Willow Creek Sugarhouse 2022

[red maples]

Well are we getting close? been watching the wacky weather forecast... next week looks pretty good looks like sap might start flowing a little by maybe wednesday or Thursday? then freeze up for 4 or 5 days. Seems to be a fairly cold winter with very cold night temps. don't remember when the last 50F day was which is a good thing if the temps hold out this year the season could go well into April.

Watching the forecast closely maybe start tapping on Saturday once things warm up just a bit. Been cleaning and getting things ready. Still lots to do but getting there.

Purchased a brand new atlas copco vacuum pump this past year its all installed and ready to go. I bought a protection Valve kit with it as well, its plumbed in I just need to install the probes into the releaser. getting pretty fancy!!! (and expensive) with sales way down from lack of open houses and craft fairs I had to borrow from the house to get it done. last year the seals on my old Welsh pump pooped the bed so was pissing oil out like crazy really limped along to get through the end of the season last year. I only paid like $250 for it and ended up needing a new motor but it got me though what 6 or 7 years so I think I got my money's worth. and lets face it new is very nice.

Russ better be here this year!!! But his daily activites are gonna be like... "well sat on the porch in my Rocking chair havin' me some maple sweet tea..... watchin' the squirrels in the bird feeder..." :lol:

Pretty quiet on the tapping NH thread everyone hopefully in the sugarhouse. nasty out this morning...

Well I hope everyone has a GREAT 2022 season!!!

[collinsmapleman2012]

good luck! make lots of sap!
you'll like that atlas copco pump, they work excellent and are extremely quiet. let us know how you like that vacuum protection valve, although i hope you never need it! i ordered my pump from MES before they offered those, and have been considering an upgrade.

[red maples]

let us know how you like that vacuum protection valve, although i hope you never need it!

Yeah I hope I don't need it either. but to the tune of $425.00 it better work!!! I ordered the pump through MES back in June or July I forget but with all the shortages, delays, shipping issues etc I wanted to make sure it came in time and in finally came in November.

It is VERY quiet I can't believe how quiet it is. The loud sound of the Vacuum pumps is kinda the sound of the season since I started using them. Its kinda weird.

[red maples]

Got in 200 taps yesterday. had some errands to do in the AM but not bad. The bottoms of all the trees are pretty much encased in compacted snow ice and heavy thick snow ice in and around the swamp with a foot of dry snow then an inch of rain combined with snow, sleet and freezing rain its really easy to get around but its gonna take some sun and most of next week to get things going. but if nothing else it will get the lines flushed and I can get leaks under control and be ready for when things really get going. hoping to get the woods done here done today 300 to go over here. finding some more trees too hoping I can add in another 10 to 15 trees.

[Hop Kiln Road]

Brad, current forecast here is no sap in February. Got the woods more or less ready but won't tap for at least 10 - 14 days. But who knows with the weather. Good luck. Bruce

[red maples]

current forecast here is no sap in February. Bruce

Hey Bruce glad to see youre checking in.

the weather channel says different for you!!!
https://weather.com/weather/tenday/l/13b68956fd02b7d258ad54e9abfe2f97681565bbf5748ae6dc c2411c51c453bd

[red maples]

Well got the new stuff up and running. get things turned on Wednesday and I got 4" of vacuum. shut off 1 section due to sap ladder base cracked bad. pulled that rebuilt that. then missed about 4 or 5 taps. replaced 2 drop lines. fixed 3 REALLY bad squirrel chews and poof pulling 27" I think I might get more but!!! vacuum pump is working really nice. Dumped nasty green sap on the ground all day yesterday. start collecting today. Got bulk tank all scrubbed and clean. RO put back together and Flushed out. Pre filter pressure gauge isn't working though Its not that big of a deal I use that one as much but as long as the machine works I am happy with that. Long day for me yesterday to get things ready. I get up at 3:50 AM for work and didn't stop until 11PM last night.

Forecast for February looks really good actually changed and is now a little on the warmer side. but it could change tomorrow ah. weather in New England.

[Hop Kiln Road]

So I see. Forecast is quite different. Probably start Wed or Thurs. More or less ready to go.

