Originally Posted by
bj's sugaring
We ended our season on Friday, ended up making 72 gal of amber rich/robust. Puts us at .36gal/tap. We suffered from low sugar content with the long warm ups, and we do have quite a few smaller trees. The RO saves us. That all said, I'm happy with our season, this is the first of our "larger" backyard effort.
We are mostly 3/16 (all with 25-28" vac), with 30 buckets. We also started running a shurflo on our mainline to boost vacuum on our lower trees halfway through the season. Made a big difference.
Goals for next year include a hood/preheater for our 2x6, a filter press, and tapping the upper section of my property which will double our production.
I am curious about using CV spouts...im currently doing 3/16 with 5/16 drops. Dr. Tim, what are your thoughts? Ive read that pullback is severe in 3/16, but doesnt the larger diameter drop help? Should I sell the hundreds of extra spouts I have purchased in favor of cv? I do have one line I use 3/16 drops in to use as a control, I saw similar production until the last week, and it did indeed slow down...but it is also a year older. I want to maximize the yield and beat the odds of losing after 3 years on 3/16.