October journal

[handtapper]

Been busy in Hollis NH. I'm in the process of purchasing a piece of property/house but I moved to a new rental house for the next 9 months. I had to move my 12x8 shack and all the firewood I had. Of course there is the household items and everything else too. I had almost 500 pallets stacked up on top of the firewood, me and my brother (god bless his soul) spent two days cutting up pallets. I sold 3 cord cut split dried pine and 2.5 cord of cut split dried hardwood. I then moved another 2.5 cords of pine 1 mile to the new house rental and moved all the cut up pallets, which stacked up to about 4 more cords. You guys might be wondering what would motivate someone to move a operation 1 mile for such a short time frame. Heat is included in the new house saving me a few thousand bucks this winter,plus its nicer living quarters and a more private backyard for enjoyment. I picked up 10 more 55 gallon drums last week off craigslist and a few old tins at the flea market to outfit the sugar shack. I have to pick up my new evaporator this month and still need to find about 200 more trees to tap. Looking forward to MapleGuys open house in 15 days hope to see some traders there. The season is coming fast

[Dennis H.]

Took a walk in the sugarbush today. The trees are right at their max colors.
While out there I did some maintenance on the tubing. Found a lot of limbs on lines and a few large dead trees down.
Reworked a few lats to better route them to the trees. I am also looking a added 2 branch lines to pick up a few more taps and also allow me to redo a few more lats to allow me to have fewer taps on them.

Probably 2 more days should be enough to finish that up.

[Cabin]

Still can't get in my woods, since trooper shooter has not been caught going on 4 weeks. Police are requesting all people stay out and now they even banned hunting for four counties in NE PA.

Did they open up the woods where you are?

[lakeview maple]

Well I rounded up some help and I got the concrete poured for our addition , it went really well and I ordered the siding this morning hopefully it will be done early this coming week. pouring concrete a.jpgpouring concrete c.jpgpouring concrete e.jpgpouring concrete g.jpgpouring concrete h.jpg The Maple leaf was the guys who helped idea it came out pretty nice , blessed to have the help I have,Al

[adk1]

Pretty sweet Al, nice job!

[GeneralStark]

Been real busy here with maple and non-related maple projects. Will hopefully have a logger start a cutting in our woods within the next week or two. Finished marking it all last weekend. Just need to take some more tubing down and finish moving a wood pile to make room for a bunch of sawlogs, and a place to stage the firewood we will be selling. We are hoping firewood will pay for most of it as we are keeping all the saw logs. There is a bunch of nice hemlock, ash, oak, and hickory we will be using to build our house next summer.

Been working through the firewood we still have in log lengths from clearing the building site over a year ago. Probably have about 3 seasons worth of sugar wood split and stacked. Probably about 2/3 aspen and the rest a mix of good hardwood.

Finished up all the exterior trim on the sugarhouse and got a coat of sealer on as well. Mostly done with the building, just need to expand the heated room a bit to fit the new RO and then plumb and wire it up.

Once the logging is done, hopefully by early november, I will get to work setting up the rest of the woods. Going to do one small area of about 75 taps below the sugarhouse with 3/16" to try it out, the rest will all be on vac. and come straight to the sugarhouse.

Sold my old dodge 1st Gen. last week and then scored 12-17 gallon stainless barrels in very good shape.

photo(4).jpgphoto.jpgbarrels.jpg

[unc23win]

Good luck General just keep crossing things off the list as you add more that's what I do. I'm doing some logging/cutting fire wood myself before I install some new line.

[Dill]

Well I'm done haying a month earlier than usual, so its time to come back to the trader.
Wife and I were able to buy the access to our woodlot back earlier this month, so now we can log much easier. Looks like we are cutting about 60 acres this winter. 20 of that is nice sugarbush, looking to remove the hemlock and yellow birch. Its a low lying bunch of maple, so it'll probably have to be froze up to work on. Also clearing 20 for pasture and another 20 for eventual hay field. Started looking at used evaps again and eyeing an old garage as a potential temp sugarhouse, but as my wife points out, temporary means 20 years of being cramped.

[COMSTOCK MAPLES]

image.jpg finishing up siding and move the arch this weekend. Then it's on to firewood and maybe alittle hunting. Hope to run mainline for another 100 taps before winter hits. Just keep chipping away at the list.

[lakeview maple]

Nice sugarhouse, awesome job