[BAP]

Forecast has changed a lot. Looks like some sugar weather later this week and after the last 2 days of thawing, the trees may be ready to run. I am looking to tap in the next 2-3 days.

[red maples]

Yes I was expecting 3 days of freeze up then a slow warmup over the next 7 days but nope that did change a lot.

So got everything tight and dumped nasty sap for all of Wednesday and collected sap since Thursday, not too much maybe 100 gallons on 465 taps. thats my woods. have more to go across the street in the neighbors woods. Friday and saturday it ran better and better some trees still not awake yet. Anyway ended up with 516 gallons of sap sugar only about 1.25 but the bottoms of the trees are pretty much still in ice so not expecting much yet. After squeezing had roughly 45 galloons to boil after I filled the evap. and actually made syrup on my first boil about 3-4 gallons. but I wasn't expecting a draw off because I rarely get syrup on my first boil so I didn't have the filter press set up yet or anything. just did a draw off into a 5 gallon blue. will have to reheat to filter.

But very smooth start to the season so far. waiting for something to break.

grabbing a bite to eat maybe a quick nap the probably start tapping across the street. get that going!!!

Put in the buckets next week some time. there are only 27 of those. Might set up a gravity line in one section to make things a little easier for me.

then come home and watch the game... don't have favorite team of these 2 so I hope the commercials are good. I wonder what Brady will do next season. funny if he ended up in vegas as offensive coordinator under McDaniels. ha that would be funny.

[Russell Lampron]

Russ better be here this year!!! But his daily activites are gonna be like... "well sat on the porch in my Rocking chair havin' me some maple sweet tea..... watchin' the squirrels in the bird feeder..." :lol:

Ask and you shall receive! I did have a big porch built on my house but I'm not sitting on it. I'm at PATHERON'S in PA helping him with his 12000 taps. I'm getting my maple fix and he's getting some much needed help with bubble patrol. This is the best kind of maple production for me. I get to do all of the fun stuff and he spends the money lol.

It sounds like you're going to have a nice vacuum set up now. That pump will put the suck on!

Good luck with your season! The sap's just starting to run here in PA

[red maples]

good to hear from you russ!!!
Glad you are having fun!!!

[red maples]

Well I did a dumba$$ thing. I assumed my brand new vacuum pump was all ready to go not knowing it was wired for high voltage. I should have known better worked great for that first run had a great boil and things were going too smooth. Well my pump was wired for high voltage and I fried the motor. :( so my heart sank just got completely stressed out. Got in touch with Shayna at MES and got out of work early on Wednesday Clayton took one look and told me what I did. But luckily he a one sitting there that I have on loan until mine is either fixed or replaced. so more money more money more money. Got it home and was back in business by 5 PM. and collected 600 gallons in less than 12 hours overnight. and slept better. Oh well live and learn.

So up to 11.5 gallons so far on the season. Heading out in the woods for a bit and search for leaks pulling 25" but want more. need 27" thats the goal anyway. not putting in buckets yet still dialing things in on tubing. might miss a little sap but its only 28 or what ever and they are sap saks and after this little warm up its gonna pretty much shut down for about 7 days and that too long for them to be sitting idle they will get chewed. I will get them in next week during vacation week.

not much sap today too cold for too long so things need today to thaw. its coming in better and better. guessing tomorrow its gonna run hard for 48 hrs or so before we freeze up and snow on Friday!!!

Hope everyone is getting their "s" together and getting things dialed in Good luck all!!!

[Amber Gold]

That stinks about the new vac. pump motor. That's one of the problems with us playing at electricians...we know enough to be dangerous.

Good luck the rest of the season. You're further ahead than I am.

[red maples]

That stinks about the new vac. pump motor. That's one of the problems with us playing at electricians...we know enough to be dangerous.

Good luck the rest of the season. You're further ahead than I am.

yeah thats the truth.

sap just aint coming in that good at all. only a 2 day total of about 200 gallons. not enough to do anything yet. trees are still frozen from the weekend. its gonna break loose tonight and tomorrow for sure. they are saying 8-12 inches for seacoast NH for friday now I just hope its cold enough its not heavy wet snow.

