Introduce yourselves....

[Kim]

We'll go first...Al brought it to our attention that there is no place to gather to introduce ourselves or talk about life beyond maple...*gasp* dare I say there is life beyond maple???? Anyway, we are Kim & Chris, part owners of The Maple Guys, Chris's hobby gone out of control. We're located in Lyndeborough, which is 15 miles southwest of Manchester, NH. We're going on 10 years of marriage this spring and we have two amazing kids, ages 3 and 18 months, who daddy is groomy to be fine little sugarers.

As for the maple operation, we boil on an Algier 3x10 wood-fired evap w/blower, have 650 taps - with aspirations to reach 1500 taps someday. We sell our syrup, candy, cream, lollipops and equipment over the internet, and our maple products at three local stores. We've starting selling our equipment wholesale and creating a dealer network. Visitors to our sugarhouse are treated with "maple dogs" - Salens hot dogs from Buffalo (no others will do) cooked in maple sap (not in our flue pan...lol).

I have to give Chris credit for the name "The Sugar Inn" because, as he always has maple-on-the-brain, he has said for a long time if he opens a tavern, that is what he would name it. Along with the name for our next dog, "Mapledog".....the list goes on! This post is pinned at the top - so who's next?
Kim

[mapleman3]

Great new topic Kim and Chris, Well lets see, My wife Charlene and I have been at our present "mini farm" for just around 6 years, we have 3 kids the boys ar 6 and 10 and my daughter is just about 13(God Help Me)going into the teenage years yikes.. but she is a huge help when it comes to maple, she loves to gather.
Our syrup operation started from 1 big tree in the back and escaleted to around 300, will it stop at that ... I doubt it
I myself get into many hobbies and functions, besides Maple I love woodworking, we kayak when time is available and someone to go with down a good river. I coach my older sons soccer, I'm assistant cub master for his scout pack, and am now on the board of directors for Ma. Maple producers assoc. ... yes my plate is full!!
But as many of you who know me, it doesn't slow me down at all, I have a wonderful family and great support, and they share in many interests with me, My wife is great!! I couldn't ask of a better friend and wife of 15+ years!

[Al]

Boy now I'm in hot water! Another subject but Maple!!!!! I'm retired Navy and a Domestic Engineer. (Stay at home Dad) Have a beatuful wife Sue an two boys Warren 8 and Samuel 3.
We have 23 acres in Fairfield Vt and enjoy anything outdoors. We tap 120 and have a Thrifyt 2x5.5 evaporator. We're tapped out and not getting any bigger. :D May improve the process a little thou!! :D :D
Take care and have a great day!

[Mike]

Me and my wife Anne will be married 27 years this june! I have 3 girls. 16-19-22....I know what you mean by teen years Jim...LOL...When I first started out I had a 2x6 wood fired! My wife said it was kind of big for a hobby!! She was right, now we have a 3x10 oil fired with a preheater Algier. Tap around 600 with 450 on vacuum. Will get up to 1000 or so by the time we both retire from IBM within 2.5 years. :D ..I sell most of my syrup locally and at work. I do sell a lot in my brothers store in Franklin.. Where they make the maple cream pies Jim cant get enough of.. My sugar house is always open to visitors and the grill is ready to cook.....Happy sugaring to you all.....Mike

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I live hundreds of miles south of most of you and well over a thousand miles south of some of you and on the bottom end of the maple belt in Beckley, WV. I have a beautiful wife(Janelle) of nearly 6 years and a wonderful son Braden who is 2.5. I started making syrup when I was 13 or 14 with about 20 or 25 taps and have made it most years since then. I am a Master Claims Associate for Nationwide insurance and my wife is a domestic engineer/housewife who sells Avon to help out with bills(hint, hint for any of your wives) :D :D

I boil on a 2x8 Leader drop flue inferno arch with stainless hood and preheater and have about 425 taps. I make my syrup in Greenbrier county which is 25 to 30 miles from where I live, so I can only boil a couple of days each week. Besides maple, I hunt a little but mostly enjoy spending time with my wife and son. I used to hunt, fish and golf all the time, but those days are past. :lol: :lol: :lol: I tap trees in three different areas and none of the trees are on my property. I have always made syrup and had my equipment set up on my dad's property, but now he is selling and moving, so I am trying to locate property and build my own customized sugarhouse close to where he lives. Won't have any trees on the property I hope to buy and build on, but it is a touch more centrally located. :D

[brookledge]

I have been making Maple Syrup for 30 years. I started out as a kid with my neighbor. I started with an open pan on a outside fireplace. As time went on I have grown from 5 gallons per year to 300. I'm now married to my wonderful wife,Wendy and have two children. Allison 8 and Ben 3. I now boil on a 3X12 Leader raised flue with Revolution pans on a inferno arch. I have increased this year to about 700 taps with all but 10 on vacuum.

I started out sugaring when I was 12or 13 @ a farm up the road;3x10 w/1100 taps; moved north and worked @ a sugarhouse w/5x12 w/2200 taps ;I now work for@ a friend's sugar house w/ a 6x16 w/7500-12,000 taps (depends on help)> I have my own 3x10 but no sugarhouse yet,to much o.t. last 4 yrs.,not enough time! I have been blessed w/a wonderful wife for 10 yrs. and an energetic 7 yr. old girl that my wife homeschools. We live in a small farming town on the Vermont border. We own 33 acres, will have about 300 of our own taps and I'll scrounge up some more. I've been sugaring for over 32 yrs. now and my friend doesn't want me to build my sugarhouse because I do all his boiling when I can! Let me see... been working @ a 62 megewatt hydroelectric station for 21 yrs. ... love the Lord,my family, my job, my life ... that sums it up I guess.

[saphead]

Sorry, last one was me, knocked off line and didn't log in.

[powerdub]

Great idea. My real name is Scott and I have been married 11 years. I have a 10 year old son who enjoys hanging out in the sugarhouse mostly for the taste testing and a 6 year old daughter who is learning from her big brother about taste testing. I work at a hospital in the engineering dept. as an HVAC/R tech. My wife only works a couple of days a week out of the home and the rest of her time is spent with the kids homeschooling and taking care of things on the home front. We started over twenty years ago with sixty or so buckets and an old 2.5 X 8 and now we will have 1500 all on vacuum on a 2.5 X 8 grimm inferno arch and raised flue back pan with a homemade preheater hood. Since our small years in the back of my fathers garage we have built our own sugarhouse, added a one thousand foot, two inch diameter schedule forty main line that is main carrier for the vacuum. We went to an RO a few years ago due to time issues not to mention the cost of a bigger rig. After the RO we needed a little quicker method of filter so we bought a syrofilter from Lapierre. This year we acquired a UV filter. Next year it will be something else but not sure what yet, too much more out there :wink:. Good luck all.

[pegjam]

Real name is Jim, and my wife of six years is Peggy, (the real drive behind our maple makin'). We have two wonderful boys, ages 5, Steven and 2, Walt, both of which are a great help around the sugarhouse. We fire with a 4x14 Small Bros rig, with an Algier same side reverse flow pan. We use a Marcland auto drawoff. We have downsized abit in the last 2 years, going from 2400 taps to just 300 last year, and we're still working on the number for this year. We own all our own trees but one bush that belongs to my mother. I've been making syrup since I was old enough to do anything of value. My father and grandfather used to run 1200+ buckets, and boiled on a grim 3x10 dropflue english tin pans. Peggys grandfather and father also made syrup, but they used a really big flatpan set up on a block arch.
We also raise chickens and turkeys. We sell butcher chickens and thanksgiving turkeys. We have our own flock of breeders, including Blue Slate and Burbon Red turkeys, as well as Barred Rock and Rhode Island Red chickens. We gather and incubate the eggs in two GQF incubators, and have a GQF hatcher as well. We also raise and train Black and Tan coonhounds, and are thinking of expanding into retrievers or pointers, not sure what breeds though.
I am also a stay at home dad, and my wife works at a factory in Westfield PA. That about sums it all up. :lol: :lol: :lol:

peggjam
"Hope it helps, can't hurt".

[Foster]

Hello ,
I am a veterinarian by trade and have been married for 22 years . My wife and I have four children , ages 13 -19 years . My wifes grandfather tapped the huge sugars of southern Michigan for as long as anyone can remember . My family kept bees commercially.
We own our Wisconsin sugarbush with a capacity of about 1200 taps . We tap to our help which is usually between 400 - 600 , all on buckets. Trees are rotated so they are not tapped every year . Boiling is done on a 2 1/2 x 8 Dallaire with a Marcland autodraw . We bottle around 70 gallons per year with the aid of a Wesfab filter press . All bottled syrup is given to the friends that help and the unbottled is sold wholesale in fives . Last years production was about 218 gallons on 544 taps . This year with some of the help attending the University we plan on around 400 taps -- we will see. I am willing to help any new area maplers get started . Our syrup shack can be viewed on Jim's ( mapleman3 ) website . Good luck to everyone and have a safe season.

Race Foster in Oneida county , Wisconsin

[Rich Baxter]

Hello everybody. I'm 51 years old but relatively new to sugaring. I'm a professional firefighter living in Hartsgrove (Ashtabula Cty) Ohio. I am married and have a 11 yr. old son. We moved to this 10 acre property about 2.5 years ago after I took about 10 years to build the house :oops: (which still isn't entirely finished). I started making maple syrup about 4 years ago. I used a stainless chafing pan which fit down into my old gas grill. It will boil off about one gal/hr of sap if its not windy. I usually put out about 12 taps.
I just purchased a used half pint which I have set up under a 12 ft. overhang for now. I can tap about 30 - 40 reds by the house. I have the potential for another 150 - 160 taps on the other side of a large ravine. Maybe once I get the barn built I can expand to those.
We do a good sized garden in raised beds and plan to have a few pigs and a small cow or two once the barn is up. I also raise some chickens during the summer in a moveable pen.
I appreciate all the help that this site has been. :D

Rich Baxter

[Ed K]

Rita and I live in Leyden Ma. we have a 10 acre sugarbush, that is SmartWood certified thru the Mass Woodlands Coop. We have two grown boys and 4 grandchildren. I have my own business, Klaus Land Improvements, doing logging. It is mostly timberstand improvement,(thinning) 90%. I do the junkwood thinning that the big logging companies won't do. Rita works at Yankee Candle Co, as a wax prep. So I can be semi retired :D . We have been involved with sugaring all our lives. I helped a local farmer as I grew up and Rita's family had a dairy farm that did sugaring and blueberrys as extra income. I've known my wife of 27 yrs, since I was 7.
We curently are tapping 400, on health spouts. Boil on a 2x8 waterloo, raised flue w/ steamhood + preheater. I am curently cutting pine on part of our property to saw out on our bandmill, to build a new sugarhouse. The one we have now is 12'x16'an upgrade from a tarp and flat pan we started with when we built our house in 85. The new sugarhouse is supposed to be 16'x20' w/ 16'x20' woodshed. Will it be big enough?

[DougM]

I’m Doug, as you might have guessed from my screen name. My wife Julie and I live near Lebanon, IN, and have been married 15+ years. We have two boys, Tucker, 10, and Austin, 6. I am a project manager in site development at an engineering firm, Julie teaches preschool. We sugar with some of the greatest friends anyone could ask for, Michael (an electrician) and Lori (a civil engineer), and my dad, Bob (also an electrician), on Michael and Lori’s property near Coatesville, IN. Most of our taps are on the adjacent neighbors’ properties.

Sugaring has been in my family since at least when my grandfather started as a boy with his father in Vermont on a large operation on their farm.

We built our first evaporator in 2000 from concrete block and used my Grandpa’s two flat pans. Late in the 2001 season we bought Rig #2, an ancient tin-pan 2.5x10 Grimm wood fired unit. In 2002 we retired Grandpa’s pans except for one we use for finishing. We used Rig #2 and added taps each year until this season, when we bought Rig #3, a gas-fired 2.5x8 D&G raised-flue. Now we are up to 107 taps, with plans to stop expanding (temporarily at least :) ) at 125. We use plastic bags and make our own bag holders.

We really enjoy our hobby, and the time we get to spend together with friends and family, especially on our “open house” day we have each year. Michael and I really enjoy tinkering with things and carrying on the backyard sugarmakers tradition of reusing and “repurposing” items for sugaring that weren’t necessarily intended for that use.

Lori and Julie have enjoyed creating scrapbook pages to preserve our pictures and mementos, and have also collected a few old maple-related items that we have on display on the wall.

[Dave Y]

Im Dave Yeany I live in a small town in NW pa at the southern tip of the Allegheny Nat forest. This is my second season surgaring. Last year I had 53 taps and made 12 gal of syurp, on a small flat pan. Don't know what this year will bring. Took up an offer from some guy named Doug for a free 2.5 by 10 arch. when i am not fooling with maple junk as my son calls it I am the head custodian of our local school, been there for 22 yrs.
I also am a very active trapper. Tapping kinda coflicts w/beaver trapping and still trying to work it out as I enjoy both tremendously. I'm married to my wife Debb for 30 yrs come June. I have a son David 20 a jr in college and a daughter Daryl 17 a sr in high school. Haven"t been able to get the family involed yet but I am workin on it. I appreciate all the in formation available on this forum.

[syrupmaker]

Hello Rick here, 38 yrs old, been sugaring for around 7 years.Started back when dad and grandpa dabbled in it when i was a kid and fizzled out after grandpa's death in '76. Well, now almost 30 years later it's dad(Rooster),my brother(Roy) and myself. We are boiling on a 3'x8' cinder block arch, poured solid and fire bricked. Custom pans that we had fabbed with some scrap stainless and a bunch of great idea's. We presently use a shack on my brothers, neighbors property, that her dad used 20 years ago. We swap her some syrup, homemade wine and good laughs in the shack for the use of her trees, shack and electric.

Since finding this site we have added a little to the project each year. Starting with a blower, then vacuum, a steam hood and bubbler. Adding a preheater this year for true TURBO CHARGING as dad calls it. Currently we are tapping 250 trees with dreams of some day hitting 1000 taps on our own property, But that is down the road.

I am married, 15 yrs, to a lovely gal named Rose Marie that puts up with me and we have 4 terrific kids.Vanessa 13 yrs,Corey 10 yrs, Little Richard (YEEEEOOOWWW i feel good) 4 yrs and Sean pushin 2 yrs.

For full time work,i do electrical/mechanical repairs on generators and electric/hydraulic manlifts for the Verizon fleet across New York State. Also dabble a bit in the wonderful world of pyrotechnics. Usually doing 10-15 sizeable shows a year.

When we're not sugarin, or working we try to spend time hunting, fishing, camping and getting together for YA'LL COME weekends. I have had the pleasure of meeting alot of the other traders(maple that is) over the years and hope to meet many more. Have yet to find anyone that sugars not willing to extend a hand and offer a hand or at least there two cents.

[ontario guy]

Hi,

My name is Mark, i live south of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. I've been married for 12 wonderful years, we have 2 year old twins, Katherine and Jacob and my wife is expecting in August. We live in the middle of a maple bush so the trees are all around the house and the shack in only about 75 feet from the garage. It is very convenient for boiling and collecting after work.

We only have 62 taps right now cause that is all our present setup will handlewithout staying up till 4am. If i can get a bigger rig this year or next i will tap probably 100 to 150 this will be my max till all the 6 inch trees are big enoughto tap.(i will tap near 200 when i retire)
I am so bloody addicted to this hobby that i have started my own maple supply business, i am a distributer for Stainless16 (on ebay). I just started a few weeks ago so i should have a new 2 by 6 soon.

