Tapping at the Tomorrow River (Amherst)

[TR Hardwoods]

Started tapping over the weekend. We have around 150 in and will finish up tomorrow 03-11-2008. Weather is looking good this week. Nothing running yet, maybe a little starts today.

All our buckets have been converted to tubing. We have some big runs of 5/16" "mainline" so it will be interesting to see how they work. One is 600 feet with 47 taps on good grade. The other is pushing 750 feet and has 60 taps. Last year we had some 5/16" lines that were 250 feet long with 25 taps or so. They did well and gave nice natural vacum. Good luck to everyone!

[TR Hardwoods]

Now have 182 taps in. Not so much as a dribble has come out of the lines. Weather has been good the last couple of days with highs in the 40's but I guess a few days of that is needed to "wake" the trees up. Hoping to get in some more taps today and then wait for this thing to start. Snow in this area is very deep, I didn't measure but would guess that we have 3' on the ground. Of course I had to get off the trail last night with the four wheeler and it is still sitting there burried in the snow. Some warm weather to knock this snow pak down would be welcomed.

[markcasper]

My trees have been exactly the same. Theres barely anything running upon tapping. 6 out of 300 were running to be exact yesterday. My analogy; Even though there is no ground frost or very little, the base of the tree, where it goes into the ground, is cold yet.

This has been an long cold winter with hardly a "January thaw". Without that, I think the trees are a bit delayed, though if it starts next week it will still be right on time. Good luck!

[Quadmom]

I tapped 7 today by Fremont. About half of them started dripping mostly the ones with the sun on that side of the tree. I'm just a newbie and only do the trees in the yard so nothing like you guys!! Last year had 3 taps so have increased this year!!

[TR Hardwoods]

My trees have been exactly the same. Theres barely anything running upon tapping. 6 out of 300 were running to be exact yesterday. My analogy; Even though there is no ground frost or very little, the base of the tree, where it goes into the ground, is cold yet.

This has been an long cold winter with hardly a "January thaw". Without that, I think the trees are a bit delayed, though if it starts next week it will still be right on time. Good luck!
Mark, glad to hear that its not only our woodlot. Another beautiful sap day yesterday with nothing for a run. I guess it will happen soon enough.

[TR Hardwoods]

I tapped 7 today by Fremont. About half of them started dripping mostly the ones with the sun on that side of the tree. I'm just a newbie and only do the trees in the yard so nothing like you guys!! Last year had 3 taps so have increased this year!!
QuadMom,

That is how it starts. 3 taps, 7taps, 50 taps, and next thing you know you are putting in 1400 taps like Mark! It is a highly addictive disease that tends to affect anyone who enters a maple forest or sugar shack. I can hardly walk thru the woods without drilling holes and setting more taps.

[TR Hardwoods]

We are now up to 205 taps in. No run yet. Temp this morning is still holding above freezing and another 40 degree day predicted today. We are just about ready for it, need to get the sap trailer all organized and a few small touch ups on the flat pan/arch. Other than that we are just about set.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

You need one day in the 50's and then they would flow. It takes a good while at 40 to get trees unthawed when it has been that cold for that long. The more sun, the better.

[ArnoldSugarBush]

TR Hardwoods

I see that all your trees are Red Maple. What are your thoughts on the difference between red and sugar? This will be our fourth year to boil and we only have red maple in our woods. It seems to work well for us and our customers (any family and friends that come to keep us company during the boil)

We started with a lasanga pan on a coleman camp stove. Did that take forever. We have built a concrete block stove and custom made an evaporating pan. This year we hope to add a smoke stack to help keep the ash out.

I keep clicking on the 10 day forecast and next week looks better.

Thanks, ArnoldSugarBush

[markcasper]

There was nothing happening yesterday either. 49 degrees, but it did not freeze either.
I expect next week for things to let loose. Many years we do not get our huge runs until April. The quality sometimes gets low, however, like it did last year. We have lost alot of snow the past few days. Still lots on the north sides, but the fields are getting more bare every day.

Just found out that my work place offered a voluntary layoff for 3 weeks starting Monday. So I jumped on it and will have evn more days off now. Going out to tap again. Hopefully by tomorrow, I will get the pumps turned on and see if that can help wake them up. Still have a good days worth of tapping to get all the vacuum taps on.

