Only mys econd year doing this and I will only have around 20 taps. I started early, the weather looks pretty good here and the trees have been really running. More importantly I have twins due in April, so my season will be short!
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Only mys econd year doing this and I will only have around 20 taps. I started early, the weather looks pretty good here and the trees have been really running. More importantly I have twins due in April, so my season will be short!
well i boiled off 10 gallons today
made a quart still finishing it right now
That sounds more like a smile.
PATheron, thats a nice set up ya got. i have been following the different posts on the the site for the past couple weeks and checking out everyones pics of there operations and after seeing yours i realized your located right over the hill! I will have to stop over cause it sounds like you got quite the set up this year.
Collected about 30 gallons today from 13 buckets, bringing me up to about 40. We'll boil down tomorrow and be able to enjoy our own syrup again. I anticipate this short run will give another 20-30 gallons before the freeze jits again, so this is a good chance to test out wht we're working with.
To the traders in upstate NY,central Vertmont and New Hampshire we are sending you some nice wet snow from Michigan. Enjoy!!! It only took 2 hrs to go 30 miles tonite 10mph all the way thru town normally a 30min trip. and we got all of 10 inches today. Its going to be a long day on the ole M tomorow plowing eveyone out. Just drive safely tomorrow. Sap will be coming someday.
I been working on a small pipeline this week. I will have 80 taps run out to the street. And i do mean street, it is only 800 yds from the center of the village,on the main drag. Put up over 800 ft of 3/4'" and set a nice 150 milk tank 10 ft off the side walk. I hope to put the manifolds on tomorrow after work and the drops Friday evening. The last three years we carried the sap out to the road in 5gal pail at this location. Now jut pull up with the sap hauler and load the sap. More time to boil. No good sap weather in the 15 day forecast, I will probably hold off tapping until after the full moon.
I was at Bascoms yesterday afternoon,,,was surprised to see they had started tapping,,,the tank at the bottom of their road had a few hundred gallons in it,,was real surprised to see how well it was running with the temp just 34 deg.,,vacuum is a real plus on poor days............
Parker; I have to agree we would not have had NEAR the sap over the last two days with out the vac. When we turn the vac off to fuel the pumps the flow would stop. We kept it off for about 15 minutes to see if the sap would flow natural into the releaser and no luck! we turn the vac on and was pulling about 300 gallons in 7 hours with 17" vac.(350 taps) Made a believer out of us for sure
Jim
J.B.- you are believer now, but if you were to add 6 more inches of vacuum to that system you wouldn't believe the difference you were seeing.
802 maple; I don't think our old dairy pumps would last very long and that amount. we have fans on them now and they get hot to the touch. Maybe someday we can have one of thoses REAL vac system LOL
Thanks
Jim
Jim,
Have you tried out that new RO yet?
Russ
Russ; The sap did not come as no shot just kind of ran over three days I didn't want to run it for an hour and not have enought to rinse and then have to leave it set, so we just ran normal with the steamaway(still did 51 an hour). Have 150 gallon to finish tonight and then according to the weather forcast we are done for 1 1/2 weeks or more. We will be tapping our main bush over the weekend(500) that will give us a lot of sap at once and then we will fire that thing up(thats the plan any)I'll be in touch when we get her running.Most likely with more questions!!
Thanks
Jim
I have one of those "real" pumps I would make you a deal on,,,,,,will pull HARD for the BIG SAP,,,,,,,,ohhhhhhh my,,,,,,,,,been listing toTheron for too long :)
I'm still here Mike. Just got back from Disney so I've been out of the loop. We're ready to go here. My youngest son biggest surprise at Disney was the automatic flushing toilets. :):) We've been on the hill to long.
Take care,
Al
15 inches of snow yesterday and this morning, havent been in the woods in 2 days been plowing snow. maybe tomorrow i can get back to my latterals
RICH
Good luck Jim and I will be happy to answer any questions you might have.
Rich just got in from plowing snow myself. Wet and heavy stuff that I don't have much place for.
What a difference a year makes. I haven't heard anyone talking about Global Warming for a while.