[raptorfan85]

Not much flowing over this way either. Had enough to sweeten the pans yesterday. Only collected about 100 gallons today.

[Russell Lampron]

Things are starting to loosen up here in PA but no bigsap yet. We should have around 12000 gallons to boil tomorrow morning.

[BAP]

Trees finally thawed out overnight in the pouring rain and ended up with a pretty good run here.

[red maples]

Well things broke loose overnight Tuesday and got about another 150+ gallons by morning. had to RO in the morning to make sure I had enough room for the rest of the day.

My boss let me run home about 10am and turn on the RO so I would be ready to boil a little earlier.

all total got about 575 gallons made about 10 gallons of syrup could have done a late draw and got another gallon maybe but need to keep some in the evap. nice smooth boil and filter. Nice to have some sugar in the sap for a change as well I will take 50:1 all season.

I ALWAYS have issues with the first syrup through the filter press. I never put in enough DE. this year the pressure spiked right away and was spraying out all over. I learned my first year to always put a towel over the plates or it makes a Huge mess I think I hit the ceiling that first year with the press. actually learned that from Glen Goodrich he said he had a school class in on a field trip and he was demonstrating the filter press and forgot how much DE he put in while he was talking and it wasn't even close to enough it clogged the papers and sprayed syrup straight up to the ceiling. he said luckily everyone was far enough away.

I have another 100 gallons of sap after I was done boiling so just gonna squeeze it a little and refresh the evap today or tomorrow.

season total sits about 21.5 gallons for February. looks like a longer cold snap than I expected. but the snow is good. Hope we go into April but only time will tell.

[Russell Lampron]

It sounds like you're off to a good start. Until I got the amount of syrup and dirt figured out filtering was a pita. I had a learning curve with the AOD pump too which added to the excitement when the pressure got too high. I made sure that I put the towel over it before I opened the air valve to keep the ceiling clean.

[red maples]

Well like everyone just waiting... a few gallons of sap here and there. but just too cold even when things warm up a bit. getting some rest too because next week back to work and no sleep. it always seems to happen that way. 2.5 weeks to maple weekend.


Been getting some confections done. got 2 batches of candy made going through the soaking time. I always do the crystal coating now you get a much longer shelf life out of it. 3 weeks to 3 months. got BBQ sauce done bottled labeled ready to go. started making sugar. I do in in quart size batches anymore than that and my arm falls off I have tried it in the mixer and it just doesn't come out right. I start with a whisk and and switch to a heavy spoon then scrape through a sieve. and just keep going back through the sieve a few times until it cools enough to the point that all the moisture is out. works for me. I bought some sugar from bascom's last year to see what theirs was like and I don't like it at all. no flavor to it. I use dark syrup or very dark and the flavor is so good.

bottled some glass for an order. today is gonna be 1 or 2 batches of maple cream and some maple mustard. If time get some Maple BBQ rub done and Maple rotisserie chicken seasoning done. Won't do nuts until a week before maple weekend.

tomorrow start packaging up candy then into the woods. gonna run a few more laterals and get in about 7 to 10 trees that are ready to tap now.

Saturday I will get buckets hung at the end of the road and neighbors. and the rest will be a woods day once the tubing thaws gotta find the leaks. got it up to 26.5 and went back to 25.5. want 27"+ I will get it!!! but can't find it when its frozen.

[Russell Lampron]

Good to hear that you're able to get some things ready for maple weekend beforehand. I don't miss those long nights of boiling and jugging syrup and getting other things done for maple weekend and having to go to work the next day.

[red maples]

thats why I am doing ahead what I can get done. doing this stuff is long days and to those that don't know seems easy but even just waiting for syrup to boil for candy, cream, sugar what ever is time consuming and you can't leave it. I simmer BBQ sauce for 4 hours!!! then bottling packaging labeling etc etc etc. I have pulled all nighters before maple weekends before and its not fun. Not this year!!!


got to 30* here yesterday. but after single digits extreme south facing taps in the sun were a little drippy lines in the shade were frozen sun is very warm.

