WV MAPLER TAPPED 02/11/06

I checked the forecast this morning early before leaving and it wasn't as good for next week as it has been, so I tapped the 2 bushes on the south side which is about 2/3 of my taps. I planned on tapping the north side bush maybe Wed evening if the forecast was better.

I get home this evening and the forecast is as follows:

Tues sunny 39
Wed sunny 44
Thurs Sunny 54
Fri Rain 55
Sat sunny 33
and then cold after that.

Hopefully I can get back over early Tues morning before work and tap the north side bush if the forecast is as optimistic.

Let the sap flow freely. :D

Go man go! Let the games begin...(feeling very olympic like! :lol: )

That 40 second from tap to tap shure is mighty quick. Daren your right, it Must be the olympics. I hope the snow dosen't slow you down to much.
Good luck Brandon. I hope your sap flows as freely as mine has this week. :D
Gerry

Good to see you tapped Brandon. It is looking pretty good at Intellicast.com, showing these temperatures this evening.
Tues 21 - 45
Wed 28 - 53
Thu 33 - 56
Fri 42 - 54
Sat 29 - 36
Sun 18 - 30

I'm anxious for another run. :)

Larry,

Here's the most accurate forecast I have found for our area. It is for Meadow Bridge and is the most closely corelated with our area. All of the others base it on Lewisburg or Beckley and are usually too warm. :)

http://www.weather.com/outlook/healt...6hr_topnav_flu

Wow, looks like good sap weather.

Our forcast is at least 5 degrees colder, so I'm still in the clear with waiting another week (I'm still not ready).

Thanks Brandon, I didn't know weather was available for Medow Bridge. I've been looking at Lewisburg which Richard says generally compairs good with his temperature. I'll watch the weathe here. We have a little more taping to do and will try to get it done before this run.

Larry,

Lewisburg is 5 or more degrees higher usually. :?

Tapped my bush on the north side this evening and I am all tapped. Most of the taps were running when I drilled them and it got to 40 today and all sun. Just warm enough to start thawing things out as it has been cold here for 10 days and lot of low temps. Supposed to be 50 and sunny tommorrow and mid 50's on Thurs and sunny. It has been a long time since I got this kind of weather for my first run. 8O Probably will run most of the night tommorrow and run thru Thurs night until Friday afternoon or night as it is supposed to get cold on Friday and stay that way for the next week which is as far as the forecast shows. God only knows how much sap we will get. I will probably boil Thurs and Fri evenings and up to 18 hours on Sat. If that don't get it all, then I will start again Monday evening. Never know, the sap may not even run that much. It ran some today and was still running some at dark, so I'll hope for the best. With the weather getting cold again, I can probably hold the sap for at least a week! :D

Good luck Brandon,,I bet it will run pretty well with those temps!!!

Brandon it looks like you need an RO machine to cut that 18 hour boiling time down to about 5 or 6 hours.

Russ

Russell,

I try to keep the boiling to Fri evenings and Saturdays and not boil during the week any. That is reason that sometimes I have long boils on Sat. Work thru the week, church on Sunday and rest, and live almost 30 minutes away, so I try to collect and hold until weekend and it usually works good. I am getting 50+ gph including startup and shutdown out of my evaporator, so it works good enough for me not to need and RO. :D

Went over this evening to collect, but not much sap. The sap was running very good, probably about 75% of full bore. The ground is still frozen quite a bit from the very cold temps we had. It hit 50 today and got the trees awake some. I hope it runs nearly all night tonight and fills up the tanks at least 2/3 full. I would like to have at least 1000 gallon to boil off this weekend, but will have to wait and see. Wind mainly out of south, so might not be much. Supposed to be 55 tommorrow, so hopefully they will pour and then get cold again on Friday. :D

Collected 500 gallon from what it ran the last two days. It is not supposed to freeze tonight and gradually get colder until it hits freezing probably by 8 or 9 tommorrow night. I am hoping and praying it runs all night and all day tomorrow even though it will probably gradually slow to next to nothing. I hope to have another 500 gallon by tommorrow evening so I can have a good boil about 8 hours tommorrow night and all day Sat. :D

Collected another 380 gallons this evening and cold temps now for several days. I am boiling as I am typing this. I am hoping to boil off 350 to 400 this evening and boil off the rest of it tommorrow. It doesn't get much better than being able to get onto the trader via company computer and wireless card out in the sticks and making syrup at the same time. Sure is wonderful to be able to have my own sugarhouse for the first time in my life. God sure is good! :D :D :D :D

