amount of syrup per tap.

[red maples]

I was reading through some different threads for what ever, and I came across a large variety in the of amount of syrup per tap everyone was producing. So I thought I would search through to see what could come up with and am getting a great variety of answers from research.

How much syrup per tap on average? Most say a quart.

Now I know it all depends on the tree the size, health, the weather, the type of season, The density of the sap, and type of set-up vac , gravity , buckets, and what ever other factors may come into play. I have read on here that some folks have made almost a gallon of syrup per tap others way less than a quart as low as a pint.

Just curious say an average year or close to it, what did you get per tap??

As Well as your best and worst???

[ennismaple]

In the past 7 seasons we've been as low as 0.45 L per tap and as high as 1.17 L per tap, our average is 0.83 L/tap. This average is improving as we improve our mainlines, shorten up our laterals and increase vacuum levels.

For those who don't speak SI units 1 L = 1.057 quarts.

[KenWP]

I asked a old timer from around here and he said they averaged 3lbs per tap most of the time.
You hear all kinds of claims of how much syrup a tree will produce and some seem far fetched to me. Will sit back and see what we get for responses to this one.

[red maples]

I agree with you Ken that's why I asked this question. Hopefully it will be a popular thread and get alot of replies.

[TapME]

never count on anything till its done. We average about a quart on a good year per tap. Best thing is it all taste great on whatever its put on.

[JoeJ]

here are my results for the past six seasons that I have had my new woods.

2004 474 taps: 80 buckets, 394 gravity tubing .25 gal syrup per tap
2005 525 taps: 40 buckets, 485 gravity tubing .19 gal syrup per tap
2006 install vacuum
2006 575 taps on tubing on vacuum (19") .358 gal syrup per tap
2007 705 taps on tubing on vacuum (21") .445 gal syrup per tap
2008 749 taps on tubing on vacuum (23") .488 gal syrup per tap
2009 846 taps on tubing on vacuum (24") .595 gal syrup per tap

The sugar content using vacuum does decrease quite a bit as the seasom progresses, but the high sap yield makes up for that. My overall woods average sap production was 33 gallons per tap with one small section of 149
taps producing 42 gallons per tap

[danno]

Year 1 on buckets - quart, year 2 changed from buckets to tube - quart, year 3 ran a long mainline - quart, year 4 added vacuum - quart, year 5 tightened the system - quart. This year thinking of adding taps and RO - bet I'll get a ................. quart. I will say that since putting in the vacuum we've had pretty lousy very cold and then very warm weather with no inbetweens that we need. So, maybe without the vacuum, syrup would have been a pint/tap.

In my defense, my sap ain't sweet. 2% at best - except for that one big sugar maple in the field that gives me 3.5%. Wish she had some sisters.

My experience with mph's on the evap are about the same. Lot's of fine tuning and the mph's don't vary much. Good wood and forced air make the biggest differance. Pre heater is nice that it gives me water to clean filters, but does not improve efficiency signicantly.

[red maples]

great stuff guys keep it coming. Last year was my first year I had many mistakes to learn from. used tubing into 5 gallon water bottle and and had 1 string of 12 taps running on tubing but I didn't close my line so I had a good first run and quickly slowed after that. had my taps too deep because I drilled the holes to big. And a few other mistakes that I will fix for next year bought the right drill bit from bascom's. the first year was a huge learning curve for me but as I grow I will get better and start to dial in on my mistakes. desite my mistakes I still managed just under 1-1/2 pints per tap. but hoping for big sap next year!!! but unlike everywhere else in the state my sap was at 2.25+ % and nice and light color, everybody else had alot of dark and B and under 2% sugar

[tuckermtn]

1st two years .19 per tap
last three .33 per tap.

[brookledge]

On a poor year my average is .33 gal per tap and the best I 've done is about .75 gal per tap. In 2009 I was around .4 if memory serves me right.
And that is with vacuum in the upper teens
Keith

[sapman]

When I was on 90% buckets, with the exception of a few lousy years in the 90's, I was usually getting around 1/3 gpt. '08 was great with .45 gpt. This year with mostly vacuum tubing, it was closer to a quart, but that setup wasn't totally up to par yet this year.

Tim

[PATheron]

I think with buckets and gravity tube your doing really good to get a quart becouse of the effects of weather and such at least down here in Pa where I am. With the high vac it puts you up in the third to half gallon range if things go good. My first year on vac I got a half gallon but it was a real good year anyway and last year I did a little over a third but it was a bad year for gravity so I was really happy. I just try to do the best job I can and whatever I get Im going to be happy with and proud of. Theron

[Brent]

Our record keeping is a bit sloppy. You get what you get. But we hauled in 17,000 litres averaging. All of it was just over 2% so
17000 / 4 = approx 4250 gallons / 30 = 140 gallons of Syrup at $ 50 gallon
= just over $ 7000 and that's what the wife says she had in the grocery money pot. That was from a mixed bag of bags, buckets and just over 150 on a vac line that did not get turned on every day. Furthermore we ran out of wood for the the last good week so it could have been higher. So I guess we hit about average 1 qt / tap. We were happy. What esle you gonna do that time of year anyway ?

[cncaboose]

We've only done this 3 years, all on buckets. '06: 180 taps, 0.35 gal/tap; '07: 200 taps, 0.31 gal/ tap; '09: 230 taps, 0.38 gal/tap. No more than 2 taps per tree regardless of size and most had one. We do tap young fast growers down to 8" and had several of those.

[Seguin Sugarbush]

2005- 6000 buckets=.4l per tap
2006-6400 buckets=.52l per tap
2007-6400 buckets=.46l per tap
2008-2200bukets 4200 on vac=.95l per tap,boiled for 7 days after buckets came down, ran out of firewood
2009-5200 on vac 19 hg=1.59l per tap
Last season was ideal temp. for sugaring.We should expect to return to more realistic yields of 1 liter per tap on vac. and .5 for buckets.

Dan Seguin

[red maples]

holy cow you really had 6400 buckets?? how long did it take to visit all of those buckets???

[The Birdman]

Last year was my first year. I had 87 taps that produced .3 gallon per tap. weather was not in my favor just boil 6 days.

[KenWP]

I know in my case I listened to people on here and figured I would have enough taps at 40 to supply my needs. Ended up with 150 at the end in order to get enough sap to make any amount of syrup. So it's hard to say how much a tap. 20 gallons was my total production but most of that was made in the last week of the sap run.

[darkmachine]

Last year was our fist year too, we made 20 gallons, on 112 7/16 wooden taps.

so that is .178 gal but we had major losses, our drawoff valve fell out and we lost almost a whole pan of sweet on the ground :( so not an exact count, this year we will try not to loose so much, lol. And we are going up to at least 500 taps.

[Russell Lampron]

I got .3 gals per tap last season with 77 buckets and 462 taps on vacuum. Most of the taps on vacuum were on red maples and alot of them were culls. It was my best year ever and could have been better. I noticed that the woods with old taps and tubing, about 250 taps stopped running about 1.5 weeks sooner than the new sections did. Reaming tap holes didn't help. This year all of the drops are going to be replaced in the old section before I add any new taps. The way that the syrup has been selling I need to make alot more! I would like to get up to the 1/2 gallon per tap number and feel that it is possible even with the red maples as my main crop tree.

[mtnmeadowmplfarm]

I have averaged around .3 gal/tap in the past with buckets and gravity pipeline. Last week I worked up north in a high elevation, north facing sugarbush and the guy averaged .5 gal/tap on high vac last yr.

[MartinP]

Last year made .40 per tap. 20 taps on 7/16 with tubes and 5 gal buckets at base of trees.