Southwestern Ontario

That’s pretty sweet. I live on the same property as my sugar shack and still would like this lol. Raining today. I want to get my lines out well the snow is still around to keep things clean. Prob try and have everything suspended and ready by the end of this week if I can. Test boil my new set up and watch the forecasts. I won’t be drilling till family day at the earliest. I’ve got a bunch of maples I don’t run on lines as they are to spread out but I may tap a few on pails to see what the flows and sugar content La are. More of a test and learning thing then actual collection.

Well, I’ve never tapped in February, but tomorrow is going to change that. Seems crazy early, but the weather looks like some good runs, and lots of folks south and west of here are getting some good flow, so it begins!

Sap was running today, not fast, but every hole was wet by the time I had a spigot in. Very weird to have mud on tapping day. Especially in Feb. I think all our snow will be gone in the next few days

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Originally Posted by Willen

Sap was running today, not fast, but every hole was wet by the time I had a spigot in. Very weird to have mud on tapping day. Especially in Feb. I think all our snow will be gone in the next few days

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It looks like your next three days should have great flow. Campbellville is a beautiful area, I used to live in Milton for a number of years.

You’re right, today was a gusher. Overflowing 2 gallon buckets on the first day. I’m not ready for this!

Tapped on the 8th in the Niagara region. 6800L in so far.

First gathering today. Had to do it twice actually. 166 taps, many overflowing buckets, 1200L. On days like today, I think a lot about tubing systems, and how much more sap I would have collected.....as it is i averaged 7.2L per tap, or 1.9 gallons per tap.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Willen

First gathering today. Had to do it twice actually. 166 taps, many overflowing buckets, 1200L. On days like today, I think a lot about tubing systems, and how much more sap I would have collected.....as it is i averaged 7.2L per tap, or 1.9 gallons per tap.

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Congrats!

I am jealous, I have flow, but just dripping, I think over 3 great weather days my 90+ taps have produce only about 40 to 60 L total. Tomorrow hopefully it will be better. Lots and lots of snow here and that might be the difference.

Yesterday was my third day in a row of overflowing buckets! It didn't freeze Tuesday night, so the run was long, but slowing down. Im over 3300L/870gallons collected in the last three days.
The guy beside me is on tubing, and has collected about twice as much per tap, which I guess is the benefit of vacuum and no overflow losses.
An early, fast and strange start to the season, thats for sure!

Looks like it will stop tomorow, re-start on the weekend for a few days, and then perhaps return to Feb temps, and no runs until March. I have never tapped for the "early run", so I hope my spigot holes wont "dry out" and that things continue in March.

Does anyone have experience with losing later production with such a large pause (1-2 weeks?). Does the tree start to heal? Or is it just the inside of the hole starting to dry out?

Sounds like you’ve got some boiling to do. Great collection numbers for an early year start. Im by no means a professional and I’m sure someone with some more knowledge can chime in with better info but I can say that A bunch of years back I put out half my taps early to catch the first runs. Come March they definitely were not running at the same speed as the ones I did in the normal end of Feb beginning of March. So many variables that could change things but I think it was from them being 3 weeks older holes.