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BitterSweetAcres
02-18-2020, 09:03 AM
Tapped Feb 16, the weather outlook was originally looking great. But the next time I looked i see lows in the single digits a couple nights this week. Bummer but if you ask the weatherman, next week looks great too. We will see if I really jumped the gun.

tgormley358
02-18-2020, 10:49 AM
I’m in the same boat, in Harvard. I tapped a week before you, had 2-3 good days and made 3 gallons of syrup. The trees haven’t bounced back yet apparently from last weeks freeze. I thought Sunday - Monday would run well, but not so much. Might have to wait for next weekend warmup.

Tom

berkshires
02-18-2020, 12:02 PM
I'm in that same boat as well. Definitely got suckered in by the long-term forecast of warmth. I tapped on Feb tenth, and I haven't even bothered to drive up to my sugar shack since then. All I'd have is a few inches of solid ice in the buckets. Going to hope for some kind of a warmup next weekend, because the forecast for this week looks cold again.

Sheesh, January was warmer than this!

Good luck!

GO

Fireguy55
02-23-2020, 12:24 PM
I'm in the same situation as you guys, I tapped Feb. 16 and have had nothing but ice. Does anyone also have dry taps even today with a good cold night and almost 50* day today? I'm tapping a final few trees today and those are running before I get the drill bit out, but ones I've already tapped are dry.

Edit - I'm in Charlton

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

berkshires
02-23-2020, 10:42 PM
So far in the last two weeks several of my trees have done exactly nothing. A few of them have between an inch and three inches in them, and just one is mostly full. And I know exactly why. I was scrambling around in the woods to consider a running run and the ground in the woods is hard as a brick. Just too frozen up to release moisture, even on a warm day. The one tree that is running is on the edge of a sunny clearing where all the snow has melted because it's clearly warm there.

But tomorrow should get the trees moving. (I hope)!

Gabe

ecolbeck
02-24-2020, 05:55 AM
We tapped yesterday (Sunday 24th). Good strong run. Hoping for another strong run today before the warm weather blows in midweek and then it freezes up for the weekend.

BitterSweetAcres
02-24-2020, 08:53 AM
On Saturday Feb 22 some of our trees started running but i believe it was little to no accumulation. Good thing for me. Did a quick test boil using vinegar yesterday to clean the pans for the season and noticed two of my drop flues were dripping right in the front corners. Bringing them to get soldered today, I hope they can patch them ok without making it worse. Otherwise I'm heading to basoms to pick up a leader supreme 2x4 pan.

Fireguy55
02-25-2020, 01:19 PM
I hope I am not hijacking this thread, if so someone let me know! Yesterday (2/24) I ended up with about 25 gallons, but most of that only came from about 20% of my trees (~15). I noticed that aside from one outlier the producers all happened to be uphill toward the edge of the woods while the slackers were all in a lower-lying area deep in the woods. These slackers are all new trees to me so I don't know how they react just yet but it seems more than a coincidence that they are all in the same area. Is it possible that they are still frozen after 2 days of 45*+ weather? If they are frozen can they run after a day and night cycle above freezing? I am wondering if it is worth my time to have them tapped if they are only going to produce a pint of sap each on a 60* day.

Although with the way this season is going maybe I should take every ounce of sap I can get...