I work for the Government of Canada with in the Geological Survey of Canada. I get to go to interesting places like Yellowknife, Iqualuit, Newfounland...

I love the information and good people of this board..

Keep up the good work.

Mark

[forester1]

Hello, I'm Jerry. It's been interesting reading everyones intro. In 1978 I bought 40 acres of cutover land in Michigans upper peninsula and built a small cabin. Soon after I bought 30 used sap buckets, lids, taps, and a flat pan. I was conveniently laid off from my job so I made syrup and lived at the cabin to save money. I liked it so much I decided if I ever got back to work I would save $25 from every paycheck to buy maple equipment. I got a job and had to move away and other things happened but I never lost the dream of making syrup. I continued my savings plan along with buying more land. It's been difficult because the access to my land was so poor I couldn't drive to it for years.

I'm 52 years old, not married, no kids, and 4 years from retirement. I work as a forester and will continue forestry part time after retirement from my fulltime job. It's taken this long to get where I'm at now. I finally got a good road into my land 5 years ago. I built a 16x24 sugarhouse with attached woodshed. I bought a brand new 4x12 waterloo/small evaporator with preheater a couple years ago. Still unused but I beat the steel price increase anyway. I hope to get my land logged so I can get tubing up this year. Then I'll be about ready. I plan on somewhere between 1000-2000 taps.

I like to hunt deer and grouse, read, and walk with my dog. I've had 3 Newfoundlands. I collect antique tools, mostly related to early logging. Most weekends spring, summer, fall I am at my property working on it. I'm planning a better cabin since I have to live there during sugaring, plus a sauna. Owning land has some headaches but overall, it is a lot of fun.

[gmcooper]

Hello everyone! I'm Mark and my wfe is Gaylene. we have been married for 22 years. We have 2 boys Craig is 20 and Soph. at SUNY Cobleskill, NY studying Ag Engineering. Eric is 17 and a Jr in High School. We have been making syrup here since 1988. Started with a 12x18 sugarhouse plus 10x12 woodshed. Added a 16x24 bottling room to sugarhouse 2003. Added a new King 3x10 evaporator last year. Should be up to 800 taps on Vac this year and 900+ total. We have filter press, 2 filter/bottling tanks and a huge wish list.
Beside the maple on the farm with my parents we rasie 40 head of registered Charolais beef cattle. We have sold cattle into 11 states. The boys have been showing the cattle for years going to shows in Maine, New York, Maryland, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Minnesota. We also have 3 greenhouses for spring plants that Gaylene runs. Kind of conflicts with the Maple season. We also started breeding miniature horses last year and just finished a new 12 stall barn for them. Our first foals will be due in April.
Just to keep from getting bored I work full time in my familys building Construction business. I am the 4th generation in construction. In my free time I have been a 4-H leader for 18 years. Just finished 2 terms as president of the Maine Beef Producers. Have served on several Farm Bureau boards. And we are currently active with the Southern Maine Maple producers Association.
Good luck to all!

[Dropflue]

My name is Rick, I’ve been married to my wife Debbie for nine years. We have a 3 year old son, Jacob. We live south of Buffalo, in Western New York State. (Near Syrupmaker & The Maple King). We have 40 acres of property in the family; with two ponds, ATV trails & a primitive 9 hole golf course that may Dad built. (If any of you sugar makers are golfers, come on over this summer!!) I work as an engineering technician for an environmental engineering firm in Buffalo.

I started making syrup in 1998 with 12 taps & a homemade 2x2 pan. The pan was gas fired from an old furnace burner. The next year I had two 2x2 pans; two homemade gas burners & a makeshift preheater. In 2002 I bit the bullet, I bought a brand new 2x6 Dominion & Grimm dropflue evaporator( The wife wasn’t to thrilled). I installed two venturi natural gas burners on the evaporator and placed 100 taps. We currently have about 130 taps; we are tapped out of sugar maple on my property, so next year we have to ask the neighbors if we can tap their trees.

So it’s been 7 years since I was bitten by the maple bug!
No complaints so far!

[emericksmaple]

Hello, My name is Matthew. I'm 23 and single, live at home yet with mom and dad. We live in south central Pennsylvania, in Somerset county, near and little town called Wellersburg.
I am a 3rd generation sugar maker. It all stared with a great uncle who tapped 600 buckets. And when my dad was little he would go and help gather. Then in 1974 my dad purchased the equipment and took over sugaring at the age of 18.
I have been invloved in sugaring since I was old enough to help. My father let me start to boil on my own at the age of 14, on our 3x12 oil fired evaporator. At that point we were tapping 4000. In 2000 I went out on my own and rented a woods to set up to tap and with the help of my father, set out 1600 taps on tubing and sold the water. Since then we lost one woods and now we haul the sap home from the woods I aquired in 2000. We are currenty running 4500, with 2300 on vac.
We only own 6 trees of our own, and we rent the rest. My father and I both work for CSX transportation in the track mantaince dept. Luckily I get laid off every winter in Dec and usually get called back at the end of March. What luck!!!
In the off season we like to fish and hunt. And go the Vermont Maplerama every summer to see old friends and make new ones.

[Jay]

My name is Jay and I am married 4 yrs with 2 boys a 2.5 year old Sutton and a 3 month old Quinn, I am a NYC Police officer/ Detective for 12 years and live in Warwick,NY. 04 was my first year tapping I had 15 buckets on 8 trees with a pan I had made and some cinder blocks. This year I plan on having 20 taps and the wife bought me a Leader Half-Pint for X-Mas. My family owns about 500 acres up around Durham,NY that has been in the family since 1902, my Grandfather and my uncle made syrup and now my cousin taps some of it and sells the sap. I think if both sap bushes were up and running we would about 2000 or so taps. Besides my other job I also have a growing hay buisness that I started with my cousin. Down the road I plan on building a sap house up there and see if we can make that go. Thats about my story, thanks for such a great site!!!!

[maplehound]

hello all. My name is Ron I am 42 years young and will be married in April. I now have between 600 - 700 taps. 300 of those right behind my property but I will lose those after this year do to timbering and possibly development. :( Ludkly I have 3-400 down the road with more than enough untapped to make up for those I will lose.
I have been making for 8 years now and hven't done it 2 years the same yet. Presantly my father and I are making on a 3x8 Lapier evaporatore. We are fully on vacumm. The woods behind me pumps right to the sugar house and the one down the road we have to haul in a 500 gallon tank. Our sugar house was just enclosed this year. Before that we had a roof and wood shed but dropped tarps for sides.
I hope one day to own my own woods and to maybe even show a profit .

[GregMVT]

Hi everyone, my name is Greg. I'm 49 and been married to Paula for 17 years. Last year was my first year making syrup and now I'm hooked!! I am fortunate that I am allowed to tap at the college where I work. They have some huge maples on campus. Last year I had about 250 taps and hope to almost double that this year. About 270 of my taps will be on tubing with another 200 on buckets. We own 13+ acres with about 9 of them with trees, not all maple. We've made a lot of changes since last year, built a 16x24 sugarhouse that is half sugarhouse and half wood storage, added a steamaway, a forced draft, and ELECTRIC!!! For those of you that are interested the governor's tree tapping ceremony will be March 18th on the Green Mountain College campus. I hope to get lots of pics and maybe a video. If you aren't boiling come check it out, it is also Poultney's Maplefest weekend, lots of things going on. :D :D :D

[dads hobby]

My real name is Yvon and i am up in the great white north in Verner witch is in Ontario Canada.It's a small community hafway betwen North Bay and Sudbury. I have been married to my wife Julie for 12 years come june, have thee great kids 9,4 and 3. I have been sugaring for 3 years now but have yet to master the art of making any money. Up until last year i was boilling with a barrel system that my father had made about ten year ago,but last year it just burnt out and my pan stated to leak to the point where it was not practical to reapair. I'm in the prosses of building a new system that hoppefuly will help me produce more in less time since i work full time and have only have weakendsto boil.


Unfortunately i dont own my own trees but my sister and her neighbour have about 100 trees betheen then and allow me to tapp
their trees. The only down side is i have to travel about 7 miles to collect and haul it home. every night after the kids are in bed. I am on buckets and have about 35 trees tapped and hopping to increas to 50 this year. I am also looking to purchase my own piece of heaven within the next few years.

[Sugarbear]

My name is Terry and I live in north central Ohio.We tap about 400.We do it the old fashioned way,buckets,horses,and a plain wood fired evaporator.It is a 3X12 King,plenty big for the amount of taps we have but we also have a dairy farm so time is somewhat limited.I am a 4th generation producer and with the interest my children are showing now it is likely there will be a 5th.My dad is 83 and still boils for me.There is something about sugaring that makes the old feel young again.

[backyardsugarer]

Hello, My name is Chris and I live in Victor NY, just Southeast of Rochester. I have been making syrup since I was 6 years old with my grandfather. I got back into it 6 years ago with a flat pan on cinder blocks. Now I have a 2 by 6, sugar shack and put out about 225 taps (bucket brigade). We yield about 45 gallons of syrup per year.

My main profession is teaching at Victor High School where I also coach football. I also own a pool installation company and do that in my summer months in between syrup, coaching and teaching.

I have a wife (Joanna) who I have been married to for just over three years and we have 15 month old son (Avery). I am hoping that in a couple of years he will be able to help me out. He loves the syrup on his waffles.

I am addicted to sugarin' and plan to expand the operation a little at a time as the years go by.

Chris

[Russ]

Mount View Sugar Bush is named after the road that we grew up on, which had a view of Rib Mountain near Wausau. My two brothers and I grew up on a small farm in central Wisconsin; when my youngest brother graduated high school, he looked for something to do during the day as he worked second shift. He tapped 400 trees in a neighbor's woods near our farm and sold the sap. He held back 40 gallons on the last day, and my two brothers cooked it down to about 1 gallon of syrup.

We found an old arch and had some pans made. Unfortunately, the neighbor had the woods clear cut during the following winter, so we scrambled to find another woods, which we did in time to have our first syruping season.

Over time we grew bigger and acquired better equipment. We finally moved to our uncle's 40 in an area known as the Newwood area, west of Merrill, WI. We tap in two 40s there, which is where our sugar shack is, plus in another 80 and 40 that we own located 13 miles away in Price county.

Our woods crew consists of my two brothers and I, our Dad, our uncle, my two sons ( Nick, 10 and Nate, 8 ), my brother's neighbor, and our wives when they feel like it. Our mom helps with the bottling back in civilization. We sell our product at various Farmers' Markets, mom and dad's ice cream shop, and to our long list of repeat customers that we have developed over the years.

I owe a lot of our success to my brother Ryan, who is the best engineer I have ever seen. He keeps us and the whole operation running. Every year we get a little bigger and a little smarter.

[jmattice]

Hi, my name is John Mattice. My father and I have been making syrup in Ashland , NY for the past seven years. We started out on small baking pans on a small wood stove. We then went to a small flat pan on a barrel stove...then to an 18x63 evaporator...then to a 2x6. We are now boiling on a 3x8 oil fired Grimm Lightening evaporator which we love. We also have a 16x32 gas finisher, a 16x16 canning unit, and added a filter press this year. we hope to make around 100 gallons this year on about 550 taps-500 on tubing.
I am engaged to Lisa, the love of my life, and we are getting married this July 23.

[Sweber]

Great idea. Like everyone else says, "it's really nice to read about everyone else"
We live in Harrisville NH for about the past 3 years. (My wife and son(5))
He loves to help dad with the evap and gathering. When we are not sugaring or something to prepare for it, we sell professional books to teachers in New England. I also am a voli fire fighter EMT-I in 2 towns. We used to live in Wilton and work on that Amb service as well. Worked with the Lyndeborough Fire Dept today on the house fire on Glass Factory rdb this am :( Sugaring started with my first taste if real syrup about 7 years ago. Then a buddy of mine started boiling in his driveway and I caught the sickness. A few years working with him was loads of fun. When he stopped, I started. What started out as a hobbie turned "bad".30-40 gallons/year. We are still pretty small (24"x66" ) but have 2x6 amount of fun ! People show up to "help" with boiling all the time.Although when the beer runs out or 1am rolls around,people seem to leave.
I learn quite a bit from my two other friends who boil. There are three of us boiling now, each at his own place. But I have the best wife. She helps with wood, runs the evap, brings meals out to the sugarhouse, Wow :D The only thing she is missing is a fishing boat.
She and the other wives call themselves the sugaring widows during March. Thanks for the new post.
SW

[NH Maplemaker]

Hi everyone, My name is Jim. My wife Pam an i own and operate Hillside sugarbush farm in Cornish,NH. Cornish is located on the connecticut river a cross from Winsor, VT.About twenty miles south of Hanover,NH the home of Dartmouth collage.
Pam and I have been married for 35 year in Aug. We have three grown children , Too girls, Heather and Amanda and a Boy, Nicholas. A son inlaw, Brad and too grand children, Tyler and Jenna.
They and my good friend Lee make up Our maple team! Like most maplers we have grown! From a plastic coverd green house were we frist boiled.(boy was that wet) Like most mapleholics we made changes every year untill we remodled our present sugar house that we have been in for the last three seasons (24x30).Thats when we made the change from wood to oil! Miss the smell of the wood, but not the mess!! We tap on 25 acres of our own. another 60 acres next to us that we use. We boil from about 1500 taps with what we buy in ! We have been mebers of the New Hampshire maple producers association for maney years.
I'm real glad that i found your site! I enjoy reading the great post! I think i have read every old post still up! LOTS & LOTS OF GREAT ADVICE AND IDEAS! The best part is that it is free !!! You don't find that much any more !! Keep it comming and I hope I will get a chance to post with some or all of you!!
Maplemaker

[Twin_Maple]

Hi, My name is Chris and I got married to my wonderful wife, Kirsten, right in the middle of tapping season 6 years ago. I tapped for the first time on my anniversary, Feb 27, last year. (I can hear the gasps now, hey, the sap was running and she was 7 months pregnant!) While we were awaiting the birth of our twins last year I made my first syrup in a double stacked aluminum disposable chafing dish pan on my gas grill. It took 9 hours to boil down the 6 gallons of sap I had collected from my 2 taps. The 6 ounces of light amber syrup I produced gave me the maple bug.

All the rest of last year I planned for this sugar season. I only have the capacity for about 15 taps on my 2.5 acres, so I bought a 200,000 btu propane stove and had a small custom flat pan (14.5”x30.5”) built with 2 sections and a preheater from a guy on ebay. I expanded to 10 health spouts that use tubing into 5 gal pails with lids. Now I am Just waiting for the sap to run. . .

I have a very patient and wonderful wife who indulges me in my hobbies. We have 11 month old twins (Evan and Nolette) who I can not wait to get involved in sugaring. The bills get paid by the small plastic brokerage business my dad and I have. Other than sugaring, I brew hard cider and I am a volunteer EMT and Firefighter. Other recreational pursuits involve kayaking, rafting, cycling and hiking. We live in Mason, NH where there are plenty of good people to talk to about sugaring. Kirsten is currently the best mom to the best twins in the world but she does want to get back to hotel consulting work. Soon.

I’ll be sugaring on my back deck this year dreaming of when I can have my own half pint and a small shack to go with it. My dream is to retire to a farm and have apples in the fall, Christmas trees in the winter and do some sugaring in the spring so I can play all summer long. . . Now if I could only get the sap to run.

[Bill K.]

Hello, I'm Bill Kust and I've been in love with maple and all the aspects of syrup/sugar production on and off for the past 22 years. My first pint of syrup was produced from a few borrowed taps in red maples, my Coleman stove and a stainless steel bowl. It was dark amber syrup and it tasted so good. I was hooked!

We are located in northeast Wisconsin about 10 miles north of Green Bay.
My very understanding wife Margaret, my buddy/neighbor Wayne and I run 80 taps in sugar maples on a friends 15 acres located three miles north of our home. We use blue plastic bags and sap sak holders. We boil on a 20"X96" homemade wood-fired arch with three flat homemade stainless steel pans. We use a tubular grate with a forced air variable speed blower to circulate air through the grate and into the fire box. The steel grate is cooled by air from the blower and the resulting hot air is fed back into the combustion zone. We average about 25 gal/hr. evaporation rate. Wayne and split our production which has averaged about 28-37 gal./yr. We sell about half our production, consume some and give away the rest to friends and family.

Margaret and I have 8 children and 13 grandchildren. Many of them have participated in the maple experience, especially the consumption part.
Yesterday, we set our evaporator and walled shelter in place and are waiting for the weather to improve before we tap.

This really is a great site and a great place to learn about everything maple I've really enjoyed reading about everyones families and experiences.
Thanks,
Bill

[katmike]

Hello, my name is Mike Merrick and my wife Kathy and I live in Clinton IL with our twin 10 year old boys Anthony and Joshua. We also have 3 grown girls. I've been tapping trees for about 4 years now. The 10 acres of timber we built our house on has a small maple grove in the back and I caught the bug the first year (which I boiled on the kitchen stove). The 2nd year was outside on a U-shaped concrete block structure with buffet type pans (which collapsed). I then decided that outdoors in the sleet and cold winds wasn't going to work so I got a half pint and put it in my detached garage. I use a JD 335 garden tractor to haul the sap back to my "sugar garage" (actually the boys take turns driving), unless it's too muddy and I carry by hand :x

Every year I've got a little smarter and got a lot of good info off this board. Thanks

[Slatebelt*Pa*Tapper]

Hi every one, figured Id get Our name in here.
Me and my wife have been togeather for 15 years and married 10 of those years.
We have 2 duaghters. Our first is 15 and our 2nd is 7. We also love Our dogs which we have 2 labs.

We have only been tapping tree's for two years now. Which is really alot of fun! Hard work but fun.

Some of Our other hobbies include:
Hunting, me and the wife go all the time. Fishing, raising poultry(chickens, turkeys and quail).

We also have a 2 acre Pasture/mini farm where we TRY to grow corn, pumpkins, and all the other things we can.

Our 8 acre homestead is located right at the base of the Blue Mountain here in Slatington Pa.

Im glad I found this site, as there are many great people on here.

We wish all the best of luck in life.

Thanks
The Hinkle's

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/hinkjc/Family.jpg

My wife Jody on the far left, daughter shana in the middle and me on the far right(charlie)
And little Amy in the front on the left.

[TroutBrookSH]

My name is Greg Keyes. My wife's name is Sheila, and my kids are Sean, Kerry, and Rory. This season begins our 4th year of making syrup.

Like many of you, we started out with a small homemade pan and cemment block arch, which we set-up in our driveway turn-around. The first year we had less than 20 taps, and we made about 5-gallons.

The following year we acquired a Lightning 2x4. We constructed a temporary sugarhouse out of an old dog kennel and covered it a big tarp. We expanded to about 40 taps and doubled our production.

Last year I improved the kennel sugarhouse by fashioning a quonset hut style roof and relocating it so I wasn't in shin-high water when the big spring thaw hit. We added another 20 or so taps and made 17 gallons.

This year maple fever really set in. I needed to build a woodshed because we use a good amount of wood to heat our house. (We have a "Russian stove" and would recommend it anyone who can work it into new house construction.) I figured working an honest to goodness sugarhouse into the design was the reasonable thing to do. I also needed a place to store all the stuff that keeps me from parking in my garage. In the end, my little project ended up being a 20x24 storage barn with a 12x24 woodshed and a 12x24 carport and a 12x16 sugarhouse. My brother, Kevin, who's a carpenter and sugar maker (see drybrooksugarhouse.com), insisted we make the sugarhouse bigger than the 8x12-ish size I was planning. He said "you're going to grow bigger, even if you don't think so today".

Needless to say, we built it bigger. About 1-month after we set the poles, I had the occasion to meet someone who was retired and retired from sugaring. I tried to buy his 400-gallon SS sap tank, but somehow he convinced me to buy his whole operation. He offered me a deal I couldn't pass up, and, thankfully, Sheila agreed! I've now got a 2x6 w/steamhood and blower, the big tank, a 140-gal tank to feed the regulator, a bunch of nice galv buckets, and a whole bunch of other good stuff. An unexpected perk is that the gentleman who sold me everything, he's my new best friend. He's been working with me every weekend for the last two months, helping me to get the sugarhouse finished and the evaporator set up. I think he's having a relapse of "the fever".

Greg

[Johnny Cuervo]

Hello I'm John we live in Kirkville, NY (12 miles NE of Syracuse). My wife Carolyn and I have a 9 year old daughter Gianna.

Three years ago on my daughter’s birthday in Feb we took a bike ride and saw milk jugs hanging on trees (not to mention the one half filled with sap tapped into a telephone pole). We stopped to talk to this old man who was boiling on a 30 gal barrel. He let my daughter taste fresh sap and her eyes opened wide and said "dad we gotta do this". We put out 6 taps and boiled on a roasting pan on cinder blocks. We made 1.5 gal of great light syrup. We now have a 10x 12 sugar shack, 22"x44" home made evaporator and about 40-50 buckets.

I work at Syracuse University Technical Support Services. We have a camp on Oneida Lake; we like to fish, ski, garden and try to enjoy as much time with family and friends that we can. I’ve also been playing drums for over 25 years with many local bands, and have been a member of the Hurricanes with Benny Mardones since 1994. I enjoy building many mechanical and electrical projects.

[maplwrks]

My name is Mike Christian . I live in Orwell Vt. My family and I run Village Mapleworks.I've been sugaring since I was 11. This is the first year that I will boiling my own sap in my own sugarhouse! We purchased a new oil-fired 2 1/2x8 Lapierre Waterloo-Small evaporator and teamed it up with a 600gph Lapierre R/O. We currently lease all of our taps (2200) and truck all our sap to the sugarhouse. My wife and children are very supportive of my sickness and help out all they can.

[VA maple guy]

Hi, my name is Gerry, I live in northern Virginia. I have mostly red maples, two silvers, a few norways, and one sugar maple.I have just over 100 taps and boil on a homemade evaporator, two 55 gal. drums welded together end to end.
I use two pans a 22x40 and a 22x19. I takes me 60 gallons to make just
one, pretty low sugar content but it,s better than nothing.
I just recently fount this forum and wow!! what alot of good stuff here.
I hope to talk with some of you soon.

[Daren]

My name is Daren. my wife Lynette and I live in Fletcher, Vermont. We have 78 acres of forestland with mixed hard and soft wood trees. The predominant maples are reds, but sugars are scattered about as well. I had made a few comments about wanting to make a little maple syrup from the maples on the property as a novelty and the wife came home with the "backyard sugarin'" book. I read it cover to cover the day she brought it home and picked up 6 taps, 6 buckets and 6 lids the next day. I collected a fair amount of sap in the first two days of tapping and was so excited that I bought two more setups and tapped a total of 8 taps last year. I boiled on a two burner gas burner in two stainless steel steam table pans. I made 3 gallons total and was completely bitten by the bug. This year I have 30 taps and I am about to fire up my new homemade evaporator. Once I get it up and running, I will post a pic in the album. I have incorporated a third pan and depending on how the thing steams, I might put out 50 taps next year. I love the backyard thing and have no interest in getting bigger, but I also said I was going to tap only 10 taps this year....just cant help it I guess. I found this website last year and check it frequently for any new posts. I love to read the banter between members year round. keeps me in the spirit. Great website here huh? happy mapling to everyone....may the sap flow fast, sweet and clear!

[Maple Flats]

My name is Dave and my wife of 38 years is Joan. We have 4 grown kids , ages Rob 36, Cindy 33, Brian 26 and Stacey 20 (in addition to me). When the kids were growing up we tapped 3 huge box alders and 1 large sugar maple and boiled it down on the woodstove in our living room (seldom a real boil but steam came off). In 2003 I decided I wanted to try to do it a little bigger and tapped 60 taps and boiled on a half pint, all in sugar maples in a woodlot I own and plan to build a new home in for retirement. Last year I bought a 2 x 6 and tapped 115, with 90 on pipeline. I also built a 16 x 24 sugarhouse thinking I would grow into it. Last year I had a little help from one of my grandsons when tapping but I collected and boiled solo. This year I added some more pipeline so I now tap 160 (140 on pipeline). Two days ago my wife surprised me and said she would come down and boil while I drove school bus so I wouldn't have to boil so late. Now she says she will do that every couple days or so, it really helps. Joan and I are also family care providers and as such have David and Jamie live with us for over 10 years who previously spent their entire lives in an institution. They have really prospered since coming to live with us. They both require total care but are gone about 5 1/2 hours each day to program. I forgot to tell you Joan is an RN. Our youngest son, age 26 watches them often so joan can get out. I also am actively managing my woodlot using a forest stewardship plan, am a certified tree farm, just bought a Peterson sawmill and plan to do custom sawing. We also own 4.5 acres of blueberries we planted but never really gave them the care they need and there is a lot of brush in the rows. (I think we went too big) Back to sugaring, I hope to grow to a 2.5 x 8 or 3 x 8 evap. soon and have gotten permission to rent some trees since I am maxed on my sugar maples and would rather not tap silver or red maples but you never know. My 2 x 6 is an older Leader pleasure model. I also have a 16 x 24 canner which I fired on an old gas stove last year but this year I bought the propane arch for it. On my Ford 1500 4 x 4 tractor (about 20 horse compact diesel) I carry a 125 gal tank on the 3 point hitch (easy to do wheeleys when full, had to put extra wt on front , to my collection tanks, pump into tractor tank and then pump into a tank on the north wall of the sugar house which feeds the evap. Because I have no power unless I run the generator and my land is rather flat I have multiple pipelines ranging from 56 taps down to 7 taps. On my 56 and my 33 tap lines I collect into 100 gal tanks. All smaller lines run into plastic trash cans. 2 of my lines are about a mile away at my mothers. As of now I plan to grow to about 500 taps within a couple of years and get the 3 x 8 evap. so boiling time is kept down, or add an RO. If I do that I could then justify tapping soft maples and concentrate the sugar before it hits the evaporator.

[PrimitiveOperation]

Hello everyone, my name is Brian and have been sugaring for two seasons now. When I was ten my father tried to tap some sugar maples but didn't have a workable set up. I never forgot how we tried to make syrup that year and finally mustered the nerve to try again. Now my brother, grandfather and myself have the bug bad!!!! They run things while I am at work and I usually take over at night.

I also have a fiance and step daughter who like sugaring more than they like to admit :wink: I'll make wood choppers out of them yet :twisted:
(The only real complaint is the sticky kitchen.)

There is a new sugar house and possibly an evaporator in our future. Got some big ideas.

[lharris1]

As my profile says I’m working with two other guys as Grassy Meadows Maple Syrup. One is Claude Cadle who is our expert fireman and diligent sap gatherer. The other is My brother who runs the farm, primarily raising beef cattle. Richard and his wife Cathy have pretty amazing home. He reconstructed three pre-civil war log buildings and did it up right with rustic porches, dogtrots, and antiques throughout. If you get a chance come by for a tour and sign the guest book and also check out our maple syrup operation.

I’m Larry Harris, an electrical engineer working at a chemical plant. If you have a pool you could be using some of our stuff. My wife Margie and I have two grown children and six grand kids, six years old down to 3 months. I live and work near Charleston, WV (Actually live at Poca, WV, home of the Poca Dots who in 2003 won the third straight state football championship.) I’m about 100 miles from the farm at Grassy Meadows. I plan to retire after next year, so I should be a little more help in running the syrup operation.

Our trees are scatter out a bit. We have six tubing systems feeding into six 30 gallon drums along with thirty some buckets, and probably around 160 to 180 taps total. We gather in either drums in a pick-up or in a 50 gallon sap trailer pulled by a 4-wheeler. For transferring sap we use 12 Volt demand pumps and portable battery packs. In 2002 we made 2-3 gallons, 2003 we made just over 8 gallons and this year got our production up to about 66 gallons with the 2 x 6 Waterloo/Small Professional raised flue evaporator. We just purchased it on January 1 from a fellow in Green Bay, WI. We operate close to Brandon (WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER) who has been a huge help to us.

[Father & Son]

It is very interesting reading how everyone got started, here's our story. My name is Jim and my son Chase is 12 years old. My wife Terri and I have been married for 15 years. She is originally from Conneticut and her grandfather made syrup in Vermont in the 30's & 40's. When I was growing up all the farmers around our little town had sugar bushes. Most of them have since been abandoned or the maples cut down. We started out last June finding a used 2 x 6 Leader wood fired, some buckets, taps, and some tubing from a gentleman that was getting out of making syrup. I didn't start building our sugar house until January 25. Working by myself and having limited carpentry skills it took me a month to get the building to a point that we could set the evaporator up. Still alot to be done. My son got a little anxious and hung 14 buckets before the evaporator was ready but he boiled it off on a turkey fryer. I've had alot of help setting up the equipment. One friend stopped by the end of February on his tractor and dropped off an old milk tank to use for sap storage. Another friend, that boils about 1 mile from me, stopped in the first week of March to see how everything was coming along ( we had talked last summer about us making syrup ) and explained how to set things up. What a help he has been. Every time I have a question he's been there to help.
This year we had 62 taps, only boiled 5 nights, and made 10 gallons of syrup. Next season we will be more prepared. I would like to have 125-150 taps and grow a little every year time permitting.
Thanks for listening to my rambling, and good luck next spring!

May the nights be in the 20's, the days in the 40's and the run be 6-8 weeks long!

[mapleman3]

I still see new members coming in, nobody seems to be including where they are from or any sugaring info about themselves. Come o all you new folks out there, tell us a bit about you and your operations be it 2 taps or 20,000 taps, we like to talk with you share stories and we all learn a little too. we are a friendly bunch here..." Lets Talk Maple" it's getting cooler outside , the trees are starting to turn... Old man winter is just around the corner.

[RUSTYBUCKET]

With summer now a fading memory, its time to look to Fall and approaching syrup season, like Jim says. Just spent a little time catching up here, since the summer months finds me focused more on my ponds than my sugarbush. Working with the seasons is a habit picked up from reading some of Gene Logsdon's books. My name is Russ and we have been burning sap for about 16 years now. My home is just outside Kingston, NY. My neighbor got us started in syrup making after witnessing a relatives operation in the Catskills. Like most others, we started out with a backyard setup and eventually moved to a DG Sportsman about 5 years ago. I've got about 50 acres of woodlands but the sugarbush is split between two parcels. One is 5 acres, the other is 8 acres. We currently tap the 5 acres and usually have about 75-85 buckets a year. The 8 acres is a work in progress, doing some TSI work and trying to build a better access road. Our operation is mostly a hobby but we do sell about half of what we make. Average year is 15-18 gallons although last year was our best with 25 gallons. Its good to be thinking fall and syrup again.


