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I'm curious to hear more specifics of how you are processing. I'm considering getting into birch and am trying to wrap my head around how I may process with my equipment.

-What brix are you...

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As Ken said that is a lot of weight to have in a loft so proper design is key. I have a 250 gal. head tank supported by 4x8 rough hemlock but the span is only 7 ft. as I incorporated the framing of...

I make over 1k pounds of sugar annually and I find that there are no hard fast rules. I typically use a blend of amber and dark syrup to get more flavor and personally like to cook to 265F. I have...

The FSA/USDA may be able to provide some assistance for producers that participate in any of their programs. Time will tell if they will determine if this season's weather will be a factor. When I...

The way I read sg’s post is they are talking about buying a barrel of syrup so the price mentioned is what bascoms is SELLING syrup for.

Probably worth clarifying that before people think...

Threw in the towel here today. Dumped over 1k gal worth of sap from the last couple days this am because it was once again ropey. Let the first 100 gal. of what came in today run onto the ground in...

I have been boiling on mine for 8 years and have been very happy with it. I generally use a mix of well seasoned and somewhat green hardwood and get over 100 gal of syrup to a cord of wood...

That must have been stressful...

What is up with this weather...? A tornado nearby on Friday, a windstorm today and another in the forecast for tomorrow... cleaned a bunch of limbs off lines...

There will likely be a whole lot of off flavored syrup made this year... just like in 2012.

Very little niter here which is very unusual. So far, every time I have cleaned the syrup pans there has been zero build up on the pans and a quick spray with the hose has brought them back to...

Still hanging in there for now. Boiled this morning about 1500 gal of sap that came in from Wednesday afternoon thru 9 this am. So, have been getting over 1 gpt despite no freeze since Monday...

Boiled again today and made almost 20 gal of nice DR from about 1100 gal. of sap. So, sugar at about 1.4. Still boiling well with little niter. Foaming a little more but nothing too dramatic. ...

Seems as though we had another marginal freeze here again last night. Sap ran pretty well and will likely be another 1+gpt in 24 hours. Boiled about 800 gal today and made 15 gal of DR but only...

What are you using to remove them?

Boiled today about 2700 gal. from this weekend and a little bit left from Thursday that I held over to freeze in the tank knowing that it was gonna get warm. SSC at about 1.6 and made about 50 gal....

I don't shut the vac off until I have decided the season is over. I often see the flow slow way down at night during periods between freezes.

Yes the instructions, which I did actually read :), do include an explanation of corresponding temperatures. I also like to draw off heavy and then dilute before filtering. I keep the syrup off the...

The weak link for me has always been thermometer accuracy and frequent calibration so I really like the fact that this removes that variable completely...

Mine only has one scale on the dial for...

An easier option than valves would be plugs... You can use these to plug the outlet or inlet from the inside of the pan so that you can drain the valves and piping between pans. They're also very...

I couldn't agree more. I personally wish they had based the new system on the old VT system and just added a category for the very dark but alas.... that is not the case.

Yesterday I boiled all...

Yesterday I boiled everything I collected this week and about 200 gal. left over as a block of ice from the end of Feb. About 1900 gal. total through Friday am so over 1gpt per day each Wednesday...

I have always had a hard time getting plastic jugs this time of year, but this last year has certainly been more challenging overall for plastic and all other packaging I use, which in my case is a...

Tapdrinker... have you calibrated your refractometer with distilled water recently? I'm not saying your ssc is wrong as it's totally possible to get high concentrations from open grown trees, but I...

When I did this I just had hole in the bottom of the box for the sap to spill through. But, you can also get a fitting that replaces the external flapper and turns it into a length of pipe that can...