Wish we could post photos, would love to see everyone's setups and production
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Wish we could post photos, would love to see everyone's setups and production
Am I the last man standing? Collected 55 gallons tonight on 66 taps left on sugar maples. Sap looks great and tastes great.
Pulled the plug today. Some trees were running, but not enough to restart the evaporator. I drained it during the warm spell and finished/filtered/packed the nearup. It takes a few hundred gals to start back up. My most recently tapped lines were running pretty well, but that's not enough. This cold snap was just too late for me.
The 18" of snow on Saturday made it a pain to walk to my buckets. Found one overflowing this afternoon. Will probably run another batch.
Pete
I'm still going. Was out of town Monday and Tuesday, but came back to a ton. 27 gallons, many buckets were full or overflowing. I may hold out for 1 more week.
Collected another 65 gallons tonight and also pulled some more taps that just aren't doing well. Looking at the forecast this weekend might be it for me. Will RO the 115 or so gallons tomorrow then boil it.
Still flowing strong here is East Berne. I've collected over 110 gallons the past few days from my 49 taps. Still crystal clear but I'm running out of wood and motivation so will probably wrap things up shortly even with some more projected freezing nights coming up.
Still getting a little flow in Porter Corners, got about 20 gallons between Tues and Wed. Looked clear and didn't taste bad, didn't taste sweet though, did have a slight film on the sap. I am a little concerned it won't be good to boil, I never pulled the taps out of my reds and they are pretty budded out, hopefully they aren't adding any sap to my mainline. I will need at least 20 more gallons to make it worth boiling this weekend, at least with the snow I can keep the sap cold.
Nice to hear others still chugging along! RO'd the last couple days of collections and boiled 45 gallons of concentrate tonight and got some nice draw offs. Should end up with a nice season which is surprising seeing how whacky the weather has been!
Had our last boil yesterday and pulled the remaining taps. Going to do our last bottling of the season today, should end up with 20 or so gallons. That's basically our annual average so overall a pretty darn good year considering it was looking like we wouldn't hit double digits not too long ago.
We boiled our final boil on Saturday as well. Finished with 9.5 gallons- just short of my 10 gallon goal, but perfectly respectable. Also made my first batch of maple cream during the big snow storm last weekend. Turned out well and seems to be a hit amongst the family, I will make more.
Now to get it all cleaned up!
Pete
Nice job Pete! I haven't tried maple cream but we started doing maple sugar this year which is very easy to make and quite delicious!Quote:
Originally Posted by crzypete
My season was not great, ended up with only 2.875 gallons of Syrup. Filtering was terrible this year, even though there did not appear to be as much niter as other season (I wonder if the particles were smaller and less visible this year), but the syrup would not go through the filters, so lost a fair amount of syrup, probably would have hit 3 gallons at least if filtering went better. Definitely one of my lowest outputs ever. I did have about 80 gallons of sap spoil before I could boil, but overall I think my sugar content was very low this year.
Hey all, getting excited about another season here in Saratoga County...although snow has been practically nonexistent for us (i.e. no snow pack in the woods), I am hopeful for a strong season given the fairly consistent cold this January (so far and as forecast).
We are planning to install a small solar array (4 panels for 100 watts) and a ShurFlo pump setup at the bottom of our 3/16th tubing run this year. We have about 100 taps on 3 lines, but may throw caution to the wind and add in another 25-50 that I've held off on because there is a bit of a depression between that top part of our sugar bush and the main set of trees. I'm thinking putt ing the system on vacuum will help carry that sap through the hump and then down into the main path that is all on a descent.
Anyway, happy tapping in advance!
We'll be getting things ready soon. Looks like a stretch of pretty frigid temps early next week so not in any rush yet. Ordered some more RO filters today and also getting the process started for custom labels for plastic quarts and pints. Took a ride to Shaver Hill Farm in November to buy some glass containers and they showed us around and their new machine to put the labels on the containers, so we're going to have them made. Quite an operation at Shaver Hill, great people too!
They are great people,i was one of the 1st customers to have them do jugs for me,awesome guys,dwayne,david and damian
Yeah they have been fantastic to work with!Quote:
Originally Posted by sugarman3
I have been using a Shurflo pump on our 3/16th lines with 100 taps for the past several years and the yield has increased by 1.5-2x.