Rustybucket

[White Barn Farm]

Hello fellow maple traders. My name is Ed. I am blessed with a fantastic wife and two wonderful kids(19and15)who love maple cream,maple syrup and maple candy. Therefore they tolerate my maple madness.I have had the good fortune to have been involved with the maple business for most of my life.I have helped relatives and neighbors with their operations and this past season started our own small set-up. We own 40 acres that we raise Christmas trees on and I never thought we had enough sugar maples to attempt to make syrup. A closer inventory this winter revealed close to 80 taps and neighbors saying help yourself to our trees.
I bought ten spiles and tapped on a Saturday and by Friday of the next week purchased the evaporator. I knew I didn't have time to set it up properly for the season at hand and have spent this summer getting ready.
I converted our old milkhouse into a sap house and have been diligently reading and learning from the maple trader crew. What a wealth of knowledge!!!!!! I don't think I have missed a day reading what everyone has to offer since I stumbled on this site. You guys have answered my questions without my even having to ask them. What a website.
Thanks for sharing!!!
Ed

[Sugarmaker]

Maple folks,
My name is Chris Casbohm and would like to introduce myself and my family. My wife Cheryl and I were just talking about the first time she went gathering sap with my dad and I, she wasn't dressed for the occassion and ended up soaked and with muddy loafers. That was 35 years ago and she is still slogging through the spring mud to make syrup with me. ( and she can make syrup too!!)
Since that first sugar making experience we have added two sons and two daughters and also have two grandsons. We live in Albion Pennsylvania. Our Grandson Mike (10) wants to know why we live in the snow belt? (Sometimes I wonder that myself) We are 15 miles south of lake Erie and 15 mile from the Ohio line. We make good syrup here, so we will stay for a while.
Syrup making is in my blood. I have a picture of my great grandfather making syrup about 20 miles from our current home, cira 1915. My grandfather made syrup, every farm did back then (1930's) Dad and Uncles made syrup on several makeshift and store bought rigs.
I was hooked on maple when I was about 11, My dad, a dairy farmer, tapped his small sugarbush and I got the job of stoking wet slabs into a cinder block arch with a 3 x 4 foot flat pan. The syrup was as black as your hat, but very good tasting! This was in a converted chicken house. Several years later Dad upgraded to a antique 3 x 10 Warren style evaporator. and moved into the converted hog house. See if you can find information on that relic? That was 1969. We used the Warren fired with a big oil burner for several years. I still have the oil burner just in case.

When we moved to Albion in 1985 I helped one of my neighbors make syrup on a 2- 1/2 x 10 leader for several years.

In 1998 I decided I wanted to get into the maple business myself and began scrounging parts for a evaporator. Dad had passed away and some of the inhertance was going to go into a sugarhouse. He would have liked that!

I found a set of used Amish built 3 x 10 King style, stainless, drop flue pans. Cheryl and I dug the castings from a old 3 x 12 King out of the weeds and began a 2 year restoration project on the arch. I rebuit it as a 3 x 10 to fit the pans. It needed everything, I had to go measure other evaporators to get basic sizes. I purchased 3 Dari Kool milk tanks and used all the stainless steel for retinning the arch and making the steam hoods and the steam and smoke stacks. (This was in our garage for 2 years, the new car had to set outside.)
I designed the sugar house after a lot of research in books and poking around other sugarhouses. Many design changes and we finally had the plans. Work on the structure started October 20 2000. and we set up the evaporator on the 9th of Jan 2001.
We are renting all roadside trees (Hardmaples).
For 2006 we will have 400 taps on buckets.

Nic (our 14 year old grandson) reminded me to metion the homemade sap sucker that we have for the pickup. Saves us a lot of gathering time and a lot of back aches. We have a 325 gallon poly tank on the F250. More about that later.

This looks like a great site! I have been a member for a while but I guess to busy to be as active as I would have liked. I met another member several weeks ago that really sparked my interest in Maple Trader. Chase that would be you!

Sorry this was so long winded! I will try to write less more often.
Looking forward to chatting with all the maple folks!

Chris C.

[Maple Flats]

Welcome, You came to the right place if you are long winded, they haven't sent me to the woodshed yet for the same offense. your story is great and glad you chose to be part of our family. I'd be longer winded now but i've got a appointment with a BIG BUCK now and must run.
Maple Flats

[sweetwoodmaple]

Chris,

Good to have you posting! (finally!) :wink:

Got your letter in the mail. See you at the meeting in January.

I second the fact that this is a great site, especially if you are long winded. Has a good search function as well if you want to look up past discussions.

Take Care - Brian

[Sugarmaker]

Brian, Maple Flats Thanks,
Just bottled 4 gallons of dark amber this morning, quarts and pints in plastic. That leaves 5 gallons of dark that has to last till spring.
Like a lot of Penns woods maple producers, today will be the preparation for deer season. Our family and friends will be hunting white tails from several stands that my son Eric has put up on private property that we have permisssion to hunt on. (bacically right out our back door). Eric got a bueatiful 8 point during Archery. He will get it mounted. It had a 17.5 inch spread and was very symetrical rack.
The back room of our sugar house doubles as a slaughter house during deer season. We have hot and cold running water and a electric hoist. We process our oun deer and make jerky, summer sausage and lots of deer burger.

I am also a novice beekeeper currently we have 8 hives, 7 on the property and one about a mile away. We made about 400 lb of honey this year, even though we lost 80% of our bees last spring. (it was a rebuilding year for the bees). Our grand son Mike has helped with the bees also and we captured several swarms together in 2004.

November 7 2005 we had a visit by a black bear, it tipped over 3 of the hives and drug one of the bee boxes about 15 yards from the hives. With the warm weather this week I may have to take a break fom deer hunting and take a look at the bees.

Good luck to all the hunters!

Chris C.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Chris,

What is a sap sucker??????? 8O

[Sugarmaker]

WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER,
Some background. We gather 400 buckets on all roadside maples. Usualy with a crew of two to four. We were using a F150 with a 210 gallon poly tank with a 8 inch hole to pour in the sap. I had a filter in the 8 inch hole to get the bugs and bark. We we consantaly waiting for someone to pour sap into the tank. Sometimes 4 or 6 buckets were in line. This really slowed down the gathering and also was a lot of extended lifting to head height to dump the 5 gallon buskets. I had seen a old sugarmaker with a sealed tank on his truck suck the sap from a low "dump" station into the tank. I also saw anothe local sugar maker using 12 volt pump in a plastic barrel pumping into a 700 gallon poly tank on a wagon running gear. So I decided to invent my own dump and pump station. This may sound a little over the top but here goes.
First we traded the F150 (11 years old) for a new F250 SuperDuty with extended cab, 2004 model. Next I bought a 325 gallon poly tank, from Tractor supply. This is a big upright tank (leg tank) and had a 16 inch dia lid, which works great for getting in and cleaning. I built a angle iron frame and steel straps to mount the tank to the frame which just fits into the truck bed (short bed). I added handle to the straps to allow tie down straps to secure the tank to the truck. I thought that the sap might really slosh around but this is not a problem. Keep in mind that 325 gallons of sap is about a ton and a quarter so we are pushing the weight a little. A F350 dulley would be nice but would then need a bigger tank! Does it ever end?
Next I designed and built a dumping station. these were the criteria:
- It had to be no more than 3 feet off the ground to the dumping zone.
- It needed to be able to pump fast enough so that there would be no delays, gatherers could dump as fast as they bring sap to the truck. Like 6 to 5 gallon buckets, one or two at a time.
- It had to be automatic so that no one had to stand there and operate the pump.
- Pump types were optional but I decided I would like to use the 12 volt system on the truck. ( I found out from a local camper store that the truck is prewired with a 40 amp system, for trailers).
- Lots of pump research until I ask a boater freind at work about my problem, he recommended a 12 volt bildge pump from a boat. This is the ticket!
I purchased a 12 volt bildge pump that pumps about 3000 gals per hour at a head hieght of 5 feet. Thats 50 gal per minute or 25 gal in 30 seconds. We dump about as fast as we bring sap to the truck and rarely had a overflow problem!
- Also purchased aautomatic float swith to start the pump. (no hands operation)
- I designed and fabricatied a steel structure to plug into the reciever of the truck and hold the bottom half of a 55 gallon plastic drum.
Then by dumb luck and a little fooling around with the parts that I had all over the garage, I realized that the top half of the plastic drum could be the dumping catch basin if inverted and slipped into the base. I drilled about 200 1/8 inch holes shaped a dumping cut out, some handles, and we had a course strainer.
- The pump and switch was mounted to some scrap stainless and placed in the bottom of the dump station. I plumbed from the pump (dump station) to the tank in the truck with clear 1-1/2 dia tubing. I had to add a new hole in the top of the tank neat the lid to plumb the 1 -1/2 hose. Wired the pump into the truck trailer outlet. (had to purchase a plug and some wire.)
- Also I used a quick disconect on the hose to allow the dumping station to be removed and set aside when not needed.

Last year was our first season for this new gathering system. I sent Cheryl and Eric and Nic out to gather for the first time and they came back in about 1/2 the normal time with a tank of sap and smiles on there faces! It was well worth the work.

I am not getting any younger and can dump buckets into the dumping station by kicking them up with my knee.
We also found that on those days when the ice is in every bucket the large strainer system collected all the ice and we kept right on gathering!
I do have picture of this system. This probably should be called a "Dump and Pump" gathering system so that it is not confused with sapsuckers producing vaccum on sap lines.
Hope this helps!

Chris C.

[Maple Flats]

Your system sound great. I may need to do something similar if I add more buckets. Right now I have several pipeline systems and use a 1.2 horse 2 cycle pump to transfer from the line tank into the tractor tank. I only have 20 buckets and just dump those but if I add a large # of buckets I will try something like yours, I like it.

[Parker]

Do you know the make and model of the bilge pump you use,,,Thanks

[Sugarmaker]

Parker,
Bilge pump is a Rule brand.
I do have some pictures that I hope to have available soon.

[Sugarmaker]

Getting our web site going, thanks to our son Adam. Check it out. Still some work to do on it, but getting closer! This was my birthday present. (Jan 3).

[brookledge]

Looks good :D
Your lucky to have someone who can build sites for you.
Keith

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Chris,

Looks awesome! :D

[NH Maplemaker]

Chris, Adam did a great job!! Look forward to checking in on it from time to time and see whats new . Again grate Job. Wish I was smart enought to build one!!!

[sweetwoodmaple]

When Adam get's the bugs worked out for yours, he should consider giving some of us a quote!

Looks great. Tried to send you a comment, but that part isn't linked yet. I'm sure you'll get there!

See you in two weeks.

Brian

[wkies]

Hey everyone- Just found this forum and very excited about it. My name is Will and I've been sugaring for a few years now. I start (introduced to) sugaring in college, where I helped out on a farm, in St. Lawrence County NY, to offset my rent. Living in VT for many years, I had a number of friends and neighbors who sugared. A few years later I landed a job in Connectiocut at the Stamford Museum & Nature Center, where I began to learn the ins and outs of making maple syrup from a great mentor the late Frank Mollinari. Today I get paid to teach people about this great tradition. Our sugar shack was built in 1999. We use a wood fired 2x6 evaporator. We have roughly 370 taps with half tubed and the other half buckets and bags. Each season (we tap our trees in S. Conn February 1) we see over 1,200 school children and additional 1,000 people to the sugar house. We are the closet public sugarhouse to NYC.

Last year we produced 65 gallons!!!
[/img]

[Sugarmaker]

wkies,
Welcome,
I think you will like it here!

[Packerfan]

Hello........Just got into this last year. This site gave me a great start. Started with a firepit and some 55 gal drum cookers. Looking into an evaporator at this time. Last year ran 75 taps(late). This year looking at 200-300 taps. What size is recommended?

Thanks
-Dan

[Sugarmaker]

Dan,
Welcome! You will get a lot of responses on your question. My 2 cents is that you need to look into your crystal ball and decide how big you want to be in say 5-10 years? For 200-300 taps a 2 x 6 or 2 x 8 would be fine but if you double the taps is a couple years you will be up grading evaporators. Nothing wrong with that if you plan it out correctly. So on a good run you will have 400 to 500 gallons of sap. a 2 x6 will boil at around 25-30 gallons of water per hour (Guys correct me if I am wrong) so I would estimate you would spend some 10- 12 hour days boiling it into syrup. We use a 3x10 and get about 80-90 per hour.
Chris

[Packerfan]

Thanks Chris! That gives me a good idea of where to start.

[maple flats]

Welcome Packerfan. My take is that you grew by a lot from last year to this and I think that shows a tendency SO I think a 2 x 8 would be better to be your next step. Used ones are always in short supply and any one you get will get top resale as you grow IF you take good care of it and never scorch it. The used market is there to find one but you will most likely want stainless syrup and flue pans and the longer the flue pan the higher the evap. rate. Welded SS is best but there are many good soldered pans out there and they work good too, just look for a lead free label to get the better unit. I am in the same boat, I need a bigger evap. but have not found one yet that I wanted AND had $ at the same time, still looking. You have already discovered the joy of maple and beware, it is addictive, but OH what fun. I wanted to go to 300-400 taps this year but must wait to sell more syrup. I also grow blueberries and put over $10,000 into equipment in that last year which used up my evap fund, maybe next year. I want to get big enough to have blueberry pancake breakfasts for visitors to my sugarhouse when I can have enough syrup available to keep up with demand. So far I have always sold out my production each year with no advertising, just a little display at the school bus garage where I drive (for the bennies).

[maple flats]

You will notice that I am now a new trader. Long story short. Computer glitch blocked the old Maple Flats out. I had to get Kim to delete my account and re-register as maple flats. Confused, me too. BUT I am finally back and glad to be back. I missed my daily fix, I WAS able to get on and read but could not sign in to post, kept saying my password was wrong or got a critical error. Here I am now!

[Packerfan]

Thanks flats! Good advice.

[Sugarmaker]

Flats,
Darn those blueberry pancakes with fresh maple syrup do sound good!

CEC

[Lwood]

Hi,
Just ran into this site today and had to register. Started sugaring about 6 years ago ( Family thinks I'm nuts! But will take some "extra" syrup if I have some. :lol: ) Right now running a 2 1/2 X 5 homemade evaporator ( welded stainless ) with a homemade preheater. Have just over 100 taps now. Plan on expanding soon and doubling the number of taps. Chances are that won't keep me satisfied for long. I'm sure everyone here understands that.


Larry

[maple flats]

We sure do understand that Lwood, it is a GOOD ADDICTION. Welcome aboard, you've found a great place to get your daily fix. We are maplers from all size operations, all aspects of maple sugaring are discussed here. You don't need to agree or disagree, just join in any time. Ask any questions, someone here will answer and the next will offer a different view or approach. Feel free to offer any ideas, they are all welcome here.

[brookledge]

Welcome aboard Lwood. I hope you have alot of time to spend in front of the computor reading all of the replies.
Keith

[Sugarmaker]

Lwood,
Welcome. Yea the syrup making is addictive but this web site is a close second. Another week or so we may not be on here as much (If we get to sugarin this year??) I think you will like it. Sounds like you are ready to expand and this is a good resource for information and ideas too.