I got in 12 more trees on line yesterday. makes up for the trees that go hollow and or die back etc. I think I have a few more but they will need to wait until next year.

after single digit nights and 10* last night its going to take a bit for things to get going I think I don't have high hopes for today. have to run a few errands this AM then but buckets going in today (didn't want the holes to dry out with the big freeze up) then once things get above freezing and open up a little I can get into the woods for leak search.

with a low pressure system coming through looks like things will break loose on sunday some time. busy few days ahead. and ..."IF"... the forecast continues true (we know how that goes) then we should see some big numbers this week.

Hold on everyone its coming!!!

[Johnston Maple]

Brad, what do you sell your bbq sauce for? I want to try making some this year but have no idea what to price it at
. Thanks

[red maples]

Brad, what do you sell your bbq sauce for? I want to try making some this year but have no idea what to price it at
. Thanks

I have 2 sizes 12oz $8 and $16oz for $10. You have to bottle it hot like 200 degrees. You can't can it like you can't fill and boil the bottles. you can only sell it meaning you can't sell it through a second hand party like a craft store unless you get appoval from the state and you have your a homestead kitchen license. you also need to check the laws in the towns as they can have stiffer requirements. Like Exeter if I do a craft fair in Exeter I have to check my products with the town health inspector. but in East Kingston they just goby the state rules. there are exception to the rules which they lightened up a few years ago. It also must have on the label Exempt from NH sate inspection. If you go on here https://www.dhhs.nh.gov/dphs/fp/homestead.htm it will spell everything out. BBQ sauce is high acid and not a potentially hazardous food. basically sugar, vinegar, tomato product, spices. I am also in the food industry so I am serve safe certified expensive course and test I have to take to get recertified every 5 years. PITA.

[red maples]

not much for sap yesterday. still frozen but thats to be expected. found a few leaks but many trees pulling air... not enough sap to really check for leaks. found a few little ones but things still pretty frozen will try again this afternoon when things get moving a little more.

shut down the vac pump at 8pm when things froze up was 30 degrees here. and got up at 5am to 32 degrees. turned on the pump at 6am. but just a little that thawed in the lines came into the releaser.

tapped buckets yesterday only the south side was dripping. north side was frozen not even a drip. overcast today so we'll see how long it will take to get things going but when it lets loose... we are gonna get some sap!!! no freeze expected until tuesday night!!!

[red maples]

spent some time in the woods as vac was down to 24" found 2 hollow trees. and few chews some hard to find but got things up to 26" and its been holding steady there. good for now.

Was hoping for more sap out of this run but needed the sun and slightly warmer temps and the wind geez!! shaking the house. but still not too bad over all 700 gallons. except for the first run which the sap was a hair under 1.25 it has been consistently 1.75 I will take it. it dropped off to about 1.6 yesterday still ok. really slowed down yesterday.

Boiled off 475 gallons monday night everything went smooth made another 11 gallons. evap was VERY sweet. last week I had about 60 gallons of sap that squeezed down to about 7 or 8 gallons which was just enough to run the evap bring to a boil and shut down without a draw off. but everything went smooth. so I am at 31 gallons so far. got to sleep about 11pm but had to get up and be in at work at 5:30 so I was dragging a$$ but it was a short day anyway so came home and took a quick nap.

so staring today with about 225 gallons in the tank not gonna be as warm as I expected today and overcast and crappy so we'll see what we get.

I am glad I made a little syrup in February because the extended forecast doesn't look good at all. I know things change and I am in a cold spot its usually a little cooler here at my house than even a mile down the road but looks pretty bad right now. last freeze is Sunday. thank goodness for vacuum but still no freezing nights all next week. fingers crossed it changes.

[red maples]

the other day worked in the woods to it up to 26" came home from work thursday only to find vac at 22... oh man. ran around had to grab bucket sap and checked that it was 2.75 sugar... I think it some of the highest I have seen on the buckets in a few years and vacuum sap was at about 1.75 combined it was just under 2. awesome I love it. especially for my reds.

ran back out got my kid from school and headed out in the woods while the RO was going.

