ddociam
04-11-2020, 10:36 PM
Well my year is over and the syrup is in bottles.
My crop ended at 66.5 gallons. I had a pretty low yield per tap which ended about 6 gallons of sap per tap. I harvested 2500 gallons.
The season caught me off guard. It started at the end of February so I was putting in taps after the first run had started. I didn’t have all my lateral lines in and I was still putting in long days at the office.
So I had a frustrating start.
I learned a few things this year that most of you knew all along. I learned that it’s a lot easier to put your lines in when it warm. Not after it snows and is cold. Gloves make running lines and using tubing tools. I won’t make that mistake again. 66 gallons is 3 times more than I made last year so I’m pleased with my crop.
My question comes from my experience of putting tubing on fairly flat land. Some mentioned sap ladders and I have seen pictures. But I don’t know anything about them. Could someone give me a primer or point me to some information where I could learn about them.
Second question. My shuflo pumps were handy and cheap. Somewhat labor intensive with the batteries. I noticed that I wasn’t as careful with my mainline installation as I should have been. Once it warmed up and expansion occurred there were a lot of places where the tubing drooped enough that the sap filled it up. I wondered how much this affected the vacuum and production of sap. Im speaking in general terms. I had three 1” mainlines and none of them produced like I thought they would. They were all it’s the problems as mentioned above and were on very low grade.
I had 2 - 500 foot lines of 5/16 with about 25 taps each. This bush did as well or better per tap than the mainlines.
This is my first year so I’m learning a lot.
Any ideas?
Jerry
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
My crop ended at 66.5 gallons. I had a pretty low yield per tap which ended about 6 gallons of sap per tap. I harvested 2500 gallons.
The season caught me off guard. It started at the end of February so I was putting in taps after the first run had started. I didn’t have all my lateral lines in and I was still putting in long days at the office.
So I had a frustrating start.
I learned a few things this year that most of you knew all along. I learned that it’s a lot easier to put your lines in when it warm. Not after it snows and is cold. Gloves make running lines and using tubing tools. I won’t make that mistake again. 66 gallons is 3 times more than I made last year so I’m pleased with my crop.
My question comes from my experience of putting tubing on fairly flat land. Some mentioned sap ladders and I have seen pictures. But I don’t know anything about them. Could someone give me a primer or point me to some information where I could learn about them.
Second question. My shuflo pumps were handy and cheap. Somewhat labor intensive with the batteries. I noticed that I wasn’t as careful with my mainline installation as I should have been. Once it warmed up and expansion occurred there were a lot of places where the tubing drooped enough that the sap filled it up. I wondered how much this affected the vacuum and production of sap. Im speaking in general terms. I had three 1” mainlines and none of them produced like I thought they would. They were all it’s the problems as mentioned above and were on very low grade.
I had 2 - 500 foot lines of 5/16 with about 25 taps each. This bush did as well or better per tap than the mainlines.
This is my first year so I’m learning a lot.
Any ideas?
Jerry
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk