Got to 34 deg here (just across the river from Waterford VT) now has dropped back to 32.
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Got to 34 deg here (just across the river from Waterford VT) now has dropped back to 32.
Thermometer at the house got to 60 in the sun :) one by my releaser in the shade I saw at 37. Got about 200 gallons today.
Only to 37 yesterday, but walked the trees this morning and they had run yesterday... of course now they are frozen buckets...looks like they will fill today...
Temperature readings in the sun don't mean much and certainly aren't good indicators of the air temperature. While the sun will warm things up, how much is difficult to predict. If you point an IR thermometer or thermal camera at the sun or even at an incandescent light source (not recommended), it can give extremely high reading (hundreds or thousands of degrees). But yes....the sun sure does feel nice this time of year.Quote:
Originally Posted by wiam
Yup, a dark colored thermometer will read much higher than a light-colored thermometer sitting right next to it.Quote:
Originally Posted by DrTimPerkins
Good day of sugaring. Spent part of the morning walking the woods and fixing some micro leaks. There are usually a couple days every season when I am really glad I set up dry lines and today was one. After a hard freeze last night it took a bit for things to thaw, especially without the sun, even though the temp. rose pretty quickly. For over an hour the sap was running hard down the dry lines until the ice let loose and the wet lines took over.
The sap ran very hard, probably hardest yet this season, early this afternoon. Fired up the ro about 2 once I had 800 gal. (@ 2.5 % by my refractometer but 2.2% by my hydrometer; which is more accurate?) which accumulated since Tuesday afternoon. Ran the concentrate to an empty 400 gal. tank and then ran that to the head tank, and then ran all the the sap that had come in so everything collected by 5 pm was processed. Ended up with approx. 225 gal. of about 10%. Boiled for about 2.5 hours and made just over 20 gal. of Golden Delicate with great flavor.
Sap is still running pretty well and likely will all night. I may not have tome to boil tomorrow due to other work commitments so we'll see what happens....
Sap never really got going till late afternoon for me. I did get 3000 gallons by 7 tonight. Sap still running 225 GPH and should continue all night. My sugar is 2.4% and that is very high for me. Raining now and that might get things rolling tomorrow. Going to spend tomorrow in the woods finding more bad CV2 spouts. Need to get vacuum up to 27-28 inches. Right now I am running 23 inches in my old woods.
Spud
Well sap was rolling in yesterday for me around 10am. I gathered apprx 925g by 4 in the afternoon of 2.2%. Fired up the RO and started boiling. Finished up washing and cleaning by 830 and made another 22g. Things should be full again today. Probably won't boil, I will wash out my holding tanks and then start the RO. Getting ready for Saturday.
Hit 80% of expected production last night and passed my 2014 production total. Gathered again this morning. Looks like gravity lines and buckets have stopped running. Vacuum lines are still flowing.
Helpers collected a bunch yesterday and I checked this am and ... oh man.:o.. buckets were overflowing for the first time this season ! I ran out of time to collect it all, but most were full or close to full. Figure around 70 gallons at least. Most were still runnning so likely they will be full today when I get home. Not sure if they will stop tomorrow or not, but looks like another recharge period coming up Sunday and next week looks pretty good. I should be able to fire up this weekend if the arch is ready.