So sure enough one drop slipped off the tap. it doesn't happen very often probably my fault didn't push it on far enough. Did a quick walk though and removed a few branches off the lines from the wind the other day. found a few little chews and checked vac pressure further out in the wood 26.5. excellent. compared with gauge on the relaser 27" I think they all have little differences based on price type and age. but I will take it.

all in all I had 480 gallons of sap and was still coming in when I was done. made 11.5 gallons puts me at 42.5 total for the season as of thursday night. I love having sugar in the sap!!! and the evap was't very sweet either because I drew off too heavy and had to thin it at the end of the boil. so based on that 41.73:1 so nice...

Friday collected buckets first wow they were full and running hard. 2 of those buckets gave 3 gpt in 26 hours. I wish I had some of those on vacuum. lots of ice in the ground in the woods. and at least 6 inches of ice in the swamp. filtered sun yesterday a little so back woods didn't get going until a little later. but had 325 gallons by 3:30 pm. but at that time the woods were running the hardest I have seen them run this season. crazy. it slowwed up quickly as temps dropped.

took the night off from boiling to clean the back pan. too much sludge this season. 2600 gallons processed and had a lot of sludge and niter build up on flue pan. don't think I have ever seen that much niter sludge. after that much sap. did a vinegar and hot water scrub and let it sit over night. so we'll get that rinsed later this morning.

have 500+ gallons for today probably closer to 600 after I collect buckets again but I have to see how full they are because its supposed to be windy from this bomb cyclone or what ever the heck this storm is.

gotta do maple nuts today and get those packaged up tomorrow make seasoning mixes and get those packaged up and I think that is all the confections I need to do. get syrup bottled up on Sunday I think I only need about 25 more gallons I bottled 20 gallons before the season started to get a jump on things. then have to clean up I have a pretty good mess going around. but sadly it will be pretty warm next week for that. don't like the forecast.

well happy sapping everyone... don't forget to sleep sometime. ;) and set the clocks ahead tonight. Glad baseball is back too.

[Russell Lampron]

It looks like you're off to the best start to the season that you've had in awhile. Like you we're worried about the strong winds from this storm. It started out as rain last evening and it's snowing now. Theron passed the 1000 gallon mark yesterday and we've still got sap to boil. Keep up the good work.

[red maples]

Yeah Russ too bad it seems to be ending as fast as it started in march.

Well nothing produced much as I'd hoped for and temps didn't reach as high as they said they we were gonna here at the house we never broke 38F. cold and rainy all day then the wind picked up temp went down to 30 and snowing by the time I was boiling needless to say it was quite steamy and rainy in the sugarhouse. the wind was swirling around and I tried with one side open side of the cupola and it would blow back in, ok try shutting that and opening the other side, nope. open both was the best option but as soon as the steam hit the cold air rain... always fun to boil anyway.

So ended up with only 425 gallons of sap left the bucket because of the wind thank goodness I did it was shaking the house at one point. Sugar dropped a tad to 1.6 average the bucket sap I picked up on friday dropped to 2 so it didn't bring the vacuum sap up that much. I made 9 gallons but color darkened just a bit. it was pretty light towards the end and by light I still mean dark/robust but not NH Fancy... but drawing off all but the first 2 gallons into the same batch averages it out just easier to filter that way.

After getting all the niter sludge out of the back pan and the sweet through a prefilter vinegar scrubbed and rinsed out it was the easiest filtering I have had this season and nice to see the stainless steel sparkle through the sweet!!!

So that was I think my 6th boil and I hit 51.5 gallons last night. with what is in the evap 55 gallons if I were to finish it out today. there is a potential for 70 gallons which is what I did last year but looks like the weather is gonna kill the season early again. after tonight no more freezes in the forecast. I hope its wrong and the Ice in the woods cools it off here but not too optimistic but het we'll see.

Bottling syrup and nuts today. Only gonna be 35F after 19F Lastnight. so no sap today funny how we can go from as cold as this winter has been and 19F for a low last night and 20's tonight to no more freezing nights. one can only hope they are wrong!!!

