I agree, my wood are very dry, not getting much of a run either, some taps are dried. Taps on the north side ran much better, but mine have been in since Feb. 10th. I do have to say it's been a great season!
Printable View
I agree, my wood are very dry, not getting much of a run either, some taps are dried. Taps on the north side ran much better, but mine have been in since Feb. 10th. I do have to say it's been a great season!
Just bottled another 6.5 gallons of dark amber. I cant believe the trees are still producing good syrup. This puts us at 240 gallons. Leaving the vac on overnight and one last boil tomorrow.
No where near 240 gallons, but the 26 made so far this year is some of the nicest syrup I've ever made. Just put up another gallon tonight and you are right the trees are still producing wonderful clear sap and syrup. Collected 140 gallons today from 130 taps all of it clear as a bell and sweet.
All I can say at this point is Wow.
163 taps, 61 gallons bottled as of this afternoon. . . boiling my last 350 gallons today and tomorrow . pulling all tomorrow. best year ever
What a first year! I made 67 gallons on 115 taps. I pulled my taps Sunday. Can't wait for next year and upgrading to a raised or drop flue pan.
Here's my numbers, 110 gallons made mostly light and medium. Just made 10 gallons of dark over the weekend. Boiled down 4375 Gallons of sap. Finally did a tap count when I pulled the buckets, not as many as I thought. We had 431 taps out. Great season, and tasting syrup!
My final numbers: 248.5 gallons made, equal amounts of light, medium, and dark, with a small amount of grade B, .48 gallons of syrup per tap. An absolutely awesome season. Ordered an RO for next year. Went through 10 cords of wood!
final totals for my woods were 135 mostly all medium. i did make some late season light amber which was nice. all in all pretty good season for me on little over 500 taps. could of kept the vacuum on longer but the wood pile was a little short after this long year.
forgot to tally ... have been tied up cleaning.
i made 74.5 gallons on 163 taps .... thats .46 gallon per tap on buckets and tubing.... oh and no vacuum. best year ever.
well i better get started bucking some logs...
Finished with 146 gal mostly medium . Sap ran sweet all season. Good year, We are a little shy of 400 taps
on vacuum, no major problems or breakdowns .
I couldn't believe it till I saw it,. but a fairly sizable operation just south of me has already tapped. Seems to me a bit early seeing another "Polar Vortex" headed this way next week. I'm still looking at the middle of february for me thats if the weather guessers are right.
ya, no way im starting this early. it should be a law that mother nature gives us at least until feb 1st . mid to late feb is the typical magic time for me in the last 5-10 years.
I guess the one exception would be the 2012 season if you tapped in early Jan. you looked pretty smart. Most people around here I think look at mid. Feb. The long range I'm watching is not looking good tip the second week of Feb. I really hope we have a normal season if there is such a thing. Wouldn't it be nice to get 10 or12 inches of snow between now and then?
I have averaged around Valentines Day the past four years.
Jason,
We have the tubing hung for 200 taps.The rest is yet to put up soon. Just got three mor batteries for the drill:) Its get things ready time. Yea first to 14 of Feb is pretty standard. But if I see 2 weeks of good weather at the end of Jan., it might be go time. Haven't even started to look at the forecast yet. Hope things are good across the 'line'.
Regards,
Chris
Thats usually my average start date I've noticed.Quote:
Originally Posted by heus
Chris my tubing is about ready to go. Just have some odds and ends to take care of. I coach basketball so I hope winter stays with us at least for another two weeks. Pretty tough not being able to start until after 7 pm or so.
Looking at the long range forecast it looks like the last week of Jan. is looking tempting. The weather channel said this morning a major pattern shift will take place the last week of Jan. Jet stream will be more zonal which would be great!
if that aint a sign that we have at least another week till tappin, i dont know what is ... time to get out the snowmobile :cool:Quote:
Originally Posted by heus
Snowmobiling is all you'll be doing for the nxt. month at least according to accu- weather . I know long range forecasts are typically useless but with nothing else to do right now I've been going on a number of sites and the news is not good even in the short term. Maybe with all the new tech we can figure out how to thaw the trees out .HAHA I wanna know where the guys in southern ohio heard temps were going in the 50's this weekend. we are in ohio right?