Regards,
Chris

[Jim Brown]

Well here I go I my name is Jim and I have been making syrup in some form since I was a kid at home. We tapped the sugar maple around the house and used 2 gallon oil cans for buckets, boiled on a an open fire rack set up with cement blocks. Real crude to say the least. But it worked! I'm married to a wonderful wife of 30 years and have three children and 5 grand kids. God has been very good to me and my family.We are making syrup for retail sale for the first time. I plan to retire in three years and hope to have 500 taps at that time. My wife semi retired three weeks ago from a career in real estate. The trees we have tapped are on our daughter and son-in laws property. They have 25 acres and we would be able to tap 7-800 should we have a desire. NoT YET! RThis is a great form to be able to correspond with other who have the same passion for the true nature of this business. KEEP PRAISING THE LORD ANYWAY!!

[brookledge]

Jim
Welcome aboard this is a great site
Keith

[twigbender]

I just found this site a couple weeks ago and signed on a few days later. I have only begun sugaring last spring with 86 taps. We cooked down 4 gallons of syrup, much of which was fairly dark, but man does it ever taste good! My wife and I bought used equipment from a couple who had been sugaring for 30 years and decided to take a break. We have a homemade arch, a stainless welded 2 x 5 flat pan and miscellaneous equipment. I have picked up a used 5 gallon SS filter bucket and ordered a 16 x 20 SS finishing pan with bottling spout. I'm also building a 12 x 16 extension on my workshop for a sugar shack. I agree with everyone on this site -- this is addictive behavior! I'll retire come fall from 36 years as a forester here in northern Minnesota. I've now come to face the fact that I can't drive down the road anymore without looking for stands of large sugar maple. There WAY too many trees out there that need to be tapped! The good news is that my wife really enjoys this activity too, so it's a nice way for us to spend time together. Thanks to all of you on the site who have/are contributing to my learning about such a wonderful disease!

[Father & Son]

Welcome twigbender and you're right, it is a wonderful disease :D .
Jim

[325abn]

Hello all

Great looking site!!

I just found this forum looked around a bit and decided to register.

We have 52 buckets out this year up from 20 last year. All the taps can be reached with our garden tractor and mosts from the hard top road.
I use a 22 x 20 x 6 aluminum roasting pan over to propane turkey frier burners. I have modified the burners so they are very much closer to the pan mabey 1.5 inches. I used blocks and bricks to enclose around the burners and have two "preheat" pans on eiather side of the main pan. I have tweeked the setup to get about 6.5 Gal/hour. I know this is not the most efficent setup but hey you go with what you got. I have acess to a lot more trees so I hope to expand each year. I do however believe I am at the max for the setup we have now.We have made 6.75 Gal of Dark Amber this year. We sell our own organic produce at the local Farmers market and will sell some of our own syrup this year.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

That is an incredible evap rate for the size setup! Most guys can't get that good on a 2 x 3 half pint! :D

[220 maple]

I have enjoyed this site for two years now, finally decided to register.
I am printer by trade and work for the worlds largest printer at one of the many manufacturing plants. Here in Harrisonburg,Va., we print books. (Harry Potters, Tom Clancy. John Grisham, Stephen Kings) just to name a few. We avg. 150 millions books a year at this location. I've worked there 25 years.
I'm married and have two sons both are in College. Thomas at Eastern Mennonite here in Harrisonburg, John at Mary Washington University at Frederickburg, Va.
My wife Debbie and I have been married for 24 years. She is the best because she lets me drive 60 plus miles to my sugar camp in WV and play sugarmaker. 1500 taps this year 2000 last year. 1100 on Vacuum. All on tubing. Seven beef cows, the ones that get free advertising.(Angus)
No chickens, 1989 yamaha four wheeler. A truck load of Misc. junk....

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

220,

Where is your sugarcamp in WV?? Sounds like a big operation to drive that far?? Mine is 30 minutes away in Greenbrier county. :)

[220 maple]

Brandon,
I'm located in Grant County near the Pendleton County line. On US 220, hence the name 220 maple. I work a 4 star shift which is 12hrs two days on two days off, Every other weekend I,m off Fri.,Sat., Sunday. I stay with my mother when I go to the camp It is located in her backyard. My dad start making syrup after he retired in 1998. With my help and other family he expanded over 1000 taps. He passed away in the Fall of 2002.
Last season I had 2000 taps. I like making Syrup. One thing I've noticed is every sugarmaker I've met is a good person. I have heard of some bad eggs but have not met them personally.

Mark 220 maple[/quote]

[Banjo]

Hello everyone,
I was pointed to this site last fall, read and registered then. Have been reading up on evaporators over the past few days.

I've made syrup a few times from maples in our backyard and started again when we bought the farm here 15 months ago. Unfortunately our "Sugar Bush" is only these four trees in the front yard:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/Banjo1293/Huckleberry%20Orchards%20Farm/th_SugarBush.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/Banjo1293/Huckleberry%20Orchards%20Farm/SugarBush.jpg)
Last year I tapped with buckets and made several litres of syrup, with much more success when I re-drilled the tap holes a bit deeper.
This year I went to these mini pipelines, which I thought I'd invented but it turns out that lots of other people seem to have too :lol: .
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/Banjo1293/Huckleberry%20Orchards%20Farm/th_MiniPipelines.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/Banjo1293/Huckleberry%20Orchards%20Farm/MiniPipelines.jpg)
They have worked a charm, the sap is crystal clear, no problems with bugs, rain or wind (at least after I put the brick on top of each pail :oops:).
All told I have 11 "health" spiles and have managed to get about 13 litres or so of syrup so far this year. This is just for our own use, Christmas presents, and my mum who uses it for her bread.
I've been doing all my boiling on a propane burner and a 14" pot and am on my fourth tank of propane now! I finish in a pan on the stove inside. This year I'm working on trying to figure out when to stop boiling. I thought I was stopping too early ... which was fine for us as we don't have a very sweet tooth and the syrup was tasty. I managed to test some of this years crop at a larger operation near here (who bought some hay from me) and it was all 71-72.5%! I just finished the last sap tonight and hopefully got this batch "right".

I'm thinking of a larger evaporator for next year, and probably going to wood firing as there is lots of wood around here that needs to be cleaned and cleared up. I have to have the propane burner going pretty much all day to keep up with what I've got. I'd like to be able to do a quick boil up in a few hours instead and/or have room for more taps if I can find more trees. I've been scouring the posts here for info and likely will start asking questions soon. I like to make my own stuff so that's my first plan of attack.

We haven't explored all the corners of our 135 acres yet, but there don't seem to be more mature maples that we've found so far. There is one stand of smaller ones, that we're going to try to manage, so that they can grow faster. I'll probably try transplanting some more from my parents too (a good use for the backhoe I made :wink:).

Well, that's probably a long winded intro. Thanks for all the good info that people have posted already. And you're all right ... maple sugaring is another of those "magic" pastimes.

cheers, Andrew

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Andrew,

Welcome and great job! As far as getting the syrup right, you can get a hydrometer for around $ 15 and you can make you up a small test cup. There are lots of forums to post questions on and just about any question you can ask has already been asked and answered many times. Not too discourage you from asking them, but there are hours and hours of good information that you can go back thru if you have the time to read! :D :D

[lharris1]

Andrew: With the handle "Banjo" are you a banjo player?

[Banjo]

Branden, been doing lots of reading, both before and after the post :lol:. Was reading till after the computer told me the hour had changed last nigh :lol:. Lots of good info here. Still looking to see if some other questions have been answered before I start askin' :D

Larry, yup I've been known to play the banjo. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to have happened much in the past few months (well ... actually at all :cry: :oops: ).

Just going to head out and see if anything ran at all today. It was just below freezing for a few hours last night and warm all day.

cheers, Andrew

[Mike]

Andrew, Welcome to the site......Like the rest of us you'll grow quicker than you think....Sounds like you have the trees for a good size operation....Its a fever.......................... 8O 8O .......Welcome to the rest of the new people............Mike

[Mike]

Andrew, Welcome to the site......Like the rest of us you'll grow quicker than you think....Sounds like you have the trees for a good size operation....Its a fever.......................... 8O 8O .......Welcome to the rest of the new people............Mike

[Pete33Vt]

My name is Pete, I joined earlier this winter, havn't had much time to introduce myself. I have been sugaring for about 20 yrs, started with my grandfather, at age 10. Been helping out others for quite a few years, everything from setting up tubing to boiling. I have a great wife that I have been with for 10 yrs this November, Three step-sons 10-14-17, and one daughter 14. This year I have finally said its time for US which means I got my pencil and paper out and getting my list together. Going to start our own sugaring operation. That way its the way I want. Have the taps about lined up hopping for about 350-400 to start. Looking for a 3x10, and the list goes on.
Wishing you all a great summer, and congrats on the site, its great.

[Mike]

Welcome aboard Pete......If ya need any help with finding things let me know......Mike

[Sugarmaker]

Pete,
Welcome! I Know you will like this site these folks do a nice job of making you feel welcome. Your sugaring operations sounds about like ours we made syrup a long time with others and finally 5 years ago built a sugarhouse and have about the same amount of taps you are planning on too.
Just cut a pick up load of pallets tonight. about enough to make 2-3 gallons of syrup. Also working on the sap feed tubes for the 3x10.
Good luck with the sugarcamp.

Regards,
Chris

[Al]

Welcome to all the new people on board. Be very careful of this site because just like sugaring it to can be addictive. :lol: :lol:
Looking forward to our Maple Festival this weekend and all the dealer open houses also.
Pete were are you located in Bakersfield? I live in Fairfield on Pumpkin Village Rd.
Take care

[Father & Son]

Al,
We were also looking forward to the maple festival this weekend. Have had plans and rooms reserved for months but my son is home from school today with a temp of 102.7. We were going to leave Thursday to meet family from Connecticut for a weedend in St. Albans. Looks like we'll have to wait till next year.
Jim

[Pete33Vt]

Al, I live on East Bakersfield Rd. Not to far from you. I just started working for Dan Bushey,(Bushey Paving) his shop should be right around the corner from you.

[Al]

Yep, right around the corner.
Take care

[JimW]

Hello I've been reading the board a bit for the past couple months and just joined.

I am a high school science teacher and also teach a class in Natural Resource & Outdoor Studies. I live in Eastern Ontario. I got interested in maple syrup last year when we tapped a few maples in my Outdoor Studies class, this year we tapped 18 trees and produced about 4 gallons of syrup in my class using one of those turkey deepfryer kits to boil the sap. I am now "hooked" and we have just ordered a small 24" by 36" evaporator and plan to increase to 40 or 50 taps next year. The students in my class think it is great to make the syrup in class. Our goal is to produce 10 to 12 gallons next year to use for personal use, gifts and to sell to raise a bit of money for our class.

Besides my new maple hobby, I am busy with my 18 month and 3 year old daughters. In my limited free time I fish and hunt, and I am researching getting into hobby beekeeping next year.

Great site!!! I hope to learn a lot and try and contribute where I can.

JimW

[Russell Lampron]

JimW-

Welcome to the site. This is the place to learn about Maple. If you can't find the answer to a question you have by reading the forums, just ask. You will get many responses fast.

Your students are very lucky to have a teacher to teach them about maple production.

Russ

[Banjo]

Jim,
welcome for sure, from not too far away just outside Merrickville. Used to be in Athens several times a year when my son was playing hockey.

I'm at about the same scale and boiling technology as you, and am contemplating how to grow for next year too. I've found this place **VERY** helpful and informative. :D It is also quite *addictive* :lol: , perhaps just like making maple syrup :lol: .

Your students are lucky, I'm sure they're getting an experience for a lifetime.

cheers, Andrew

[Sugarmaker]

Jim,
Welcome also from NWPA.
Sounds like you and the students are hooked on maple. Great! We are new to the site (several months) and have gained a lot of knowledge and support.
Worked the bees and caned honey this weekend, it is also a hobby that is easy to enjoy. Picked up two new colonies on Saturday.
Regards,
Chris

[Bucket Head]

Greeting's everyone. I'm Steve and my father is Ron, and together we operate a backyard operation of 160 tap's. However, we did not start out with this size operation, so I'll start at the begining. Back in '85 we decided to tap 12 tree's of a neighbor's with the 12 steel spile's my mother had purchased year's before. We hung plastic milk jug's on them and they were alway's running over by the time we could gather them. Occasionally, throughout Jr. High and High School, my mother would let me play hooky to boil sap if we had a good run. That first year we boiled on a cement block fireplace with a small cast iron pot and a large aluminum frying pan. We soon learned that this was not the best boiling set up. We also learned that a roaring fire will melt the handle off an aluminum frying pan. And without a handle to pick it up off the fire with, the small amount of syrup that was in the pan burn's to a crisp! The following year my mother let us use her oval shaped roasting pan's. They worked better and we were pretty happy. Mother, on the other hand, was not too happy after seeing the condition of her pan's at the end of the season. My father had a pan made for the following year. It was about 1.5'x2' and that worked well. Over the next two year's we added two more fireplace's and pan's and increased the number of tap's to 55. It was quite a site in the back yard! We collected sap with milk can's in the trunk of a brown and white 1975 AMC Hornet. As you can imagine, this was quite a site too. Due to college and work taking up a lot of time, we had to call it quit's on the syrup making in '89. We had a lot of fun making syrup and we said that somtime we would do it again. Fast forward to 2002. I was laid off from work and just by chance, my mother and I saw a homemade evaporator that was for sale. It needed a lot of work to make it an efficient boiler, so I decided to pass on it. But my mother insisted that I go back and look it over. I'm pretty good at welding and fabricating so she was certain I could make it work. I did buy it after a lot of argueing with myself. It was pretty much just a big steel box with two flat stainless pan's. That first spring, I fire bricked it and got a smokestack on it. Over the last couple of year's, I've welded partition's in the front pan and put ten flue's in the rear pan. The proper fitting's and valve's were also added. I plumbed a furnace blower into the ash box and welded an a small overhead tank to it so we could gravity feed the rear pan. We are real pleased with it's performance and it's a huge step up from our three block fireplace's and pan's! My father and I made 42 gallon's of syrup this year. We have access to more tree's so we could make more syrup, but we would have to either invest in a larger evaporator or a R.O. Every minute of our spare time now is spent boiling our 160 tap's. Does this dilema sound familiar? Time will tell but were alway's thinking "bigger". Unfortunately, my mother passed away in 2002 but I am thankful for her "insistance" on getting back to sugaring. It truly is an addiction! Now I can't imagine springtime without making syrup! I also can't imagine life without the Mapletrader! This is a great website. Goodluck everyone in 2007!

Steve

[Pete33Vt]

Welcome aboard, It sounds like your start in sugaring is a colorful one with alot of memories.Hope all goes well for you in the future. This site is amazing and will really help you. Everyone here is great.
Pete

[maple flats]

Welcome aboard Steve bucket head. Sounds like you are hooked for good now. I live in Oneida, just 20 minutes down the road from you. Sometime we should get together and exchange ideas. Do you have a sugarhouse yet? It keeps getting deeper and deeper, this maple addiction, great isn't it! :D :D :D

[Bucket Head]

Thank's guy's. I'm happy to be aboard. I have spent hour's in front of this computer reading the forum's. What an incredible wealth of information! Keep it coming!!
Maple Flat's- Your right, we are hooked. I would love to see your operation some time. Getting together sometime is a great idea. I will e-mail you and we can set up a time. To answer your question, no we do not have a saphouse. But we need one! I made a removable "roof" out of tin roofing material that we can cover the evaporator with when it rain's. It has leg's that slide into pocket's on the side's of the rig. Rain does not really bother us, it's the wind that we can't stop! Someday we'll be inside. I'll talk to you later.

