2015 Season West Virginia Mapler

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Starting tapping this afternoon in the cold, wind and the snow coming down. Looks like we may get some sap later in the week and into next week. This is about the normal start time for us somewhere between the 1st and 10th of February. Put in 295 taps today and hoping to be 675 to 700 south side taps in by Thurs even. Forecast shows 47 on Wed so I hope to leak patrol everything that is tapped by Wed afternoon and there is no frost in the ground on the south side and the snow we got today should keep it out. Praying for a good season and hoping my back gets better so I can make it through the season without the constant pain. 270 taps on the north side won't likely go in until sometime towards end of next week. Good luck to each of my fellow sugarmakers, may your tanks overflow!

[PATheron]

Hopefully itll be a good year so you have lots of sap to play with your new ro machine. First draw youll be seeing dollar signs everywhere!

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Hope to do same day boils now. In the past, I seldom ever boiled sap the same day it ran, it was nearly always the next day. Pushing 1000 taps this year with close to 400 on natural vacuum 3/16 so hoping to have plenty of sap. RO is a little big for my size operation, but rather too big than too small and I like one membrane instead of 2 or 3 smaller ones, less things to tear up.

[Russell Lampron]

Good luck this season Brandon. I think that you will find the the new RO isn't too big. It's about time that you got one. You're going to like it.

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Russ,

Thanks and I knew you would be the first to say it was about time. In past I had 3 retired guys that did a lot of the boiling the next day while I was at work. One has retired on me and the other 2 are getting older. Figured if I was going to expand, my woodshed wasn't going to be able to hold enough wood and I like the idea of only cutting about 20% as much wood as before. Besides, since I built my new house I heat it with wood and I get plenty of enjoyment cutting the wood for it now too. Hoping to run it to about 12% to maybe 14% on heavy flow days before it hits steamaway.

[Sugarmaker]

Brandon,
Hope your season is good.
I have been out of the maple loop for a while. I see you have expanded your tap numbers and also have a R.O. from Deer Run.
We are about a hour from Rays place.
Hope the back gets better. I somehow recovered from siatica this summer. Ice lots of Ibuprofen and just kept moving.
Regards,
Chris

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

I did get in 702 taps on the south side earlier this week. Weather looks good for a big run next 48 hours. Already have 200 to 300 gallons in the tanks and supposed to be 50 today and 57 tomorrow and day or 2 that it should run again middle of next week. I had a massive amount of deer damage on the new 3/16 tubing in woods of my one of my sugarbushes and almost all of it is on new trees. Probably had 50 places it was chewed completely in two. Guess they didn't appreciate this new stuff suddenly showing up in their play area. Hoping they will leave it alone through out the season. Tried to keep hands scent free and sweat free while installing it, so not sure why they damaged it so bad other than they didn't want it blokcing their paths. The other 2 areas I put up about 50% of the 3/16, they only chewed it in two in 3 places, so not sure why they are tearing it up. Dont normally have hardly any problem with deer. Back after last season and before this past fall, in the same area they probably chewed up 50 to 75 of my droplines on tubing that has been there for over 10 years before I put up the new 3/16 this year. Some of the drop lines were least 5' off the ground.

[mountainvan]

I had the same issue this winter, but the tubing was very close to a stand of hemlocks that the deer bed down in. I raised it 6 ft up and the deer leave it alone.

[darkmachine]

Hung the first 79 buckets 2/6. Hope to hang the rest tomorrow and get started on tubing asap!

[WESTVIRGINIAMAPLER]

Good start to the season but after Wed, it is supposed to get very cold as far as long ran forecast shows. I have ran 1230 gallons of sap through so far and should probably have a few hundred more by Thurs. Got up to 64 yesterday which is crazy warm for this time of year and shut down the sap. Lot of single digits after Wed.