Russ
Update on Theeerons big sap situation. Matt flew in from Maine on wednesday. One day ahead of schedule. Started with nothing really done. Currently have vac pump operational, tanks ready, and just finished tapping in. Put in 15 saddles tomarrow and done. 1187 on line and operational. Checked pump today thought we were doing pretty good with 18 " at the pump and 200 drops hanging in the clear sucking air. Figure we've got about the right cfm's for the signature bush. Gonna get a little shut eye and figure on putting another several hundred in tomarrow. Just kidding. Are going to see if we can make it an even 1300 though, dont want people to keep thinking were not taking this seriously, becouse we are. No more screwing around. Go time. Hoping for some BIGSAP soon. Will be boiling sat night. Sap is in tanks currently. Hoping to add some tomarrow. Hoping for the gulley washer on saturday. Life jackets available for visitors. Theeeeron
18" with 200 spiles out?????? Man,,,makes me pretty jelous,,,if I loose 2 or 3 spiles I loose ALOT of vacuum,,,,is the weather just about right down there? Just keep that pump pulling if its above 31 degrees,,,,you will be surprised at the sap you get on marginal days,,especially if you can pull over 20",,,GOOD LUCK
Theron,
While Matt is there to help, you should tap the bush across the road from your house. you can bring the line high over the road with no problem. Good luck on your maiden voyage!
Not much getting done in the woods here lately. This 4th day in a row with snow and days 5 and 6 are bringing more snow they say. Every tree branch is covered with snow. Not much fun to work in with consant supply of fresh snow down your neck..Suppose I should clean out the sugarhouse and get everything there ready to go. Or I could go plow more snow?
Theron, How are you surviving? Be carefull Matt might have you tapping a couple thousand extra the you didn't know you owned before he leaves. LOL
Be sure to check his luggage when he leaves, he might be looking to bring "Ramona" home a companion!
Mark
Mark- Matt wanted to try to put a bunch more taps in but we had our hands full just trying to get what I had operational. Pump currently at 24.5". All tapped in. Had no idea what 25" of vac really was. Had to pull a 1.5" plug from one of my boosters and almost lost my whole hand. Definitely on a big leak would suck a squirrel clear to the releaser. Squirrell populations are down currently and not finding too much damage. They must be in decline due to disease or somethng. Keep finding them dead all over the place. Still waiting for the big sap. Almost hit temp today but not quite. If it warms up I think there could be the big sap. Theeeeron
didnt have to plow today tried going to the woods but need snow shoes or a melt down. more snow tonite
RICH
PATheron, when do you think you might get to boil? I would like to stop over and check out the operation and see how the saps running on your side of the hill. I have not tapped yet but my bush is on the North side plus i dont have a vac system. Everything is still pretty froze up.
gmcooper- I know what you mean about the snow in the trees,,I am logging in a hemlock woods,,every time I cut a tree down there is a miniblizzard,,BIG FUN,,,more snow on the way here too,,,,,my truck is filled with dry clothes to change into thruout the day to try to stay dry,,,should bring the logging shanty to that job and have a woodstove glowing red on site,,,,,,
Theron-what was the temp down there last night and today? How much sap did you get? What are you getting for vac. at you end taps? Are you able to isolate leaks well with those boosters?
Good morning all,
Well here we are back in the freezer again!!
That's ok, it'll freeze the trees up good.
I would venture a quess and say when this freeze breaks it's time to start tapping.
We was going to tap February 17, but it doesn't look like that now.
Have to wait and see!!
Stay safe and good luck to all!!
Dave
Parker- We havent been ignoring you guys but we havent had time to hardly check the trader so youll have to bear with us. Weve had a struggle just getting tapped in and have everything right as far as my tanks, line, vac, etc. Yesterday we were tapped in and the system is CLOSE to tight and we had 24" at the pump. It almost ran yesterday but the day before we didnt have the vac ready and it ran some gravity and there were little sags in the mains and in a couple spots it froze solid there so it never quite got so it could run yesterday. Today its supposed to go to 38 degrees and rain, snow and we have the vac good and the line pretty tight so if we dont have any setbacks we should be able to have a run if the weather provides it. If we havent responded to any posts dont worry about it becouse we havent had time to really check the trader. Matt came down on wednesday and we basically have been working every day untill about 0400 am and getting back up at about 0700. So weve been running on 3 hrs sleep a day for like 4 days. We pretty much tapped the whole bush at night and worked on fixing stuff days. I think if we get the weather now there is going to be some form of the BIGSAP unless something of mine sets me back. We should have 24 on the pump and the lines intact so I THINK we should be good. We dont have the shutoff valves at all the mains and we havent checked the vac at all the spots in the bush and all that becouse weve had a STRUGGLE to just get this far. Well keep you posted but I do think that with the holes we drilled in the trees, the size of the trees and the vac there seems like there has to be BIGSAP coming our direction. Theeeeeron
Theron,
Ask Matt where the governor is and what he is up to?