Steve

[HanginAround]

Hi, been lurking a bit here in the past, so thought I better sign up. I'm not a maple producer, but my dad sells maple supplies, my uncle and cuz have a 12,000 tap op, another uncle makes maple related electronics, I help a friend with his 100 taps, and my fam has been in the business for generations. Oh yeah, I know a dozen other producers too. Sooo... I don't feel out of place in the sugarwoods :D I would like to have a hobby operation for myself, and that might take place sometime in the next few yrs, but not right away.

[Sugarmaker]

Great to have new folks involved in the Maple hobby. Steve nice write up on your early sugar making!
Hanging Around, I am sure you could teach us some things. If you have been hangin with sugar makers then its bound to rub off.

Northwest PA
Chris

[maple flats]

Welcome HanginAround, you need a shorter nickname, like Hangin or HA. We will likely learn a lot from you. We need new ideas and new blood always spurs new ideas. You have found a great place to sit down, put your feet up and just talk sugarin.

[HanginAround]

Thanks for the welcome. Several people in on-line games and other forums call me Hangin or Hang as I've been using the nick for years. Not sure how much you could learn from me, most likely the other way around.

I didn't put many details in the first post, so here... I'm 41, temporarily unemployed Network Tech (computers). I live in southeast New Brunswick (geez where's all the rest of the producers from the Maritimes?). My dad has a maple supply business which I give him a hand at often. He sells Lapierre/Waterloo/Small as well as glass, etc. My uncle has two sugarwoods, one is 11,000 taps and one is 1000 (much closer to the city, so more for show/retail). Another uncle owns Ystec Electronics (www.ystec.com). And my name is Pete, and I think I'm becoming a mapleholic.

[Cardigan99]

Todd here. Been looking at the posts on this site for most of the summer. Figured it was time to hop in. I live around the corner from the AMC lodge in Alexandria NH with my wife and son. (She's amused. He's too young to haul buckets.) Started with 15 taps this last season. Boiled down on the grill. Close to a gallon all said and done. (gone before June). Hope to tap 100 or so for next season if I can rig up a decent evaporator. Like the looks of the oil tank types. The real thing is out of reach for the moment.

Thanks for the great site guys.

PS Kim, thanks for your understanding.

[Fred Henderson]

Welcome to the site Todd. Most of us started out small just as you have done. Its an addiction.

[Sugarmaker]

Todd,
Welcome.
Summers is busy and haven't had much time to get on the trader.
You will really enjoy this site as much as sugaring!
100 taps you will need a little upgrade from the grill or you might consider taking sap to a fellow sugar maker till you get set up.
Regards,
Chris

[Parker]

Todd I am in Salisbury,,just down the road,,If you need some old tubing or other stuff let me know as I have a bunch of stuff kicking around the sugarhouse I would be glad to pass on to someone getting going,,good luck

[Cardigan99]

Guys, thanks for the welcome! I really enjoy this site, it's a fantastic resource for info. Yeah, 100 taps is a little ambitious for the barbie. A couple of the posts I've seen have pictures and comments on a DIY oil tank evaporator. I think that's right up my alley for next season.. Sawzall, angle iron, welder. We can built it!

Question, how does someone go about posting pictures on the BB? I came across what's left of an old Leader evap buried in the leaves and sod out back a cpl months ago while scouting trees (this was definately a sign). Pretty well rotted out but doors were all in one piece. Looks to be about 14X3 with a very big oval flue at the end. maybe 30x10 inches. Wanted to see if someone could put a date to it. Above the doors on the casting it says Leader Evaporator Co. Next line in smaller letters Burlington VT

[sbingham]

I registered on this site in June of 2005, guess that it is about time to introduce myself. We are located in NW Wisconsin, the spring 2005 was our first year - made a total of 5 gallons of syrup on an old fuel oil tank and a 2'x4' tin pan, 38 taps. This past spring we updated to a 2'x4' GBM Arch and stainless steel pan, 50 taps and ended up with 12 gallons of syrup. Most all is for family & friends to enjoy.
This site and all of the info is fantastic, I check it almost daily. It is unbelievable how this maple sugaring gets into your blood, I am already planning and looking forward to next spring.
The information that was posted on outdoor furnaces a month or so ago also helped us decide to purchase the Central Boiler furnace, hope to have one delivered in the next couple of weeks.
Thanks again to everyone for all of the great information.
Scott Bingham - Tony, WI

[mapleman3]

Welcome, Pete, Todd and Scott, as you have seen here there are a lot of sugarers with tons of experience,some or none at all. we are all here for the same reason learn, teach, or just plain have a good time reading and chatting back and forth, everyone here is great, I have learned so much here and keep learning... and what a way to get reviews on all the equipment out there! Enjoy !! :D

2 taps or 40,000 taps .. it's all made the same way.. have fun doing it !

[HanginAround]

Welcome Todd and Scott.

Todd, I helped make an oil tank evaporator last spring, and posted a couple pics of it today:
http://www.mapletrader.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=23341

And Parker and I were discussing posting pics here:
http://www.mapletrader.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2540

Feel free to ask about either topic.

[Cardigan99]

HangingAround, Thanks for the heads up on the Pics. I posted them under evaporators. I have a few more, but the evaporator itself is pretty well buried and if you pull on it, it just falls apart. The fuel tank evap you built is exactly what I had in mind. Have you fired it yet? and guesses on GPH? Is that one continuous pan on top? (no baffles)

Parker, thanks for the offer. I'll holler when the time comes. mapleman3, thanks for the welcome

[HanginAround]

Card, I replied to your questions in my thread under Homeade Equipment to avoid hyjacking this thread.

[bonnie]

:? Hi everyone! My name is Bonnie, I just moved to michigan's beautiful U.P. where I hope to spend the rest of my life. I am forty years young and have never made maple syrup before. I can't wait to get started in sugaring, but I have everything to learn. I have about 10 acres of mature sugar maples to work with. My hope is to start with 20 or 30 taps and expand rapidly. There is an old sugar house here but it needs work, The only equipment left behind is an old wood cook stove, a few taps, and a few buckets. I've been reading alot here and elswhere but if anyone is near Iron River and is willing to help a beginner I am a great listener. Well, wish me luck! I can't wait for spring!!!

[HanginAround]

Hi Bonnie, welcome. Sounds very exciting for you to have a new place, a new hobby, so much to learn, and so much fun to be had. This is definately the place to learn what you need to know. Also, make as many contacts in the maple industy in your area as you can, maybe start with your local dealer. Visiting others' camps are the best way to learn what's going on and to see where you want to go. In-season is best, but lots of people can show you their setup in the off-season as well.

Here the Michigan Association's site where you can find a list of producers and equipment dealers:
http://www.mi-maplesyrup.com/Contents.htm

Have fun.

[Pete33Vt]

Welcome, you have come to the right place. There are alot of knowledgeable people on here and are willing to help out in anyway.If you are not sure on something just ask. You will find that you get more than one answer to your question. Then its a matter of using the answer that fits your needs.
Again welcome Pete

[forester1]

Welcome Bonnie. Nice to see a fellow Yooper on the board. I don't know of a used evaporator but I have a bunch of used tubing and 7/16" plastic spouts you can have if you ever get near Gwinn, which is 100 miles away from you. Good luck.

[Cardigan99]

Hi Bonnie, Welcome. It's a great site. You'll spend hours going through the posts. So much to learn.

Michigan is beautiful state. I use to spend my summers down in Tawas. I miss it often.

[Sugarmaker]

Bonnie,
Welcome. Wow 10 acres of sugar bush should allow you many options. How many hard maple taps do you think you could put in there? careful about the size rig you start with. The hobby's is very addicting and your could end up trading up several times. New rigs are not cheap!
Find some local sugar makers and visit them. Also selling your sap to them and helping them is a excellent way to learn the ropes. Getting the sap to a sugar house is over half of the battle!
I have just the opposite problem, sugar house on 4 acres and no maples! We rent all of ours.
Good luck,
Chris

[maplehound]

I agree chris,
Bonnie you won't be happy till you have every tap possible out of your woods. So plan to build and buy acordingly. I have a small sugar house ( wish it was bigger) on 1 acre of land and rent my taps. I still have about 200 taps that I haven't yet tapped and am near my capacity unless I spend 6,000 - 15,000 on an R.O.
Dream big.
Ron

[blackstrapking]

Hi everybody, My name is Jason King, I live in Henderson Ny which is south of Watertown and north of Syracuse, next to Lake Ontario. I have been boiling sap for several years on a very small scale. In the past couple years I have been getting more serious to a point where two years ago I boiled in a large bulk tank skin. Built a stainless pan last year. I've been scavenging bits and pieces for this year. I am currently building a sugar shack to keep the neighbors warmer this year! I stumbled across your folk's web site and have been enjoying it ever since. It has become part of my daily ritual.

I just can't figure out why this is all so addictive?

[maplehound]

Welcome blackstrapking,
This site is a daily ritual for most of us. And for some (like myself) it is checked several times a day. To the point of obsecion. At least my wife thinks so.
Ron

[HanginAround]

Welcome Blackstrap, always good to see new faces.

Feel free to jump in and post lots.

[Fred Henderson]

Welcome and even if my name is the same as you town I am not related. My mother was born in Clayton but she past a few ago. Henderson is some place that I always wanted to spend some time there but just never got around to it. I got a brother that will some be living at 3 Mile Bay when he retires at the end ot this month. He has spent all his free time for the last 4 years remodeling a summer home there into a year around home.

[Pete33Vt]

Welcome Blackstrapking, I take it from your name you make some good blackstrap syrup. Not alot of people like it, but I like to have a few gallons on hand for baking. As far as this addiction goes, there are alot of things that are really unhealthy for your to be addictied to. So it one you can enjoy and not get in (legal) trouble. (Wife) trouble is a whole other thing. :lol: :lol: :lol:
Again welcome aboard and feel free to jump in and post.


Pete[/quote]

[super sappy]

Welcome Blackstrap king. I know just where Henderson is. My wifes family is from there. Her Great grndfather had a good size sugar operation there in the 40/50s. I usto go to southwicks beach for the reunion every year but now its too far of a drive for a one day event.Do you have family roots there? Super Sappy

[325abn]

What is Blackstrap?

[blackstrapking]

fred H.,
I grew up just a few miles from 3 mile bay, thanks for the reply

[blackstrapking]

Super Sappy,
I dont't have any roots in Henderson, I moved here six years ago after college. I grew up 40 min. north in Cape Vincent. I was curious to know where abouts your wife's family's sugar bush used to be located?

[blackstrapking]

325abn,
Well to start out "blackstrap" is something I like to refer to as "the sweet nectar of the god's" Just kidding, as Pete33vt stated earlier most people dont care for blackstrap, which is very true. Blackstrap by my definition would be very,very DARK syrup as a result of boiling in a pan and continually adding sap without drawing off until all sap is gone or until it's 3 Am in my case. The syrup is usally very strong flavor, goes great in coffee!

[802maple]

That sounds like a good definition of blackstrap, I thought I would take this time to introduce myself. I live in LIncoln, Vt and I have been a sugarmaker all my life as was my father and grandfather before me for nearly a hundred years on the same woods until 5 years ago when it became a burden to keep 200 acres of land just to use 25 acres just for sugaring. I thought at that time I could just walk away from it but once you have the fever it is like riding a bike it just does not go away. So I went to work for a large sugarmaker here in town until this year. My wife and I are presently looking for a piece of land that would eventually have a 1000 taps or so. We want to stay small so that we can also enjoy our other passions such as golf and hunting.

Jerry "Beanie" Masterson

[HanginAround]

Welcome... I know you've posted a bit in the past, but since you're just now officially introducing yourself, I'll officially welcome you :D

[Sugarmaker]

Welcome Beanie,
Looking forward to learning some things about syrup from you. I think your right, seems hard to break this habit. Weather has been spring like here in NW PA and one local sugarmaker has a crew washing buckets. Wonder if they are going to tap? Hummmm :wink:

Chris

[Ohio Bobcat]

I first posted over on the wanted page, but I wanted to introduce myself officially here. Hi. I'm a hobbiest of the smallest proportions, having made four gallons of liquid gold last season. Looking to do a little more this year in suburban Ohio. Hoping to learn a lot from all of you, so please excuse me if I ask any dumb questions.

[Pete33Vt]

Bobcat, there are no dumb questions on here. For me sugaring a way of life and an obsession. Not everyone know everything about sugaring, so we ask. Even people that have been at this all there lifes ask questions from time to time. Everyone has there way of doing things and tricks they use. And syrup gets in your blood so we are a little sweeter then the rest.
Welcome aboard.
Pete

[super sappy]

Hello bobcat,And 802. I was in Arlington Vt Yesterday and saw a property tax bill.If that bill was any indication of property taxes in VT I can fully understand why you got rid of the 200.The sugar maker said he was packing it in after 25 years. Black strap king I will ask Grammy Moore about the bush out in Henderson.She is in her 80 s and most likely will remember where it was.-Super sappy

[802maple]

you are correct nearly $7000 a year for land with only 30 feet of road frontage and nothing on it for buildings was alittle more than I could justify

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

So much for freedom, we are heading more toward Communism every day. I have an uncle who lives around Corning NY and has a small farm and and a farmhouse on it that they have renovated some and he pays close to $ 500 a month. It's getting out of control as most of the money is wasted anyways. :twisted:

[super sappy]

Hey hangin. How are things in canada?.I have some people that I do work for from Toronto and they say that everything is better there. They just have great Jobs at RPI in Troy,NY That is why they are living here for now. What are taxes like in canada?super sappy

[HanginAround]

We pay more taxes overall, but I would say less property tax, more sales tax and income tax. Sales tax (mixed federal and provincial) in NB is 14%. Taxes on gas, alcohol, tobacco are very high. Residential property tax here in the city is 1.65/100 assessment, rural areas are less. Property values are quite low too, especially if you get out of town a ways. But we don't have to buy health insurance 8O

Oh yeah, didn't the guys from T-O tell you the world revolves around Toronto?? 8O None of them Upper Canadians could find NB on a map :lol:

[NH Maplemaker]

Brandon your right! The only differance between LIBERALISM and COMMUNISM is that with liberalism the poeple just give there rights up to the goverment with out question!! With communism the the goverment takes them!! In the end it is the same :oops: Jim L.

[Sugarmaker]

Thanks to Kim we have a new maple name on the trader.

I just happened to be browsing the names and realized we were missing the "Sugarmaker" So with Kim's help she transferred all my old posts to the new name.

Since I don't go back to work till Jan 2, I should be able to spend some 'quality' time on the trader, in between deer hunting events.

Same old me, just a new (trader) name.

