Tapped in Tamworth March 2nd

[Mac_Muz]

I am getting nearly no sap at all. I think it is just too cold. i have just 15 buckets and haven't even collected anything off the trees yet. Each bucket has a slight covering of sap, and that's it!

I checked on the warmer days and there is a little bit, but i don't believe I would fill one 5 gallion bucket if I did collect.

Some of these are turned yellow, should I dump them?

[Mac_Muz]

No one has a word to say? Have i offened everyone?

[jtthibodeau]

Don't feel bad Mac, it's cold here also. I've got 145 taps out and have only picked up 65 gals of sap so far. Hopefully, this week will bring some warmth.

[Mark-NH]

The temps have been marginal so far. If you had a south facing bush with good wind protection it would have run. Remember, it takes a little extra warmth to warm everything up for the first time, especially with all the snow around the trees.

Some of the guys have been able to boil just with shear number of taps. If you have 1000 taps and get a gallon from each........... Makes a big difference over having a couple dozen buckets.

I've always dumped the yellow sap. For half a bucket here and there it is not worth messing with. Hang in there. By this time next week you'll be wishing for a night off.

[Maple Restoration]

Mac don't worry last year the first boil was march 8th and we bottled on the 10th and this year we are still waiting too tap with any luck the weather will change in our favor. If you tapped them they will run in time.:smile:

[Hop Kiln Road]

Mac - The run line is just a little south of you. Here (and at 1000' elevation) I got 3.4 gal/tap on 3/4 - 3/8. Been icing up the barrels since. Hang on it's coming! Bruce

[Mac_Muz]

Thanks for the replies I was wondering what I may have done wrong with views and no replies.

The wind blew on of the lids of during the rain. I missed it as I check 2, maybe 3 buckets when I check. Since 2 or 3 show little I don't bother with the rest.

What I found seems interesting. That last heavy rain ended with a couple inches of snow and the temps fell. This one bucket was 1/2 full of rock hard ice. I chipped the ice for sample and for a fact it was ice, just plain ice, so I dumped it.

The bottom was that yellow, and it seemed thick for water, so I ran my finger in it and it was mighty stickey. Huh????? So I tasted it, and **** if it wasn't very syrup like.

The nine days seem to have sublimated the water out, maybe like freeze drying?

I don't know, and I am no scientist, but that yellow is almost syrup. Somehow it stayed low in the bucket and didn't mix with the rain.

I really wonder now if I should dump the rest or not.

[Mac_Muz]

Well well well, Today 15 buckets produced 15 gallons of sap! One bucket was nearly over flowing, and the rest had what they had, and lots of ice, but with 15 buckets i'll keep the ice too.

As I have said, i tapped march 2nd. This has been a cold 12 day wait, but from now on it outta run a bit better, and there should be a couple of days it runs hard soon.

The local farm store came thru too, and today i bought a coffee barrel, cut off the top, which i can flip over as a cover. I got it washed out, and airing now. I used a common walley world trash barrel made by rubbermaid for the first container. That holds 32 gallons and is about 1/2 full. I parked that in the shade, all day shade, and it wasn't hard digging into a snow bank, to keep it cold either!

I might slip over to see Bill Mason, and get a few more taps, as i think I can come by a few more pails. There are more trees than i can use.

Maybe next year i will run line and set up a collection trough.

First I need to see what this pan can do. I have never had a pan 21" x 33 3/4" before, or dividers. My only others were a 1/3rd of a barrel and a 24"x 24".

[lpakiz]

That yellow sap may well be concentrated for some reason or another. I purchased a sap refractometer and used it last night for the first time.., When I tested some of the pails containing just a trickle of yellow sap, it registered 6 or 7% which is almost off the scale!! Usually 2.5 to 3.5 at best.
Other pails that had several quarts tested normal.
Larry

[Mac_Muz]

Well being a back yard guy with never more than 22 joint compound buckets, pretty much means I don't have really good tools and equipment.

So asking here helps. I made sugar for maye 10 years, moved after that and couldn't for awhile. This is my return to making any.

As I recall all other times when I tapped I got sap before the drilling was done.

Not this time. For 12 days I waited and during these days most buckets got some sap, but not enough to cover the bottom of a tilted bucket.

A lot of that little sap froze just about solid, and what was left was a yellow, maybe golden residue.

I have seen late season sap turn cloudy in the pails, and to me that is pretty much the end of my season.

So I had never seen this yellow before and or waited so long to fill a pail.

As to that yellow, well I considered dumping it but didn't except one pail that the wind blew the lid off, and the pas rains and snow storm filled that bucket.

I chipped the ice, and tasted for a sign of sugar. Finding none I dumped the ice cake and with it that yellow, which was a thick liquid film on the bottom of the ice cake.

I ran my finger in that and it was very much like syrup, and seemed very good tasting to me. bIt was far better than a drop of raw sap on my finger, but I can't back that up in numbers.

So I didn't dump any more of that and taste tested some of the rest of the pails, which also seemed to me to be more syrup like.

I do winter hiking and camping a lot, many trips in the White Mountains where I live in what I call the Residential Range leaving out the P for presidentail.

I have seen well below -40 on the thermometer up there many times, wind chills of -96'F, and also seen rain and temps of +55'f in rain with a drop to -40'f in 2 maybe three days. This means I got wet, my gear got wet and it came in cold.

I found in that cold things can dry pretty fast just the same. Sun and sublimation, and I think that is a part of what happened to me here now.

I just can't prove it. I think on the sunny days the little sap dried and concentrated. Perhaps the sugar content was higher than normal, and the freeze separted the high sugar from the water?

I really don't know.

I do know from hunting in Fall, deer rubs on sugar maple saplings will run sap and it seems as if the sugar content then is high. Before a rubbed off tree can 'leak' all over the place the sap beads at the edges of the wounded tree bark and turns a deep gold, and creates syrup beads with no more than dry air and sun.

[Mac_Muz]

The Saga: Still sap is not running well. Last night it was 7 out and the night before that 9. I did manage to get 41 gallons of sap and try my new home built rig.

It has a few monor issues, like my pre heater works well to warm or spit boiling sap into the pan, but it the devils own work to get off a hot stack.

I am not sure but I think I was boiling off about 5 gallons an hour. Little things occured that messed up and created a few delays. the 6" damper came undone and I had to let things cool to fix it.

Of the 41 gallons of sap, I made (2) 1 qt jars, (4) 1 pint jars, and (2) 12.5 ounce bottels.

Bill Mason was kind enough to give me an out of date color gauge, and so for kicks, I filled the little sample bottle, and my syrup is just a shade darker than 2007 Fancy.

My 21" x 33 3/4" pan with 2 dividers is a vast improvement over a square 24" x 24" non divided pan.

The syrup filtered nice and clean too... I am pleased with myself for rushing to build the items to get this done, and then get in more pine as my wood is still buried and iced in bad.

I hope things warm up and I can get more sap. I got everthing I need but for more sap.

[Mac_Muz]

Pics if anyone is interested:
http://s282.photobucket.com/albums/kk274/Gwynagerie/

Today my trees began to drip a little, and I will wait till the next best weather pattern come along, before i decide if i should re-tap.

[Maple Restoration]

Mac Muz Nice pic's glad to here things are starting to run for you all the best!

[Mac_Muz]

Next time I fire the rig, I will get better pics. More details for the little guy, like me.

Things seem to be coming up to a better here. I had 1 bucket over flowing when I gathered today. That bucket is apx 7 gallons.

The bad deal is tonight it is siad we have 6" to 10" more snow on the way :rolleyes: