Syrup Per Tap Rules of Thumb

[ascutneymaple]

Does anyone have numbers for the expected syrup per tap on:
tubing w/ vacuum?
tubing w/ gravity?
buckets?

[red maples]

I am sure most guys would agree that there is no rule of thumb. its all about the weather!!!! and if mother nature want to let you have sap or not!!!

but if you do a search on here there is alot of info on that subject.

just search gpt or syrup per tap.

I f I remember correctly and this would be average.

buckets .15 to .25 gpt
gravity .15 to .30 gpt(beacuse of a little vacuum if you have proper sloping)
vacuum can be as much as .15-.50 gpt the .50 might be high but it could happen you never know!!!

I am probably a little off but its close at least.

[KenWP]

You also have to take some figures you get with a grain of salt as people tend to have long arms on the net. Up here on vacuum most guys are happy with 3 pounds per tree. Buckets is hardley close to that except in a exceptional year. Don't do like I did and actually belive you could get a lot of sap from a tree and end up haveing to go to more taps to get enough to make a gallon of syrup.

[red maples]

I just tried to search that wow forget it !!!

[red maples]

yeah boy you said it ken. and even if you get alot of sap doesn't men the sugar is very high either!!!
You also have to take some figures you get with a grain of salt as people tend to have long arms on the net. Up here on vacuum most guys are happy with 3 pounds per tree. Buckets is hardley close to that except in a exceptional year. Don't do like I did and actually belive you could get a lot of sap from a tree and end up haveing to go to more taps to get enough to make a gallon of syrup.

[PerryW]

From my scraggly woods trees on gravity tubing I get a gallon of syrup for every 5-7 taps.

My roadside bucket trees w/ big crowns are about 4 taps per gallon of syrup.

[maple flats]

The general rule of thumb is 1 qt syrup/tap gravity and 2 qts/tap vac. Now if I could come close to that this year I'd be much happier. Those are sort of averages and you must live with the extremes too. This year is extreme in the bad direction.

[wnybassman]

The past bunch of years I averaged a quart per tap or even a little more. This year I doubled my taps and got a pint per tap or even a little less :lol: Oh well, what are ya going to do?

[johnallin]

I got 6.7 gallons of syrup last year on 35 taps and that was pretty normal three years running for me... will be lucky to get 6 gallons this year on 105 taps.

Pisser is the new 2x6 raised flue arch in the new sugar house. Hardly wore the stickers off em' this year! Oh well, there's always next year.

[Brent]

And to take it to the other extreme, some of the tests done last year on vac with check valve spouts they got a bit over 1 gallon per tap.

I've got 600 of them now and it looks like we not going to make it to 125 gallons for the year, mind you we did dump about 15 gallons of ropy junk, so say max 150 gallons on 600 = 1/4 gallon / tap.

The 100 taps on bucks has maybe given us 5 gallons of sap per tree.

Tonight will be our last freeze. Amen

[abbott]

Are the trees in the woods or in the open? Are they sugars or reds? How many taps are you putting in each tree? If you use tubing, how old and full of bacteria is it? If you have vacuum, how high do you run it? And, of course, what does the weather do? The only way to know is start tapping and find out.

This year i had 540 taps in the woods on vacuum (19"), tubing new or one year old. No check valves. 10-20" DBH trees get 1 tap, 20-28" get 2, 28+" get three. Most (not all) producers put in more taps per tree. I didn't run my pump constantly, often shutting it off and going to bed while the sap was still running. I made 190 gallons of syrup, or .35 gallons per tap. I'm convinced that by running the pump at higher vacuum for longer periods and making more commercial grade syrup at the end of the year i could have been close to a half a gallon per tap, even this year.

Last year i made almost a quart per tap with no vacuum. Everyone's situation is different.

[trackerguy]

At this point I'm at 110 gallons, .33 per tap on the nose. Lost 15 gallons (estimated) due to no taps on early runs, another 8 gallons dumped on the ground after an RO mishap (too lazy to boil raw sap)- So "woulda coulda" is 130 give or take. I've been running 25" vac all season using CV adapters. It might be over, might not - not going to boil the small amount of RO plugging C grade that comes out when its 65 or 80 degrees. The system is in suspended animation, membranes cleaned and bisulphited, lines out of tank, releaser and tanks clean, BUT... permeate tank is full. - If the weather co-operates it'll be back up on a moments notice. Generally not over here until the 3rd week of April - we'll see. Tempting to pull taps in the nice weather but I'm holding out 2 more weeks.