pathern, you are tapping trees at night ?, exclusively?
Theeeeron, are you guys nuts? I hope I don't get the bug that bad. I like to get my sleep. I guess that's the difference between playing and business. Anyway, I hope things go well. If I get to that side of the state I would like to see how you guys get it done. Good luck!
Gary
Theeeeronnn You da mannnnnn and Matt too lol
Theron,
SOunds like you are running on pure adrenaline, just don' t fall asleep when you get the BIGSAP ATTACK. If I tapped at night, I would either end up running my truck into a ditch, fallining 100' feet off a cliff or get attacked by a yearling horse - neither of them sound great, plus, my wife would shoot me.
I think our season is winding down here. One more cold spell this weekend, and I can perhaps get 1-2 more boils. Three days of 60+ degrees killed me here. Making Grade B currently. THis time last year, I did not make Grade B until the last week in February. We had great runs last week, and we will be close to .25 gallons of syrup/tap on buckets, quite the improvement over last year.
Andrew
No they are nuts, there is no other explanation. Good morning boys or is Matt up yet Theron.
Young and full of testosterone.
Andrew,
Don't be too quick to throw in the towel. Your taps haven't been in long enough to dry up yet and the 10 day forecast for you don't show it getting out of the forties but one day and some 25 degree nights. The forecast changes several times a day, so you may have some temps in the teens yet. It's still early for the season to end, even for your location.
Andrew,
Yes and at the price of commercial it pays to make it till the trees just wont give it anymore. No matter what it tastes and smells like.
Taps are still in, I will probably go another week, or so.
Do you guys ever get together for a MapleTrader party or get-together? I know a good portion of you seem to know each other or at least have met before. I would like to meet some of the traders some time, but between my work and my wife's grad school work, not to mention two little boys with #3 due in June, time is limited. Just curious.
Andrew
Udate on the bigsap- Last night Matt showed me the royal boil. We worked on the shed plumbing, tanks, etc. We ended up with around 350 gallons of sap the other day with gravity on a few taps so last night we did our first boil. Worked on getting ready to run evap, had to plumb feed tank and finish plumbing evap and cleaning stuff etc. Once all that done we fired up and boiled. Started around 11 pm and finished this morning at 0630. Ended up sweetening the pans and not quite drew off. Sap was 2.3%. Local boy from the trader came over and wanted to check out what we were doing so we put him right to work. Real nice guy and big help. I think I can handle running the evap now and was really impressed with the performance. Very nice even hard boil that was not difficult to maintain even with larger wood. So now we have bush tapped,Roughy 1200, Vac, operable evap and two sap tanks and a concentrate tank. Now just have to plumb in other two sap tanks and minor plumbing on perm tank. Sugarmaster is going to train me on the ro and I have to figure out the press. Really enjoyed boiling the LAST green sap I intend to ever boil. Gonna keep finetuning while im waiting for the big sap. Never could have accomplished all this without Matts help last few days. Most selfless person Ive ever met. Theeeeron
Andrew,Quote:
Originally Posted by andrew martin
I get down your way a couple of times a year. Usually in Louisville. Your what, about 1 1/2 hours from Louisville? Next time I get down your way I'd be glad to catch up with you and see your set up.
Larry
Just talked to Matt at the airport and hes stuck there becouse of the bad weather. I almost felt sorry for him being a little tired with only 1.5 hrs sleep last night. I told him I was sorry for his condition and He said that If I wanted to ever be a real sugarmaker Id have to Waaaaant it. Guy is very mouthy but hard core for sure. Theeeron