Tapping now in southwestern Ohio

[buckeye gold]

Had a big run over night. 95 Gallons off 75 taps. Still low sugar though, man I hope sugar content comes up or I'm in for a lot of cooking and less syrup. Got the pan back from the machine shop at 11:30 and was cooking by 12:30. Got 70 gallons run by supper time. since there's not much run today I left 35 gallons to finish tomorrow (that's with the 15 held from yesterday) so I had the old full pint hybrid humping. 70 Gallon in 5 hours is pretty good for me.

[GSCampChris]

We have 350+ up as of yesterday and collected about 100 gallons off 150 taps. Starting the evaporator early in the AM and the crew will collect the rest. Our sugar was between 2.1 and 2.4 yesterday- all hard maples and probably half first time tappers. I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve... so many new toys in the sugarhouse to play with.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[fresh spout]

Happy for you GSCampChris..this is truly the best time of the year. Glad to see you had decent sugar content. Reports have been coming in with much less thus far. We need more hard cold spells and frost in the ground. May you have a successful one!

[newman_maple]

S of 70, I think you are doing great from your video. You might want to add a stack if you can. Having stove pipe will draw the fire better and keep more ash away from your pans. I had a concrete arch several years ago using a 2x3" pan and made quite a bit of syrup that season. Generally, you can cook off a gallon per hour per square foot of pan. Just something to think about if you are considering more taps.

[SouthOf70]

S of 70, I think you are doing great from your video. You might want to add a stack if you can. Having stove pipe will draw the fire better and keep more ash away from your pans. I had a concrete arch several years ago using a 2x3" pan and made quite a bit of syrup that season. Generally, you can cook off a gallon per hour per square foot of pan. Just something to think about if you are considering more taps.

Thanks for the tip Newman. I pulled about 12 gallon off 18 taps yesterday and boiled up a little over a quart. I was pleased with my first time but noticed it was very dark. It's not burned but looks like maybe there's a lot of sediment that settled out. I filtered with cheesecloth but looks like i missed a lot of it. I expect that may be some of the ash you're describing?

[SWohio]

Hey South, The sediment is just that, sediment that precipitates out of the syrup as it cools. I let my jars sit for 24 hours and then decant syrup off into fresh jars. This sediment is often called "sand". Much like sugar content of sap or yield of syrup to sap, you will see guys talking about a lot of sand or little sand. Like most things in sugar-ing, it varies. Add it to the fun of watching the weather, different runs, different colors etc. etc. etc. Sometimes it is sandy sometime not. Again, I just let it settle and decant it off. It will not kill you so I often sip the sand/syrup mix left behind. wont kill you. lol

[SouthOf70]

Hey South, The sediment is just that, sediment that precipitates out of the syrup as it cools. I let my jars sit for 24 hours and then decant syrup off into fresh jars. This sediment is often called "sand". Much like sugar content of sap or yield of syrup to sap, you will see guys talking about a lot of sand or little sand. Like most things in sugar-ing, it varies. Add it to the fun of watching the weather, different runs, different colors etc. etc. etc. Sometimes it is sandy sometime not. Again, I just let it settle and decant it off. It will not kill you so I often sip the sand/syrup mix left behind. wont kill you. lol

Thanks SW, that is very helpful. Good to know.

[newman_maple]

Thanks for the tip Newman....... It's not burned but looks like maybe there's a lot of sediment that settled out. I filtered with cheesecloth but looks like i missed a lot of it. I expect that may be some of the ash you're describing?

SW is probably right. If you do have ash falling in, it will darken the syrup. Hopefully, it is all just the sediments. Even with some ash, it won't kill ya!

[buckeye gold]

Sof70
You'll not get the sugar sand out with cheese cloth. You need a denser filter. It's best to just buy some prefilter and final filter from a maple supplier.

[SouthOf70]

Thanks everyone for all your help with this first year sugaring neophite! I turned in about 50 gallons over 3 boils and ended up with about a gallon of syrup. I was very pleased with how everything turned out, this has been a lot of fun... but looking at the forecast... is that it, are we done??? Say it aint so.