Dr. TimOriginally Posted by DrTimPerkins
Last year I had 100 taps that were all gravity. The 100 taps were made up of 50 large maple trees all 30+ inch. I wound up getting 2.6 times more out of my high vacuum trees then I did on the gravity trees.
This fall I tapped 3 very large maples (30+ inch) and 12 smaller maples (8 inch). What I have found out is the big trees were producing 4 times the sap. The big trees were also testing at 1.8% right up until the other day when they dropped to 1.4%
The smaller tree have been testing 1% all along and have not changed. The amount of sap I posted was 13.5 GPT for the big trees and 3.5GPT on the small trees. These amounts are after I multiplied the actual gallons by 2.6
This is no high tech study I can assure you. It does give me an idea as to what I might get if I was going to tap my whole woods in the fall. My woods is made up of 75% smaller trees (8-14 inches) My thought so far is it would not pay to tap any small tree for two reasons.
1- Very low sugar (1%)
2- Very small amount of sap per tree.
It would appear that tapping large maples (30 inch+) could make a person additional income. Although after reading one of your past post you mentioned reaming holes will not be very productive. The Brannon's said they went on to get a .4GPT in the spring after reaming their holes. This may not work for everyone though. I am taking a very big interest in the numbers PaTheron is posting on his fall tapping. I am hoping he gets at least .4GPT in the spring. If he does then fall tapping would be well worth it for him because he said .4GPT is about what he makes in spring time sugaring most years. Thank you Dr. Tim for helping all of us here on Trader with your words of wisdom. I think there is a lot of people that are interested in the possibilities of fall tapping but just not sure if it would pay to do it.
Spud
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