Watching that light amber trickle out of the evaporator! :D :D

Well Brandon you pulled it off. Building a new sugarhouse plus a new child in your family all in one year. Congats!! I did the same in 2002.
Keith

Boiled off 880 gallon Friday evening and all day Sat. I drew off around 15 gallon and stored it in bulk. Will try to get at least that much more before filtering and canning it. This way, nearly all the sugar sand settles to the bottom and it makes for much faster filtering and canning in a couple of weeks. I didn't grade any of it, but it was all light amber or very close if not. :D

It got to -1 where I live last night which was a record and probably at least -5 or -6 at the sugarhouse as it is always a few degrees colder there. Sure was probably the coldest day I have boiled in before as it was in the single digits last night when I finished. Looks like a pretty cold week with a couple of days barely above 40. Hoping for a few hundred gallon so I can boil Sat.

Collected 2 of my 3 bushes this evening and got 280 gallons of sap. It looks like it will run a little tommorrow and Sat, so hope to have 500 to 800 gallons to boil off on Sat. :D

Hey Bud congrats on your first boiling season in the new Sugarhouse... your right , having the wireless card is great, I'll have the web cam on again this season when I boil.. so I take it everything is working flawlessly? I'll try to give you a call today to chat with ya. doesn't look like I'll boil till next weekend but thats okay as long as I get at least 4 weeks in this year!!! 5 - 6 would be better 8O

Didn't collect anything today but it looks like somewhere around 600 to 800 gallon of sap to boil off tommorrow. Start about 600 in the morning and boil and collect until it's all gone hopefully. :D

Sap ended up running better than expected yesterday and I ended up boiling off 820 gallons yesterday. Sure made for a long day, but the end result was worth it. All the syrup appeared light or medium. I still haven't filtered and canned anything yet, but I have drawn off around 33 or 34 gallon. I sanitized all my tanks in the woods yesterday after collecting as I try to do nearly every week and the sap was still pouring. Probably left around 200 gallon in them before it quit running last night. It was running full speed yesterday. Cold here today and tommorrow and warming back up. Appears that it may be one of the best sap weeks of the year and I have to be out of town on Wed and Thurs, so a lot may run on the ground unfortunately. :( Do the best I can and go from there. So far, it has been a good year and if the past two weeks are any indication, it is looking like it may be a good year. :D

WOW nice run.. way to go

It is supposed to warm up here Tues and stay that way thru the middle of the next with with no freezing. Went thru this 2 years ago and 8 straight days from March 1 to 8th with no freezing and temps in the 50's and 60's every day nearly killed the season and the holes wouldn't run much after that. Too early yet and with being out of town two days this week and trying to do three days worth of work on Fri, may loose a lot of what runs this week. :(

Get some extra tanks set up beside you regular tanks and have someone check on the level for you this week/if there getting full have them move the mainline to the other tank :idea:

Plumb up a splitting manifold with one of these in each tank.

www.mcmaster.com

Item #46585K16

This will stop the flow to the tank that is full, but let flow into ones that are empty.

Brian

Some of my stock tanks have a factory hole just below the rim where you could use a bulk tank type fitting and pipe it over to a tank a little lower in height/so when the first was full it would overflow through the pipe to the 2nd. tank..

Better yet !! Tell your Boss like I do.. During Sugaring season I don't travel... Period.. oh.... what sir? I have to find a new job?? Crap :? :wink:

Collected 480 gallons of sap last night and hoping it will keep. Some of the sap was not completely clear. I ran it all thru the UV light and hoping to get it all boiled off on Thurs as I have someone hopefully going to boil for me all day on Thurs as I am out of town until late Thurs evening. Sap should be running today and tommorrow before shutting off due to no freezing. I am hoping that sap will keep until Sat as I hope to get it collected Thurs and Fri evenings and run it thru the UV light. Sure stinks having to be out of town as I could have boiled today and tommorrow afternoon as work hasn't been too busy this week. Supposed to get cold thurs night and stay that way until the middle of next week, so that should help some.