Just looked at the long range. It looks like the week after nxt. it's gonna be 40's to 50's. If so I will be tapping starting nxt. wed. the 12th. Although I know how long range forecasts go ! I think sometimes accuweather is in tune to us and throws out these little teases now and again. The puzzling part is long range for March is nothing for the most part in the 30's. Now I wish I would have become a meteorologist like my niece.
I am south of you, SW of Canton, and thinking similar. Probably tap toward the end of next week if forecast stays same or warmer.
next weekend is showing 29,28,24 fri-sun for chardon , but we all know how that can change .
What I see on accuweather is a bit warmer nxt. wknd, though may not be good for sap to run it's the following week that gets my attention. It takes me 3 days to tap so if the following week holds up I want to be ready. Besides it's getting to the point by then I don't think it will be to early to tap.
I've been sitting here bored to death and upon looking at the extended forecast(which is just a waste of space) for northeast ohio they are forecasting after this coming week, low 40s to 50 that sounds great, but when you look at march the first 3 weeks anyways there is not a temp above forty. At least you would think that far out they would throw in a 40 or 50 somewhere. Just goes to show why they shouldn't keep trying to forecast that far out. I still say those weather guessers are playing with us.
I went out and replaced 150 drops, met a friend back at the house and he said the neighbor had steam rising. I thought I had better go check and Keith was testing his new pans. Water was freezing on the floor but we had some heat and he got most of his testing done.
Forecast looks the same across the line. So we continue to get ready. To cold to clean tanks!
Regards,
Chris
Once again I'm getting cautiously excited about starting to tap. Just read an explanation on accuweather about why there will be a pattern change coming at the end of this coming week. the following week will feature mid 40's to around the 50 mark. time to tap! They also said March will be normal in the sense there will be temperature swings from cold to mild etc. pretty much a normal march. lets wait and see.
man you guys are tweaking to tap !! ;) ill be snowmobiling at the ice festival at lake chautauqua this coming weekend... from the attached screenshot, it looks like next monday's the day for me !
I love Presidents Day. NO SCHOOL. We be tappin.....
I will be tapping this weekend.
Here in Lorain County I will be tapping most of my trees today, in preparation for when it warms up later this week...we may be in for a good run! Especially coming off a deep freeze like we had today, it looks promising.
Same here. Man did it get cold last night. Perfect start to the season. Lets just hope the warm up doesn't last too long. Tapping today for me!
Did anyone else see the long range freeze up after Sat. it looks like eight to ten days below freezing. Time to decide about getting this run or not . Really cold here, it might thaw by Thurs.
Yeah not sure about putting my sap sacks out for this run. I might wait for the next. I have all 532 of my vac trees tapped, though.
wed-sat should be a healthy run of light amber im sure...especially since there calling for a bit of rain mid week, thatll help thaw the roots.
i figure ill collect enough for a boil on sunday and then let the lines freeze till the next run. no harm no foul.
next week during the freeze ill just throw a halogen work light under the flue pan and call it a day.
itll be interesting to see how much we collect this week as this has been one cold winter.
I saw the long range after this warm up and I still can't understand why I put myself through this abuse. Last week one local channel was calling for 60's this coming weekend and the the nxt. day pulled the plug on that idea and lowered it to the 30's.haha! Anyways it might be smart to be tapped in because we may only get a "run" here and there and before you know it , it's april and time to mow the lawn. I tapped all 650 on tubing and 100 buckets , the other 250 buckets are gonna have to wait because I have no way of getting to where I have to go. Hopefully if we get a thaw I'll get them by the end of the week.
I was going to tap yesterday and did not. It's blowing like heck tonight and after seeing what's coming, I'm waiting until this weekend. This week looks like sap could be a no show with the "newer" cold temps and wind in the forecast.
We are watching you guys:)
Looks like Jason is ready for sap and several others too!
Huuuummmm what to do across the line?????
Regards,
Chris
started to tap in my tubing yesterday. should finish today and start to fix all them dare squirrel chews. using this warm up as a chance to seal up the vacuum before it really starts. snows pretty deep so we will see what happens