syrup retail, from three places, first the sugarhouse and my house (I keep those together), then my website and finally the one retail outlet I sell thru. If my sales grow at a similar rate that they grew in 2018 I will need about 475-500 gal for 2019. In anticipation of that I already bought 40 gal and will buy another 80 gal in a week or 2. I already have the supplier lined up.

[Ghs57]

Was your production concentrated to March? Almost everything I did was in three weeks in March. I could have kept going into April for the first time in 5 years, but I had to cut off at March31st.

[maple flats]

Yes, my sap ran real slow until 3/13, when we were still tapping. That day from about mid morning I noticed that each new tap hole we drilled ran in a solid stream rather than a drip,drip, drip. I then decided we needed to collect the sap and finish the tapping when we had finished boiling. The sap ran that fast for 9 days before it slowed to more normal. In the 17 seasons I've been doing this on a small commercial scale I had never experienced a sap flow that good for that many days. I had seen a day or 2 that good, but not 9 days. By the time those nine days were over, we tapped more holes, but never did get then all done before the season was on the downhill slide. At the lease we had expected to tap almost 700, but after we were done we had only done 427 and about 75 of those were tapped after the fast flow 9 days. For a while I wished I had a bigger RO to keep up, but as I'm getting older, the decision has been made to cut back and sell the lease.

[S.S.S]

We made 865 gallons on 1300 taps, best ever for us and highest sugar content ever. sugar started at 2.3 and went as high as 3.2 but stayed 2.9-3 for whole season till end it dropped to 2.7.

[maple flats]

I have only had 1 day, years ago when I got my highest sap sugar %, it ran 3.75 that 1 day. I got a call from a couple of others who had also experienced a 1 day surge. I'd need to check my log books but I don't think I've ever had over 3% any other time, from my trees, I have bought sap from a guy who taps all yard and roadside and he has had % in the 3% to over 4% a few times. The one day I got 3.75, all I had was a short hydrometer, it likely wasn't as accurate as the long ones I use now either.

[DrTimPerkins]

Nice job Dave!

[bawplank]

Nice season!! Your website looks good, I am wondering how are you shipping? I would like to try to sell some just to FB friends and every time I look into it the shipping prices make me think it wont work.