Either way, do the best I can and leave the rest in God's hands. I am just thankful for the awesome privelege to be able to do what I do. :D

Got the 480 gallons boiled off today without me being there and it was all dark A grade due to some of the sap being 5 days old and the temps have been high the last 2 or 3 days. Collected around 520 gallons this evening and ran that thru the UV and hoping it will keep until early Sat morning. Supposed to get in 20's tonight and low 30's tommorrow and 15 tommorrow night. Looks like we should get a pretty good run next week and then it may be over. If I can get the sap I have now boiled off Sat and get 1000 more gallon next week, I would be around 75 gallon which would be fine. Been a hectic year here to say the least and with my dad working on the new house he is building all the time, I don't have him to help me like normal. :)

Hopefully you'll have a couple more weeks left to the season?? 100 gallons would look better then 75? wouldn't it :?: Has it been a Good? Average? Bad ? year.

Kevin,

100 would sure be better, but either way, just take whatever comes and be thankful. It has been a hectic 12 months with helping my parents move and getting started on their house, building a new sugarhouse of my own and moving and resetting up everything, have a baby, whew, need I say any more. 8O

What do you think about my line in the stream. :?:

It looks to be below average year here. Tommorrow will make 5 boils. :?

Stream mainline :?: Good idea to keep the sap cool but with all the dips and humps sap is going to settle and be a day or several before it makes it to the bottom of the hill into the tank./Myself i would run an aerial mainline and be happy with that knowing you got it all in that day and none was left behind..

Kevin,

The problem with an aerial mainline is it would be about 250 yards in direct sunlight. By the time the sap got to the tank, it wouldn't be fit for anything on a 1 percent grade. I can keep the sags out fairly good in the stream. Guess I will know by this time next year. I may just burry the thing about 12 to 18 inches deep permant. Our frost usually never goes over a few inches deep. :)

I boiled off around 500 gallons yesterday in 9 hours and was finishing syrup the entire time I was boiling. Was the best evaporation rate I have gotten so far for an entire day which included startup and shutdown. I would have done a little better if I had just concentrated on boiling, but I hadn't finished any yet and had people waiting. I canned everything I had drawn off and ended up with 20 gallons of light, 14 med and 14 dark for 48 total. Everything yesterday I boiled was dark or b, but I mixed it with some lighter to ensure it was a dark A. The syrup yesterday tasted med or dark, but it was extremely dark in color. It has been a weird year with 2 or 3 days every week with 50's and 60's temps and it really makes it difficult when you work 40 to 50 hours @ week and live 1/2 hour from sugarhouse. :D

My little helper is sick, so I am sitting on my rear relaxing all day as I can't take him to church so my wife and I can alternate. :(

Well it sounds like your handling things pretty darn well with all the things you have going on . Just think, it will be all over for us down here verry soon. I think i'll get one more small boil this week and that's it. Good luck with the rest of your season.
Gerry

Gerry,

Thanks and it looks like my last week also. I am hoping for my best week like it did last year. :D

Hey Brandon I find it amazing that you are winding down and we are just getting started. If it were not for this websight it would never have occured to me that there are sugarmakers that far south. Rob

Rob,

Last year I went two weeks later than this. The last two years the season lasted six weeks, but this year I don't think it will make it 4 weeks. Not to be a gloom and doom, but I'm afraid it may be the same up north the way the weather has been all this year, :(

I collected sap at 2 of my 3 bushes this evening and got 290 gallons. Probably 75 to 100 at the other bush but will leave it till Wed and collect it then. Hope to collect all 3 again on Wed and boil off what I collected today without mixing any of the sap. Cold tonight and tommorrow night and then warm for next 10 days. Likely this will be the last week and hoping for my best sap week of the year to make it a decent season. :D

I collected 430 gallons yesterday and 280 more today which put me at 1000 for the week. I pull all the taps in 2 of the 3 bushes today and flushed all the lines. I left the taps in on the north side bush and will collect it one more time tommorrow evening and flush it. 60+ today and temps in 50's and 60's all the way thru next weekend. This is my 4th week and we have had at least 2 or 3 days every week where the temps have been 50+ and it has made it difficult this year with all the warm weather.

I should end up around 70 to 75 gallons and considering it hardly froze the entire month of Jan and the 1st few days in Feb, a good year considering those factors. Sugar content was lower than I have ever seen it and it looks like it will be around 52 to 1 ratio. Not suprising with the warm weather we had all winter.

I have about 300 more gallon to boil off tommorrow evening and I will be finished. Just have to wash up a few tanks and about 30 buckets and I will be ready to wait for next year. Not as much syrup as I would have liked, but just grateful to God for the awesome privelege. :D