Checking in too, also getting excited for the year. I did around 25 taps last year, but found about 10 new good size and convenient sugars and reds on a new trail I built. We'll see how many taps I get total.
The weather has been nice this year, so I'm hoping for a good haul. We'll see how long I can hold out before I get anxious and inevitably tap a week or two early :-).
That's what I'm hoping for. I just bought a new (well, used..."new to me") 500-gallon collection tank to replace my IBC tote, which regularly overflows on a good day already. The guy who sold it to me does 2400~ taps and he said the same thing: "vacuum is a game changer."Quote:
Originally Posted by YBSean
Last night I went through the woods to cut off all the old spouts and run a peroxide mix through all the lines, checking for leaks. I need to move the solar system and pump into place, finish my "manifold" connection to the lines of 3/16 at the collection point, and swap out the old IBC for our new giant *** sap tank.
Based on the 14 day weather, our traditional tapping date of President's Day looks just about perfect. LFG!
Looks like a pretty decent dump of snow over the next 24 hours (8-12” forecast) and then real cold for the next 10 days or so. Probably decent for tapping but not much else.
Looks like it'll be at least a couple more weeks of cold weather. Going to be some deep snow to walk through when tapping finally comes around!
Yeah, it should be an interesting start to things…we are expecting 10-14” over the course of the weekend into Monday. I’m a little excited, honestly, as it’s been a while since we’ve had the winter maple conditions I remember as a kid in VT.
Ordered all new check valve and stubby adapters from Bascoms, they were due to deliver Wednesday...today they're telling me they arrived at the regional distribution center IN SOUTH CAROLINA! Sigh...I'm planning to tap on Monday and have help lined up, may need to come up with a Plan B real fast.
7-14" of snow and potential .5" - .75" of ice on Sunday. I anticipate a lot of limbs and trees to come down if that forecast is accurate!
Do you have a local supply store nearby that you could buy from?
I'd say drive over to the CDL store in Castile NY but Bascoms in Vermont is closer!Quote:
Originally Posted by ADK_XJ
Yeah, same here - now I’m glad that I haven’t tapped in yet!Quote:
Originally Posted by MRFNY
I do but they don’t carry spouts for 3/16 drops…this whole thing got kicked off when I asked them to order them back in the fall and then found out in January that none of their dealers carry them 🤦*♂️Quote:
Originally Posted by Pdiamond
next time that’s exactly what I’ll do.Quote:
Originally Posted by johnallin
You H2O/Leader dealers closer to you than Bascoms. Bascoms is in New Hampshire not Vermont. You have a H2O dealer in Pawlet, VT which isn’t that far. Go onto H20 Inovations website and use dealer locator to find some near you that you can drive to.
I have been using 5/16 spouts and drops on 3/16 lines with tees that are 3/16-5/16-3/16. I also use the Zap Bac spouts and replace the spout, drop and tee every other year. This is year 8 of that setup and was recommended by Cornell Maple. It helps with tap hole sanitation and keeps all drops/spouts (and tooling) the same size as we also have mainline with 5/16 laterals.
Check out Shaver Hill Farm too, they are an H2O distributor. Awesome people
nice, is that a little closer to Saratoga region?Quote:
Originally Posted by MRFNY
I just checked out the zap bac spouts, had never heard of these before…looks like Bascom and a few others carry them, so I’ll have to try them next season. I have the stubby adapters on their way and looks like ZB makes the spout ends for those, too.Quote:
Originally Posted by YBSean
They are out near the Cobleskill area. I went there recently for some glass containers and it was about an hour and 15 minutes from the Charlton area (just west of Ballston Spa).Quote:
Originally Posted by ADK_XJ
We use the zap bacs as well. Order them through anyone who deals CDL equipment. They do make stubby adapters too but we just use the spouts. Our cycle is year 1 new drop and white smart spout, year 2 and 3 zap bacs. Year 4 start cycle over again.Quote:
Originally Posted by ADK_XJ
Today is the day! We didn’t get anywhere near the snowfall projected, so I’m suiting up for a day in the woods. The only concern is the high wind warning later this afternoon and evening.
Be safe out there,there looks like there will not enough warm weather for 10 days,i am going to bottle up bourbon barrel syrup today and then make about 20 lbs granulated sugar next couple days ,stay warm