Lots o’ ice

[Birdland Sugarbush]

The past few years it seems I’ve been worrying about keeping sap cold till I can boil. This year I have the opposite problem. Everything is ice.

I have a barrel where I store the collected sap till I have enough to boil - almost frozen solid. Then there are the buckets on the trees. I imagine those are frozen too.

It looks like there’s a warmup on the way (followed by a sapnami), but I think it’ll take a while for the sap to thaw naturally.

How do you handle something like this?

Thanks,
Chris

[ecolbeck]

On Wednesday we went around with a barrel and a clean trash can and collected all the sap and ice chunks and boiled it all down. Its not an uncommon thing for us to have to do once a year. We avoid letting the sap freeze in the barrels because that makes for a monumental pain down the road.

[maple flats]

If the ice is about 50% or so of the total volume, toss the ice. That's known as "poor man's RO" There will be some, but very little sugar left in that ice. Not worth boiling the ice unless you just want to watch it boil. It's wasting fuel and time.

[Birdland Sugarbush]

Thanks Dave, the problem is it’s 100% ice!

I pulled my barrel out into the sun and collected the frozen buckets. I put that in another barrel in the sun. Hopefully it’ll melt a bit in the next day or so.

I guess I can throw out the chunks of ice that are left over after it melts a bit.

[berkshires]

Thanks Dave, the problem is it’s 100% ice!

I pulled my barrel out into the sun and collected the frozen buckets. I put that in another barrel in the sun. Hopefully it’ll melt a bit in the next day or so.

I guess I can throw out the chunks of ice that are left over after it melts a bit.

That's about all you can do. It's definitely a challenge with early-season runs, particularly for those of us who can't boil every day. Later in the season you get to trade this problem for the potential of spoiled sap. LOL

GO

[ecolbeck]

If the ice is about 50% or so of the total volume, toss the ice. That's known as "poor man's RO" There will be some, but very little sugar left in that ice. Not worth boiling the ice unless you just want to watch it boil. It's wasting fuel and time.

I strongly suspect that significant amounts of sugar will be incorporated into ice at volumes far below 50%. I wish I could calculate an answer, but I can't at this point. I know some folks on the forum have tested this informally.

[SkunkWorks]

I did the experiment. At 50% frozen, sugar was less than 0.1%.

It really works !

[Sugarmaker]

Ice good for keeping sap fresh and improving sugar content in remaining sap. Ice bad for gathering, Breaking fittings and pipes. Causing delays in serving your sugarbush, Causing delays in getting fresh sap into your system or containers.
I hate to say And It doesnt always come out that way is to go and get the sap (or the majority) gathered up just before the freeze. Much easier said than done sometimes!
Then keep your sap slight above freezing. Yep not always easy. I have a 30 containers in the sugarbush. My goal is to keep them empty prior to a freeze. My truck tank and outside dump tank get emptied into tanks inside the sugarhouse. It has to get really cold to freeze a tank of sap under roof. Then I try to boil that sap as soon as possible getting it into the evaporator.
This did not happen over night I worked on this for 20 years improving my systems. Making syrup around an during freezing weather for 60 years help make this freezing sap thing a real priority!
Hope this can help a little!
Yea dump the ice!
Regards
Chris
Keep boiling!

[Gord]

Still learning here. My question is, if the first thing to freeze in your buckets is water, what about the opposite? Scenario: You have a deep freeze, and the entire bucket freezes solid. The next day it warms up. If the first thing to freeze is water, wouldn't the first thing to thaw be water? As that frozen solid bucket starts melting, wouldn't there be more water in your bucket, and the sugar still be frozen in the ice, being the last thing to thaw?

[Aaron Stack]

Been struggling here with ice all week as well. I'll gather/remove ice from buckets this afternoon as it is supposed to be in the 60's tomorrow so it will be flowing. The other day the non-iced sap in the buckets ended up as high as 3.4%, but only about 20 gallons collected. Which as of this morning is a solid block in the tank.

Set up the shop light with a 100 watt bulb to help thaw the valve so may have a boil tonight if there is liquid. At least the sweet in the pan was frozen so I don't have to worry about spoilage.

[Birdland Sugarbush]

I borrowed a heater from my neighbor who uses it to keep his cows water tank free of ice.

I got rid of all of the blocks of ice that I collected from buckets. I’d already chopped holes in them to drain the unfrozen sap.

I’ll add fresh sap to that as it flows this week.

I’m thinking I’ll drain from the frozen barrel and discard the rest. Poor man’s RO, right?

[maple flats]

As it melts, the sugar portion melts first, thus, when it back to about half ice, toss the ice. You then in the liquid have concentrate.

[Gord]

As it melts, the sugar portion melts first, thus, when it back to about half ice, toss the ice. You then in the liquid have concentrate.

Thanks maple flats!!