Merry Christmas

Sugarmaker formerly chris_casbohm

[NH Maplemaker]

I'm sure it will be the same old helpful Chris what ever the new name :D

Merry Christmas to all :!: Maplemaker

[hholt]

I just wanted to say hello to everyone and introduce myself. I was on here last year and asked a few questions, and just this past month made the PLUNGE and bought a small evaporator. All I have here is box elders and silver maples, but I think I'll have a lot of fun with my two boys.

[royalmaple]

Welcome aboard, glad to see you too have the addiction.

[HanginAround]

Hello and welcome!

[Fred Henderson]

Pete; You really need to tap 1 tree so you can change your sig. :roll: :roll: Happy New Year :)

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome hholt,

I had some visiters to my sugarhouse last year that tap box elders. I don't remember what state they said they were from. They didn't have a sample of their syrup for me to try but they liked mine and bought some to bring home with them.

Russ

[blackstrapking]

hi hholt,
A neighbor of mine used to tap box elders years ago. The finished product reminded me of honey. Very good stuff.

Jason

[hholt]

I didn't know you could use box elders until I visited a nature center outside of Cedar Rapids Iowa and that's all they were using....and yes their stuff tasted great but then I'm one of those people that LOVES maple syrup in all it's various forms and grades!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[VA maple guy]

Homestead Maple, I've heard of shagbark hickory syrup. I was told that
the flavor is extracted from the bark and then sugar is added to make syrup.
I don't know what it tastes like, but I would like to try it.
Gerry

[JasonS]

Hello Again,

Just wanted to let everyone know that I had to create a new username, for some odd computer reason. So from now on the old username of "Seibold's Sugarhouse" in CT will be known As "JasonS" I traded emails with Kim and somehow "Seibold's Sugarhouse" was lost into the great unkown world of the internet. Anyway it's nice to be back and lets hope the weather stays cold!!!

Jason

[HanginAround]

Welcome back :D

[oneoldsap]

Hi! I am Mike Bromley I'm !/2 of Two Old Saps Sugarworks. We are located in Lincoln Vermont . We started this operation 9 yeaes ago, selling sap from 750 taps on gravity. IN 2001 we built a 24x50 Sugarhouse we installed a sort of home made arch and a srt of Grimm Lightning 5x14 SS pans 10 foot flue 4 foot front. We installed Vacuum and added 300 taps the following year. 3 years ago we added a 600GPH Lapierre R.O. Last year we added 850 new taps.This year we've added 300+ more taps That makes us about 2000 taps All On Pipeline with vacuum. We also buy sap from a neighbors 600+ taps. We have made a lot of our own stuff. WE do all of our own welding including stainless steel. If you are broken down we'd be glad to help you out.

[Dave Y]

Mike, Welcome to the " Trader" . I am sure you will find the forum helpful and entertaining.

[HanginAround]

Welcome Old Sap, good to have you here.

[Sugarmaker]

Welcome Mike,
Love to see what folks can fabricate on there own. Looking forward to watching the posts from you.

Chris

[Seibold's Sugarhouse]

Well, now thanks to the new software the user name "Seibold's Sugarhouse" is no longer lost in the great wonders of the internet. Now I don't know which user name to use, this one or the new one I created "JasonS". Well, I guess I could have bigger problems!!!

[PFHII]

Hi everyone I would just like to intrduce myself. My name is Renee Pattee I live in Enosburg Falls,VT my family and I have been sugaring for 6 years now. I came from a maple family. My Grandfather was Arthur Toof of Fairfax. So I guess you would say it is in my blood. We have a 1200 BUCKET operation and just purchased a INTENSE-O-FIRE last year what a difference. We recieved 1ST place at the 2006 NAMSC maple conference in Wisconsin for our Light Amber. Just goes to show you a little operation can still be the best.


Pattee Family Herefords II
1200+/- buckets
Wood Intense-O-Fire
Kubota Tractors
Beef Cows

[HanginAround]

Welcome to the forums!

[Sugarmaker]

Renee,
Welcome to the Trader and congratulations on the win in Wisconsin.
"Danger" some of us are talking about not making syrup this year because it may cut into the time on the trader. LOL
Chris

[Pete33Vt]

Hi Renee,
Good to see you checked this site out. I know you like to chat about maple and this is the place. And like I said the other day, if you are looking for something this is the place. Talk to you soon.

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome aboard all new members. Don't afraid to post a question or reply to one if you have an opinion or answer for someone. The new sugaring season is just around the corner. I hope it is a good one for everyone.

Russ

[andyp]

Hi everyone, I would like to introduce myself, my name is Andy, I'm from Ford City, Pa. My friend and I started making maple syrup three years ago. We are two retired, crazy old men with maple fever and a hobby that has gone completely out of control. We started the first year in the back yard with a homemade arch and a 30X60 stainless steel flat pan and 100 taps. The second year we lined the arch with fire brick and added a preheater and constructed a temporary sugar shack and added 140 taps. This year we built a new 16X30 sugar shack and plan on adding 60 more taps. There are more trees on the farm to tap but we don't know how much the homemade evaporator can handle, but more important, is we don't know how much more the crazy old men can do.
Hope you all have a good maple season.
Andyp

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Andy,

Welcome to the forum and isn't it fun feeling like a kid again. The one thing you have on your side is good help and lots more time than most of us have since you are retired. With 2 of you to boil, wear out the 30x60.

With that size building, you might want to tap all those trees on the farm and get you a 2x8 or 3x8 evaporator. You could boil off around 60 to 70 gph with a 3x8 and this is a popular size and you could pick up a nice used one for a good price!

[HanginAround]

Welcome Andy to the forum. Feel free to jump in anywhere you see fit.

[Fred Henderson]

Welcome Andy, I too am one of the old retired guys.

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome aboard Andy,

I still a few years before I can retire but I am setting up my sugaring operation now so that the major things will be paid for before I do. Good luck and have fun this season.

Russ

[woodcutter]

Hello to everyone,
I just found this site and I am a producer with 20 years under my belt. Looking at the posts I can see a lot of the things I have done, tried ,and wish to do. I started out on buckets and a 2x2 pan in the woods. We progressed to 750 buckets ,a 24x24 sugarhouse and a team of Belgians. We now are retired and use tubbing and vacuum. I make just as much syrup with 400 on vacuum as I did with 750 buckets. My good wife is a wheat weaver and we do craft shows in Ohio, Pa, and Va. under the name Wheat-n-Sweet. Our website is www.Wheat-n-Sweet.com . I spent most of my time cutting wood, to heat the house, sugarwood, or in my wood shop, where I make enough mistakes to keep that fire going. Hope to meet some of you in the future and I will add my two cents if I think it will help someone not make some of the mistakes I have lived through.

[HanginAround]

Pleased to meet you Woodcutter, welcome to the forums!

[Fred Henderson]

Welcome Woodcuter and thanks for telling us a bit about yourself.

[Sugarmaker]

AndyP and Woodcutter,
You guys have found a home this is a really nice forum, and has really helped me in a variety of areas. If your ever in NW PA ,Albion area, look me up.
Chris

[Ohio Bobcat]

Welcome Woodcutter. I too am newer to this great forum. Where are you located? I'm in Concord Township, backyarding it.

[ryan marquette]

Hello fello maple adicts,
I would like to finally introduce myself, this great forum has been in my favorites for a year now. I live in WI & I am married with 3 young boys ages 1 mnth.,2 yrs,& 4 yrs. old. My uncle made syrup when I was young & I started doing it on my own 4 years ago. I am trying not to tap this spring because 200 taps with a 30 x 48 flat pan is crazy & we want to build a house in the spring. When we build I have to get a better set up.

[maplehound]

Ryan.
Welcome to the site. Try to tap if only a couple, If you are waiting to tap till you get that bigger rig, you may never tap but if you just do a little evey year then you will be more apt to buy that good rig that you always wanted.

[ryan marquette]

The two boys & I tapped the 1 & only tree in the backyard it was running pretty good. Thats the only tree I can tap, otherwise next thing you know I'll have 200 taps & pulling 24/7 cooking.

[maplehound]

up it to 20 taps and keep those boys interested. At least you would have some for yourself. I would If I could. I am sitting this year out myself. I had surgery on my back and am forbidden to tap this year,

[HanginAround]

I am trying not to tap this spring because 200 taps with a 30 x 48 flat pan is crazy...


HA! Good luck with that... you know you want to... just a few... can't hurt can it?? It's not like your addicted or anything... you can quit anytime you want...

LOL Welcome Ryan!

[3% Solution]

Well here goes, we're new here. So let me introduce us;
We are a family affair making syrup in the backyard. There is wife (good help!), daughter and son-in-law, granson and granddaughter, and of course myself.
My maple days started back in the early 70's with Morris Putnum of Putnum Brothers in South Charlestown, NH. He taught me a lot!!!!
I retired in 1999 and needing something to do, my grandson ask if we could make syrup, just think after 30 yrs I have a chance again (good excuse hey!).
Well we have been doing the boil thing since 2001 on a sheetmetal shop rig, SS 2x5, 2x2 flat and a 2x3 flue.
We have fun with it.
I have been visiting here since maybe December and have read quite a few posts and thought maybe I could lend a helping hand and no doubt get some good ideas (I have picked up a few already).
So with all that said, we are planning on tapping Saturday, 127 taps ..... the lot of us!
You may see posts from anyone of us.
Glad to be here!
Hey Brandon, I finally got time to do this.
Hope I did this right.
Dave

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome to the site 3% Solution. Just jump in anytime with advise or comments and don't hesitate to ask a question if you want to know something.

Russ

[royalmaple]

welcome aboard-

You are not too far from some producers on here.

[Fred Henderson]

Welcome 3% . Are you doing road side trees or a small bush?

[Russell Lampron]

Yeah Matt he probably isn't too far from "The Governor".

Russ

[3% Solution]

Hey thanks for our welcome so far.
You know once this maple stuff gets in your blood, it lasts for years and your pretty much done!!!
However, I figure this is my "Spring Weight Loss Program"
Matt; I would say I could travel to a number of members in just a short time, NH, Vt. or Mass.
Fred; We do roadside and lawn trees (sugar maple) just because they are easy and mostly cause they are sweeeeeeeet - hence the username.
Russ; I would say I am close to "The Gov" it's only 10 minutes across towm, do you know the road/street he lives on? I bet I know him!
If it looks confusing at times when I'm off and on line, it's cause we are on dial-up so I clear the phone lines alot.
Again, thanks for the welcomes.

Dave

[royalmaple]

Kevin is maple hill sugarhouse. Right next door to you pretty much.

[3% Solution]

Hey there Sugar Daddy!! We were able to find you with your email you sent us. Pretty neat stuff and YES this has really proven that it is in your blood.

Love,
The four L's

[HanginAround]

Welcome folks, always good to see new peeps.

[sweetvt]

After several years of some serious lurking on this site I finally have taken the jump and joined in. I am located in East Montpelier, VT. I am 42 years old and have been involving in sugaring since I was a kid. My parents run a 600 tap operation in Addison County VT and I grew up sugaring there. I currently have an approx 120 tap set up and my evaporator is a Lapierre Junior 18"x66" drop flue. I have about 50-60 taps on pipeline and the rest on buckets. This year the bucket number might be less as the snowbanks on the roadside Maples are "wicked big " as us Vermonters like to say. As we all here already know, this maple bug is some kind of serious, as I find myself spending way to much time reading on this site and constantly checking the 15 day weather forcast. Glad to finally be on the site officially and have some questions to ask of all of you hard core traders.

[HanginAround]

Hi sweet, welcome to the site!

[Sugarmaker]

Neil,
Done lurking, start typing! Great to have another seasoned maple guy with us.
The site is almost as 'bad' as making syrup.;)
Regards,
Sugarmaker

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome aboard Neil,

Like Sugarmaker said this site is addicting. I think more so than sugaring.

Russ

[Jim Brown]

Welcome and everyone is right it is as bad as making syrup!

[eye8astonie]

Hey all, I'm new to this site and to making syrup. We're in Whitney Point, NY, and we're just tapping a few trees behind the house and putting together a little rig to do over a wood fire, but even after doing just a small test batch I can see how contagious this is and how tempting it is to want to grow once you get started. Kinda like owning a boat, you always want the next size up!

Anyway, thanks for sharing all your knowledge, I'll be soaking it up as I go through our first few trials and I'm sure many errors as we learn about this awesome hobby.

Look forward to talking with y'all!
Duane

[HanginAround]

Welcome Duane, glad to meet you.

Feel free to jump in and post freely.

[3% Solution]

Hey Duane,
Just registered myself in the past week
Welcome!
This is a neat site with alot of good folks with great ideas to help each other.
Hey guys we got another one that's been bit, it is now spreading through his blood stream!!!!!!
Now, your going to start thinking "How can I tweek this baby to get more out of it". That's the facination of the whole thing.
Well have a good time.

Dave

[Sugarmaker]

Duane, and 3%,
Welcome::)
I need to get to the sugarhouse and do some work!;) Happy tapping!

Sugarmaker

[eye8astonie]

Thanks all, I appreciate the welcome.

Well, I think we're all set up here, got the "evaporator" put together today, and we're going to start boiling in the morning and see how it goes. Should have about 14 gallons of sap, which with our little rig will probably take a little while to boil down. I see you guys talk about how many gallons per hour you can do..... I may be figuring hours per gallon!! :)

Looks like that will be it for a week or so though... getting more no-mosquito weather next week!

Anyone else in the Central New York area on this site?

Have fun!
Duane

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Dave,

Great to see ya on here!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[davey]

not quite Central Ny but I live in Macedon, part of the Finger Lakes Region. I am about 3 miles from exit 44 on the Thruway.
Dave

[3% Solution]

Hey Brandon,
How's the sugarin'?
Must be doing good, you haven't been here much.
What's the total?
We finished up tapping today, got 130 out.
Looks like starting Friday we may be busy for a few days.
Have fun!!!!!!!

Dave

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I finished off 29.5 gallons Friday night and drew off 6 to 8 more yesterday. With what is in the evaporator, should be pushing 40 gallon. Hoping for 2 more weeks.

[3% Solution]

All right, keep right on hammering!
It's 29 degrees here and snowing off and on
I think we hit it right again this year, tapped just before the push.
Thanks for the info.

Dave

[Gary in NH]

Hello, My name is Gary. I live in Bedford,NH. This is my fourth year making syrup. My 3 kids and I enjoy the whole process of making syrup. We have only made a couple of quarts per season but would like to make more. This year we have tapped more trees and a couple of them are real gushers so we are optimistic. We have made just under a 1/2 gallon so far this year. It is very sweet, light yellow and fancy according to my grading sampler. I have worked in the field of water treatment for 18 years for Culligan. I design and sell all types of water systems including RO for many commercial applications so I am anxious to try RO in syrup production. I am currently putting together a small RO to try out since my turkey fryer evaporator is so inefficient. This forum is an incredible source of information and as a beginner I am very appreciative of the info posted. I hope everyone has a productive season and thanks again for a great site.

[HanginAround]

Welcome Gary, we'll have ya sold on an evaporator, camp, thousands of dollars in "investments" in no time LOL.

You'd be the guy to figure out how to make or convert a small home RO to the maple bisuness. My Dad has a tiny one for drinking water, and I wondered if there was a way with the right membrane, and maybe boost the input pressure to make it work for sap.

[Gary in NH]

Hi Pete,

When I started thinking about the RO I considered the possibility of using a small residential system. Without adjustments for system pressure and concentrate flow I don't think it would work too well even with a booster pump. Small residential systems usually control concentrate flow with a capillary tube which is a very narrow tube acting as a flow restrictor. The one I'm putting together will be a small commercial system running @ 250 psi, flow meters, and system pressure and concentrate adjustment. I was also thinking about recirculating the sap through a 5-micron filter and a UV light prior to the RO feed.

Maybe someday we'll be a larger producer and need a real evaporator.
If my math is correct to end up with $10,000 by the end of the season I'd need to start with about $20,000 :)

[Russell Lampron]

Hi Gary,

Welcome to the site. Keep us posted on the RO project. You are the smallest producer to be thinking RO right out of the gate. I think the $20,000 figure is a little on the low side.

Russ

[SapSuckers]

Hello,

I have been reading many of the post's for a few weeks now and decided to join the site. My name is chris, and I am from northern NY, pretty much in the cornor between VT and Canada.

This will be my third year sugarin. I went from borrowing sap and setting a turkey fryer on fire (not bad for a paid firefighter as a primary job) my first year. This year we will have approx 100 taps on gravity tubing and a 4x4 syrup pan on a homemade oil fired arch. Looking forward to a great season.

Still very cold here in NY, commerical producers are starting to get their 1000's of taps in. We are planning to tap this Sunday, suppose to be in the 40's.

Looking forward to asking and adding input to many questions. Good luck and I hope everyone has a great season!

Chris

[HanginAround]

Welcome Chris, always nice to see another new victim... errr, member. Feel free to jump in and post wherever you see fit.

[3% Solution]

Welcome gary and Chris,
I have only been here a short time, but have enjoyed being here helping out (I hope) and most of all getting ideas.
Gary: You can start right in my sugarhouse with any type of experimental RO you might be thinking about!! I agree, you need more taps, more taps, bigger rig and no time then you'll fit right in!!!!!
Chris: Oh this is good, a firefighter burning stuff up, playing with fire, oh great!!
Well, from one retired firefighter to one that's on the job, you need a bigger rig ...... more taps and no time, like the rest of us!
You guys have a good time and enjoy!!!
Good luck.

Dave

[jdj]

Hello everyone. My name is Jason. I am 25 years old. Never been married and no kids. I am from Brandon, NY. My grandfather, father and myself started making syrup in 1990 with a leader 3x9, wood fired, 375 taps. 2000 my grandfather passed away. The pans on the evaporator got bad so my father and I decided to stay in the business and buy a new evaporator. 2002 we purchased a new leader 3x10 drop flue , wood fired and built an addition on our existing sugarhouse. In late spring of 2006 we purchased a steamaway, so this will be our first season using it. We are now up around 1100-1300 taps, all buckets. It seems that once you start sugaring, you can't quit. I wish my grandfather could see our operation now. He would probably think my father and I have gone crazy. Each year we try to buy a new piece of equipment or two. Well I guess this about sums it up. I am new to this site and really enjoy reading peoples posts. Best of luck to all.

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome Jason,

It is nice to have young guys doing this to keep the maple industry going. If you have a question or comment don't be afraid to post it.

Russ

[3% Solution]

Good morning Jason,
I haven't been here to long either, but find folks are pretty neat and easy to get along with.
There are many tips that I have picked so far.
This maple business is VERY addictive as you know!
Anyway, welcome aboard and happy sailing.
As for your grandfather seeing what you guys have now, he knows and sees and he is happy for you guys. Believe me.
When you guys have a problem think how would grandfather would do this, I do that a lot, how would my dad deal with this.
Will the sap run today, one can only hope!
Enjoy!!

Dave

[HanginAround]

Welcome Jason! I think it's great to see the younger guys getting/staying involved, there seems to be so few. Jump in and post as much as you like.

[brookledge]

Jason
Well atleast you are young. That is alot of buckets to have to collect. I have 9 buckets and when I collect them I always say to myself I'm glad I only have 9. I'd put them all on my vac. system but they are to far away to do it.
Plus I work a full time job and have two young kids. So I have no time to collect. When I get home the sap is waiting for me.
Welcome aboard and let us know how that steam away works
Keith

[jdj]

Keith all those buckets are a lot work. I too work full time, mostly the midnight shift. Probably worse than having to collect the sap from them is having to wash them at the end of the season. I hate washing buckets but it's all part of sugaring, it can't all be fun. Pipeline is looking more tempting every year. I'll try to let you know how the steamaway works. I've heard lots of pros and cons about them but soon I will see for myself. Best of luck to you.
Jason

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Jason,

I too am very interested in how the steamaway works and what percentage it increase your evaporation rate. Keep us posted and welcome!!!

[Gary in NH]

Got some more buckets from Bascom's this week. Now have 25, up from 15 and no more maples on my property to tap. My RO is coming together a little slower than expected but I have all the parts. I made a Sap storage tank from a water softener salt tank that was never used. It sits outside my house in a shady spot packed with snow around it. I put a bulkhead fitting and valve in the bottom and I will feed the RO in the basement with a line through the basement window. Got about 21 gallons of sap in the last day and a half. I collected late last night around 1:00 am because it started raining hard and I didn't want diluted or brown sap. Everything slowed down today. Last night I got 15 gals. of 2% sap and today I got 6 gals of 1.6%. My wife and kids think I'm going a little overboard. This site is great - you don't even need a sponsor :)

[jdj]

Brandon,
We boiled the other night for the first time using the steamaway. What a difference! We have a 3x10 drop flue and were doing approx. 80-90 gph before the steamaway and the other night with the steamaway we were doing 150+gph. Can't believe the difference. Of course it's not an RO but does just what we wanted it to do. Also more hot water than you can imagine. I've read where some people say a steamaway is nothing more than a preheater-kinda wonder if they actually ever owned one and/or used one. I would definetley recommend one if you want to cut back on boiling time and wood/oil.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Jason,

Sounds great, I hadn't given much thought to the wood savings too. I will send you a PM later.

[saphead]

Jason,what size is you're flue pan? 6' or 7'. I've heard Steam-aways on small rigs will darken the syrup, notice any difference? All you have to do now is run the condensate through the heating system in your house!

[jdj]

Saphead,
Our flue pan is 6'. Haven't noticed any difference in syrup grade or taste.

[PATheron]

Fellow sappers, My name is Theron Pierce. My wife, two boys(6&8), and I live in the hills of Tioga county PA. I`ve been making syrup since I was about 12 on a homeade evaperator my dad had made for me out of one of his old semitruck fuel tanks, usually about 25+- gals per year. I love your site and enjoy reading all your maple talk. This year I am not making syrup becouse I am building a new sugar house and installing a new tubing system on my property. Hopefully next spring I will have 800 taps on my new system right to my sugarhouse. I really enjoy looking at the pictures of your tubing systems and sugar sheds. Gotta go Theron.

[Russell Lampron]

Welcome Theron,

What size evaporator are you going to upgrade to? If you want to sell your homemade rig this is the place to do it.

Russ

[HanginAround]

Welcome Theron, good to see another new face. Make yourself at home.

[PATheron]

Thanks for the warm reception guys. I'm figuring on buying a 3 by10 maple pro evaperator with a steam hood and preheater over the flue pan. I would like to install my tubing system and set up my sugar shed this year so I can make syrup next spring; and then next year get a vaccuum pump and RO. If you guys have any opinions on maple pro equipment let me know. Mainly I'm going with that because the local dealer has been really good to me and the equipment looks pretty high quality. Hope you guys have a good year making syrup. We really haven't had one good days run here yet. Right now it's snowing and very cold. Theron

[3% Solution]

Welcome aboard PATheron,
Hope you find this site as informational as I have.
Nice bunch of folks here!
Just jump in and help when you can, we're all making syrup together!
Snowing there hey, well just keep it there! Ha! Ha!
Keep us posted on your progress.

Dave

[PATheron]

How do you make out with your homemade evaperator? Mine is pretty slow but we always make good tasting syrup. It usually takes us a good long evening to boil a drum of sap. My grandpa got me started when I was a Kid. He made an evap out of a 55 gal drum on its side with an 8 gallon welded flat pan on top, ever since i've either been making syrup or wishing i was.

[3% Solution]

Hi Pa,
How do we make out with our homemade rig?
Well, that depends what your looking for.
As far as boiling rate, it's about 17.5 gph.
As far as syrup production, this year with 2.7% sap for the average, it's about a 1/2 gallon an hour (past years we have gotten 3% sap, so you do the math).
As far as the taste, it's great and the grade is Medium and folks are knocking on the door for it.
Now, I consider this as my "Spring Weight Loss Program" so this part is going good!!!!
A friend who comes over to help said "You can't beat the friendship that's in that little sugarhouse" and that's the most important element.
Would I like to get 25 gph, SURE, but I don't and that's all there is to it!
Grandchildren will be over this weekend to help (oh yeah the big kids, too) and this is another PLUS!
How big is your drum your talking about?
Send me a PM and I'll send a pic of the ole rig.
Hope this helps!

Dave

[PATheron]

3% Sounds like you have a great time making syrup just like us. We don't try to make any money at it we just have fun doing it. We have about the same setup as you but I think your evap is probably faster than mine. We make enough syrup to give eveyone in the family a quart for christmas and my coworkers can't wait to get the rest. My evap is so slow that I usually quit making syrup before the trees quit running just to get rested back up. I'm not very computer literate and not sure what a pm is but it would be great to see pictures of your operation. What I really like to see are pictures of peoples woods. I love the woods and it's neat to see how people get thier sap. Theron

[HanginAround]

Theron, PM is a private message. Click on anyone's username, and you'll see an option that says "send a private message".

[Pete33Vt]

Theron, Welcome aboard, Its good to see someone that enjoys this hobby as much as us. If you are looking for pictures of different setups, check out the the different websites people have setup in there signatures.If you will notice at the bottom of my post where its tells how many taps I have there is a link in blue. Click on that and it will take you to where all my images are posted. Quite a few of the people on here have sites like this setup.
Again Welcome and enjoy

[mooseman]

My name is Paul and I have 5 kids ages 8,6,5,and 2 1/2 year old twins. I only run about 30 taps all on buckets but have the location for about 300 just not the time. I boil on an open fire just to make enough for family and friends. I have been sappin since I was 10 (am 32 now). I am going to start boiling today for 2007. I am still waiting to be able to run an efficient evaporator and run a lot of taps. Right now the three oldest kids love setting taps and collecting. Keeping it a family affair. Everyone keep posting how your posting cause I am learning all the time.

[HanginAround]

Welcome Paul! Sounds like you're having fun.

[PATheron]

Thanks for the tip haginaround. I just sent 3% the Pm. That helped me a lot. You guys will have to bear with me.

[PATheron]

Thanks for the tip Pete. The pictures are awesome. I haven't been on the computer the last couple nights becouse the sap is finally running here and i've been visiting neighboring shacks to get some new ideas and learn some things. Hope you guys are making lots of syrup. Theron

[Quadmom]

Hello, my real name is Sandy. I have been married for 25 years and have 2 grown sons in school. I grew up with home cooked maple syrup here in Wisconsin, husband didn't, but never tried to do it myself until this year. I am a very very small hobbyist with 3 trees and 3 taps. My dad has told me one of our trees could take at least a second tap but the family doesn't want me to kill the tree by trying that. I evaporate my sap with a restaurant ss pan and a ss roaster pan in my garage with gas grill burner and a 2 burner gas stove top on a grill bottom. My real problem thus far is suspension in my finished syrup, what I think you call sugar sand. Can the syrup still be used? All the jars have sealed and I hate to think of not using it! My filtering material thus far has been a flour sack towel and cheese cloth. My taps and buckets are from my dad. Any help anyone can give me would be greatly appreciated.
Sandy

[royalmaple]

Welcome and you can go to the sponsors of the site and get some pre filters and a cone filter, I think a package of 12 prefilters is like 15 bucks and 1 cone filter is about the same 15 bucks. Put the prefilters inside the cone filter, heat your syrup up in a pot to over 180 degrees but don't have to boil the syrup again, and pour it through these filters into another pot, then just put in your jars. Nothing is wrong with the syrup you have. You can use it just the way you have it, but if you want to help get rid of the sugar sand do what I said.

Also helps to have the filters damp before you try to put syrup through them.

By the way I highly doubt you will do the tree any harm if you did put a second tap in it. I like to give the tree a bear hug and if I dont' touch my hands together I give it two taps.

[Quadmom]

Thanks Matt,
First I think I'll see how much settles but may go to the MapleGuys and look into buying some filtering items.
Sandy

[HanginAround]

Welcome Sandy! You know the 3 taps is just the beginnning, you'll have a couple hundred in a couple yrs :)

Do what mapleman says, buy a couple filters. If you prefer, you don't have to use the cones, buy the flat filters and prefilters and cut them to size to fit in a collander, might be a bit easier for small amounts. But, no worries, it will settle just the way it is, just doesn't look that appealing in the bottom of the jar.

[Quadmom]

Pete,
The 3 taps I have I borrowed from my dad who tapped his trees when I was young. I hate to admit but I've been thinking of asking him for a couple more for next year! I only have 4 maples in my yard, and one may be too small yet so I am limited in how much farther I can go. No woods for me to venture into.
Sandy

[3% Solution]

Oh no!!!!
The bug has bit you and it has been growing all these until now!!
Welcome aboard Sandy.
This is a cool place with a lot of friends you haven't met!!
Yup the guys are right as usual, you need filtration!!
Keep boiling!!
Have fun.

Dave

[sapwelder]

Hi, I am new to this site and have a lot of fun here. I am a 4th generation maple producer with my dad. We are in central ny and run 1750 taps but only tapped 1600 this year. We spent a lot of time getting ready this year as we bought a new 5 x 14 evaporator with a steam away. for the last 10 seasons we had a 3.5 x 12 and a 3 x 8 in series. we are deffinately able to process sap a lot faster with the new set up. this is a good thing because we both work full time jobs. My wife and I have 5th generation producers in the works now. they are 6 and 7 year old boys. today has been a long day so I am going to hit the shower and then off to bed.

[HanginAround]

Welcome sapwelder (hmmm, didn't know you could weld sap :) ). Sounds like a nice big evap. Jump in and post wherever you see fit.

[Sugardaddy]

Howdy,

I live in Sussex County, NJ. First time tapper this year with my wife and 4 kids (12, 10, 7, and 4). We ran about 20 taps late in the season and have just shy of 2.5 gallonsof dark syrup. My "evaporator" is a series of mongo stockpots over a wood fired BBQ pit. As we fired each smaller batch we got a bit better, learning to bank the back with stones and redirect the heat.
I have tapping rights to 50 or 60 trees a mile up the road. These are obvious sugarbush leftovers from a time when that was farm property. We're looking at a collecting tank for my truck and are scavenging for a better evaporator set up as well. Next year I plan to run 75 taps (some of those trees are BIG!) and our target is 10 or more gallons of finished sap.

Can anyone give me a few bottling tips? I have a case of bottles from Andersons. Do I need to boil/sterilize the bottles, or just put the syrup in at boiling temp and leave it at that?

Thanks. Great site! Wish I had found this a month ago!

Ed in Sandyston, NJ

[HanginAround]

Welcome Ed, good to have you aboard.

Just bottle your syrup at 180-190 F, and you're all set, no need to sterilize.

Have a look at some of the pics of people's homemade evaps if you want ideas on building something.