[red maples]

Well this will be the last run of the season the vac pump will be running until it stops. Accuweather has a freeze next sun/mon/tues nights weather channel not even close so we'll see who is right. probably be hearing peppers by the end of the week. the last freeze was last night and even though it only got up to 33/34 yesterday the sun was pretty warm so there was a little sap coming in. like 25 gallons but its still something.

finished bottling syrup last night a little later than I wanted to but its done. and worked on getting the sugarhouse cleaned up a little while the syrup was heating. got nuts made yesterday morning just need to package them up and made Maple Rib Rub too. didn't buy enough salt so didn't get the Rottiserie chicken rub done yet. but things are moving along pretty good. up for work early as usual could use a nap already. but taking off Friday to get things finished and all set up and make cotton candy.

hope all my southern folks here get lots of sap over the next several days before things shut down!!!

[Russell Lampron]

Your forecast is a mirror to the forecast here in north central Pennsylvania. We're looking forward to a big run starting today and hanging on until the next freeze. I'm going home Wednesday so I'll miss the tail end of it.

[red maples]

Well ready as we are gonna be for this weekend. after not having open houses for the past 2 years things needed a GOOD scrubbing. Thank goodness I had off yesterday(friday) to get things in order.

did a quick boil yesterday to boil off 300 gallons that I collected it was just to warm yesterday 68* didn't want to risk anything spoiling. let it cool and drained the evap and put it in the fridge I let it evap down a little farther than I normally do so it wouldn't take up too much space. just gonna boil water for the weekend. with a little sweet in the front pan to make the good smell any syrup this year is just too valuable being the season is over too early this year. I am at 67.5 gallons as of yesterday.

got some sap yesterday about 100 gallons pretty cloudy though and no sugar in it. but no freeze so thank goodness for vacuum because bucket stopped a few days ago. so we'll see what we get today. cook off 1/2 gallons make sure its still good. buds are still OK and no peepers here yet either.

Goodluck everyone hope you all get lots of visitors. tomorrow supposed to be much better weather than today!!!

[red maples]

Well Saturday was a DUD!!! had some people out but usually weather doesn't deter new englanders... but it really wasn't nice out those downpours were pretty rough. but today 60's its gonna be busy. I hope so I need to turn everything I made into green!!! RO's the 125 gallons I got Friday and Saturday and did a sample on the stove and its still tastes OK. its not quite as good as the stuff I was making but no off flavors yet!!! but still boiling water today so I broke that up into 3 buckets and put it in the freezer. (honestly I was just too tired to boil it out) hope today is better for everyone... gotta make some more cotton candy.

[red maples]

much better day on Sunday. Like the maple weekend of old. Beautiful day lots of people out to visit. We were pretty busy all day. Was nice to see people out. Everyone had great things to say EVERYONE was really nice and polite.

I mean sales were down bit and I ALWAYS sell lots of maple cream but that was the one thing I didn't sell that much of. I ran of quarts about 2 pm we were open to 3 pm. I had 70 of them. But didn't sell out of the other sizes pretty darn close though.

I really had no idea what to expect at all. Hope everyone had a really good weekend. As we all know its just a ton work and had to get up for my real job this morning that sucked!!! but overall all a really good weekend!!!

As for sap its still coming in. I have a little in the buckets too but thats pretty old so I am gonna dump that tonight expecting a freeze tonight and tomorrow trees haven't budded yet so we'll keep going!!!

[Russell Lampron]

It's good to hear that you had a good open house. Selling a lot of product makes it all worth while in the end and I think that after the last 2 years people just want to get out and do something.

[red maples]

pretty slow on the amount of sap I am sure sugar is down I have a long sap hydrometer and was shocked at how much the sugar dropped I mean it was reading like .5 on the bucket sap and almost .25 on vac sap. hmmm cracked... oh man. I wonder if someone touched it during maple weekend and dropped it back in the cup I had that stuff on the shelf behind the door but you never know. but I still have my high brix hydrometer.

Season is still pressing on everyone else pulled taps that I know of. we got a good freeze which woke up the trees a little only managed 250 gallons over 2 days and its not enough to clear up the sap its coming in pretty cloudy. had my 2 early trees bud but no others. supposed to be 60 tomorrow but looks like a nice freeze up sun, mon, tues, so if my trees can hold out a little longer we can keep going... fingers crossed. no peepers yet and only a few moths in the buckets. almost all the ice is gone out of the swamp and the ground as well. so we'll see.

[Amber Gold]

We're still going here...slower than I'd like, but sometimes slow and steady wins the race. SSC is at 1.4% and still making a mid-grade DR, so I thinks there's plenty of season left. The upcoming freeze-up will reset things (I hope).

[red maples]

yeah still getting sap... like I said its cloudy doesn't really smell good and aromatic like it did a couple of weeks ago but after its filtered and it cooled down it still tastes good.

[red maples]

dam... didn't make it. was really hoping I would make this little freeze up but my red maples buds are popping all over the place. the buds swelling so much that even if they aren't popped they are so close that they will taint the flavor. just too much sun and warm Friday sat. and this morning because I checked on friday and they were still OK.

Looking back seems Like the lack of freezing night towards the end of the season seems to be a trend then after the trees bud I get a few more days of good sap weather oh well what are you gonna do.

So I am still gonna keep the buckets for a few more days and I have a clump of sugars across the street so gonna pull the reds over there and keep the sugars and that will give me close to 70+ sugars and make a few more gallons before I call it a definite season. I am already better than last year then I can make 3 or 4+ more gallons from those taps plus what I get form the evap then it will be a better year than the last 2. just glad I tapped early to get those runs in February.

Thats just what happens when you tap reds but if its what you got then you tap 'em.

[red maples]

well called it a season last weekend. didn't make the freeze too many budded changed the flavor of the syrup. Tastes more like metabolism than buddy I have 7 gallons of it so I might see if I can make sugar out of it. at least I didn't go ropey this year. I kept up on cleaning better an did smaller quick boils at the end of the season to keep the evap fresh.

Ended up with 77 gallons total. better than the last 2 years and made more syrup on 1200 gallons less of sap than than the previous 2 years as well. Sugar was high all season until the last week when the sugar fell out of the sap due to lack of freezing nights. not the 100 I was looking for and thank goodness for February syrup or it would have been an awful year. all except my first boil which was VD/strong it was just into D/robust and was there the entire season. all my sample bottles look exactly the same that has never happened before. but its too close to grade it as D/ robust because its going to darken so just calling it all VD/strong. was VERY aromatic all season except that last week as well.

Pretty stressless season which is nice. a vac pump hiccup in the beginning but other than that pretty good. The loaner pump was great and thankfully new technology saved my electric bill down about $100+ from past march electric bills and I ran it more which is surprising especially with delivery fees up. The loaner is a 2 post, the one that is getting fixed is a 3 phase so that if I understand it right will pull less power as long as I have a tight system.

Have some work to do in the woods this off season that I have been putting off due to needing to spend money elsewhere but upgrades to tubing should help vacuum transfer and help with more sap in the future. and maybe a preheater for the evap. have wanted to make one for a while now. we'll see if there are funds to it. mo money mo money!!

Have a lot of work to do this weekend pulling taps and getting the sugarhouse cleaned up and everything put away. the worst part of maple. hopefully I can get it all done this weekend. gotta get seeds started(I am a little late on that) new packages of bees coming next monday. and the honey do list has been on hold for a while so gotta get working on that too.

Well good luck everyone who is still going. see ya next year. I will still stop in here and see how everyone's season ended up.

[Russell Lampron]

I'm glad that you had a good season for a change. It's nice when you don't have many problems and can just make syrup.

[red maples]

yeah I'll say. I always want more but really the last 4 years or so have been down in the amount of syrup produced. but it is what it is. I still have a lot of fun.

[NhShaun]

A low stress season is always nice, and making more syrup with less sap is too. Hope you can scramble to together the funds for a preheater, i am in the same boat. Enjoy the off season.