[TR Hardwoods]

Sap flow is starting. Very small amounts but hey, better than bone dry! I finished putting out a few buckets this AM, we now have around 250 taps in with 223 of them run with 5/16" tubing. Even with the small run yesterday we were seeing some very good vacum on the long runs of 5/16". They sounded like someone pulling a milker unit off of a cow when we pulled a tap out of a tree. I couldn't tell you how much vacum is actually there but it is fairly significant. We still could put out more taps but considering that we cook on a 2.5' x 8' flat pan I think we will try to limit ourselves. Maybe another 30 taps or so but that is it!

[TR Hardwoods]

Things are picking up in our area. Smallish runs but something non the less. We have brought in 140 gallons of sap in past few days. We fired up the flat pan, everything as expected except we are once again working with wet wood. Popple on top of that. It is going to be a long season of boiling!

The tubing run with 60 taps on 600' of 5/16" tubing seems to be running the best so far. It seems as though it is getting a tad more sun than the other runs as well. Either way, the natural vacum on this line is really good. Yesterdays run was very small but that 60 tap section gave us nearly 1/2 of our sap! So far I'm impressed with this type of set up.

[TR Hardwoods]

We have been boiling away over the last few days. Finished up around 8 gallons of syrup on Wed. evening. Sitting on 180 gallons of sap plus whatever ran yesterday. Will start boiling again on Saturday AM. It is slowly picking up every day. Nothing huge but nice and steady. If this would continue for a few weeks we would be looking at a nice bit of syrup.

Our 60 tap 600' run of 5/16" tubing has been our best producing area. It does get a little more sun than some of the other areas so I'm not positive as to why it runs more. All I can say is that their is no decrease in running this type of set up. If I had to guess I would attribute the extra sap from the natural vacum that is generated. It is a fairly quick method to catch a bunch of taps without getting involved with mainline.

[TR Hardwoods]

Been boiling since Friday night without a shut down. Trees are running well, not gushing but running steady every day. We are trying to work off the last 300 gallons of sap in storage and then we will be caught up. I think we are maxed out on our current set up. With a little reworking of the arch this summer and some better fuel we should be able to add some more capacity for next year. Long days but still fun!

[TR Hardwoods]

Well we've made it up to around 30 gals. of syrup so far. Tempatures have been too warm at night for anything to run which has been good, gave us a chance to catch up. There is still a fair bit of snow on the north slopes around our place. Rain today may turn to snow tonight. Forecast is calling for some colder weather in the upcoming days so we are hoping for one more nice run. With the exception of the first few batches all the syrup we have made this year is quite dark. Good flavor but dark. We are darn near out of wood, have resorted to cutting and spliting as we go along. Not an ideal situation, but desperate times call for desperate measures! Boil rate has been way down this year due to the wet wood, 7.5gph is not what you want to see. This has been the most work I've ever done for 30 gals. of syrup. I do wonder wether or not we should call it a year, but the thought of missing one last run pains me.

[Quadmom]

Hi Quadmom here and I pulled my taps last weekend when it hit 70. Nothing was running so I pulled them. Now I wish I would have waited. I got about
2 1/2 to 3 gallons. Not bad for 6 taps. I set 7 but one fell out of the tree and wouldn't stay but I let that one go.

[TR Hardwoods]

O.K., I've eaten well and slept good the last two nights preparing myself for the last marathon run. Went out yesterday to check the collections points and things were starting to pick up. Should have 150 gallons of sap waiting for me this AM. Temp this morning is 26 degrees so I'm expecting a bumper run today. Wood is the main issue, I've got my eye on some old dead white pines maybe mixed in with the wet red oak. My eyes keep drifting over to the seasoned firewood for the house, I've got to stop looking at that, otherwise the house will be cold next winter, of course we could all huddle around a quart of syrup!

[TR Hardwoods]

Quad, yes it looks like one more run in our area. It would be a good feeling to have everthing cleaned up, although once that happens a person feels like they are missing something. It is a sickening disease.

[TR Hardwoods]

Pulled in 250 gallons today. Looks good for tomorrow and tuesday and that will probably do it. Should make around 40 gallons of syrup. About the same as last year. Decent, considering our poor boiling rate this year. Most syrup has been dark.