Wow could the end of the season be so near?

Listen to Dr Tim, he's the man with the knowledge. I pulled my taps MOnday and my season is over. I complained about 60-70 degree days in February, but my sap stayed good. Now it might have spoiled after it ran out of the tree, but it was good to start. I ended season maybe 4-5 days sooner than average, but I was still getting some usable sap. It started turning cloudy last week and progressively got more cloudy. I quit because the warm weather was making all my gear start to get nasty and I decided I had done enough. My average end of season is between March 3rd and 10th, so it was not that far off from normal and the trees did not bud out way early. So don't fret about the trees they will do their part as best as they can.

I agree with Dr. Perkins I have worked in the woods logging and sapping my whole life and rarely have the trees ever budded this early. If I were to speculate I would say we have lots of sap coming. The earliest I ever remember the season ending was the end of march and that was after a week of 70 degree weather. So leave the taps in and the pumps on until its truly over. Happy sappin Les

Thank you for the reply Dr.TimPerkins,

Did the 60's and 70's in 2012 cause trees to bud. We'll be pretty close to that in my area if the forecast remains true.

Guess I'll just play by ear, nose and taste.

It's not so much a worry as learning what to anticipate.

If maple trees do bud out early and get hit with a lot of freezing weather does it damage them? Is there a chance one could get good sap should good tapping conditions return?

I'm predicting a banner year that won't even start for us until next week :cool: Gotta stay positive folks!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by red dorakeen

Did the 60's and 70's in 2012 cause trees to bud.

If maple trees do bud out early and get hit with a lot of freezing weather does it damage them? Is there a chance one could get good sap should good tapping conditions return?

---

In looking back, the temperatures from March 19-22 throughout much of upstate NY and Vermont hit the mid-upper 70s and low-80s for 4 days, with very sunny weather, so the tree/branch/bud temperature was probably far higher than that. Therefore the "heat sum" was way higher than temperatures in the 50s. We found that black-colored spouts got up to nearly 10 deg F higher than clear-spouts, so they tended to "dry out" faster. The sugar maple vegetative buds started to swell (Stage 1 on a 5 point scale from winter condition to bud break) around March 22nd, and buddy off-flavor was noticed at that point.

In terms of damage, if the buds swell, but don't open, they still have some minimal level of cold tolerance, and can survive down to about 4-5 deg F below freezing. Once the buds fully open and the leaves emerge, cold tolerance is very poor, so a return to sub-freezing temperatures can cause leaf injury and death. In 2012, we had a good return to "normal" temperatures after the heat wave, and some people kept making syrup after that time, but most of it was buddy to some degree.

Typically what people first see in terms of buds are the flower buds, and most often, red maple flower buds. These tend to break the earliest. Vegetative buds open somewhat later. This makes sense as it is not nearly as problematic/costly for the tree to lose its flowers and seed potential than it is to lose its leaves and photosynthetic potential.

Attachment 13501

And I suspect quite a bit of that late 2012 "off" syrup is still in many packer's warehouses.

Kind of makes you wonder what the old timers and Indians did in situations like this? The Indians didn't have a weather forecast to look up several hours a day like we do. He is right, 50's is not as bad as 70 and 80. I have been through years before tubing and vacuum where actual tapping was delayed to sit out a week long warm stretch in mid March until freezing conditions returned sometime after the 20th. The year 2000 comes to mind where it was downright hot the 1st week of March and then we had a cold snap the middle of the month getting down to 4 degrees with huge runs after. Before the cold snap the syrup was getting a hint of buddiness, after the cold snap it disappeared. 2012 was the disaster of disasters however.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DrTimPerkins

In looking back, the temperatures from March 19-22 throughout much of upstate NY and Vermont hit the mid-upper 70s and low-80s for 4 days, with very sunny weather, so the tree/branch/bud temperature was probably far higher than that.
Attachment 13501

---

Good to note... My March 18-23 highs were 70's to 80 here in 2012. This helps understand what it takes to cause the trees to be fooled. Like you said, they are smarter than we think. I have presented in my posts some numbers indicating an early/warm season, but in no way would predict a maple season outcome.
I certainly advocate for nobody to throw in the towel until you are truly down and out. I quit earlier than I should have one year, and will not again. I will just keep going until I cannot stand the flavor.

Thank you DrTimPerkins

What an incredible wealth of knowledge you share here to make an already great forum even better.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DrTimPerkins

In looking back, the temperatures from March 19-22 throughout much of upstate NY and Vermont hit the mid-upper 70s and low-80s for 4 days, with very sunny weather, so the tree/branch/bud temperature was probably far higher than that. Therefore the "heat sum" was way higher than temperatures in the 50s. We found that black-colored spouts got up to nearly 10 deg F higher than clear-spouts, so they tended to "dry out" faster. The sugar maple vegetative buds started to swell (Stage 1 on a 5 point scale from winter condition to bud break) around March 22nd, and buddy off-flavor was noticed at that point.

In terms of damage, if the buds swell, but don't open, they still have some minimal level of cold tolerance, and can survive down to about 4-5 deg F below freezing. Once the buds fully open and the leaves emerge, cold tolerance is very poor, so a return to sub-freezing temperatures can cause leaf injury and death. In 2012, we had a good return to "normal" temperatures after the heat wave, and some people kept making syrup after that time, but most of it was buddy to some degree.

...

---

2012 was a special year and I don't that we're going to see that. Next week we might have 1 or 2 days in the 60s, not weeks of 60s and 70s. In 2012, save for three days between the 8th and 25th I had highs above 50° during an 18 day stretch. It culminated with a 6 day period with highs averaging 77° and there was 11 days without seeing freezing temps.

I'm with Dr Tim. I see no reason to pull taps until the season is really over and not based on a forecast (and I went to school for meteorology!).