Checking what VT sugar makers are doing

[DrTimPerkins]

Made 400 gal GD on Friday. Good run on Fri/Sat and some on Sunday. Have another 760 gal of 35 Brix concentrate to boil today, with another 2,000 gal of sap in the tanks to process in the RO. That'll bring us up to around 2,000 gal of syrup for the season. Still a good amount of snow on the ground and no real hot weather forecast, so things look good for at least another week or two. We've been quite a bit colder than many other sites so far this spring, so lagging a bit behind, but still have some season to go. Sap sugar still around 2.0 Brix. Hopefully the freeze overnight will bring it up a bit, but it was cold enough that I don't expect it to run until around noon. We'll start boiling in about an hour.

Afternoon Update
Made another 360 gal of syrup earlier today, putting us at 2,080 (0.42 gal/tap) so far. Right on the edge of GD/AR. Sap sugar dropped off to 1.8 Brix by this afternoon. Niter is still not too bad, but picking up some. Sap started off running fairly late today due to low overnight temperatures. Should run moderately well overnight. Will likely concentrate tomorrow again and then boil either Wed or Thurs depending upon how much comes in.

[tcross]

I don't have a gph reading device but my sap is coming in better right now than it has all year so far.

[spud]

I'm a little less then .5 GPT today. Sap should keep running till about 9:00pm tonight. I am hearing that North/West facing woods are running very good in my area. My South/East trees are slowing down a lot. My South/West trees are running better. I'm hoping to get another 4-5 GPT in the next two weeks or so. Time will tell. The guy I sell my sap to has made 32,000 gallons of syrup so far. He made 3000 gallons in one day. He is hoping to hit 40,000+

Spud

[steve J]

Everything is slowing down for me and my sap is testing just over 1% so I will boil tomorrow and call it a seadon. This is most syrup I have made and my sap is up close to 40% with 15 less taps.

[Parker]

T cross,,,put a gallon jug under your pipe going into the tank and time it. Divide 60 by the time you get..the result is how many gallons per hour

[tcross]

thanks Parker! I could do that but with the releaser dumping my timing would probably not be real accurate, but I suppose it'd get me in the ball park. when I'm around boiling and it's running i'll time the dumps on occasion to figure out how the flow is... not real ideal sitting in my office though . I did figure it out from the amount of time it ran and how many gallons I got in that time... put me at roughly 27gph for the 200 taps... or about 275 gallons. today should be another good day.

[rhwells2003]

pretty good day yesterday. Got a touch over 1gpt on my vacuum system, and about 1.25gpt off my 3/16 lines. It was 25 degrees by 9pm last night. Hoping for another good day today with more rain then sun. I'm at 21gpt for the season! I always hope to hit atleast 20gpt and figure everything over that is gravy, but now that I'm over it I'm hoping for 25. We'll see.

[GeneralStark]

Pretty decent run yesterday with almost 1.25 gpt between when it thawed and then froze last night. Coming up on 25k gal. sap for the season. Boiled about 1800 gal. sap yesterday and made about 30 gal DR just over the line from AR. I miss the old dark amber option...

I'm now 20 gal. over last year's production and 5 gal. away from .5gpt. Have certainly begun the slide to the finish, but how long will it be before the trees bud? I think I may have another week.

[smokeyamber]

Looking like things are drying up for my buckets, collected about 20 gallons for all 70 taps and the weather was prime for it to run. I will boil what I have in the next couple of days and may pull taps. Sap still looks nice and clear so likely the trees I tapped way back in mid feb are just healing up ? Should end up with around nine gallons, which is close to last year so no complaints here.

[peteinvermont]

Pretty decent run yesterday with almost 1.25 gpt between when it thawed and then froze last night. Coming up on 25k gal. sap for the season. Boiled about 1800 gal. sap yesterday and made about 30 gal DR just over the line from AR. I miss the old dark amber option...

I'm now 20 gal. over last year's production and 5 gal. away from .5gpt. Have certainly begun the slide to the finish, but how long will it be before the trees bud? I think I may have another week.

25k gallons from 750 taps...wow, thats solid.