Willow Creek Sugarhouse 2017

[red maples]

Well finished up my woods yesterday and walked the woods for about 2 hrs and found a few bigger leaks and fixed a few smaller ones before lunch and was able to get the vac up to 22.5" still need to get out and find more I know they are out there. but its good enough for now. let it run for a bit to clear the lines. while I cleaned the tanks started collecting about 3 PM and we didn't get a freeze last night, sorry to say. but I have about 225 gallons of sap this morning. So thats nice.

Got the RO put together cleaned and washed. and everything is running pretty good at this point.

Went over to Chris Hicks' place to see his "sapzilla" and it is alot of stainless steel let me tell you. just missed the boil though... I will see it sooner or later.

Got Some new big sugars on gravity this year only about 20 taps but they always bring in good high sugar so looking forward to those. gonna get those on line this after noon. and hopefully get a little time across the street.

[Amber Gold]

Glad to hear things are going well for you. Think you'll have time to get those taps in across the street?

I'm going to have to suffer through another season of making maple cream using a candy machine. It takes a while, but it does work well. Someone posted a thread on all the part/pieces needed to make a gear pump cream machine...it's going to be a cool build.

[red maples]

collected everything and boiled out almost 700 gallons yesterday morning well by the time I got started and lit the fire it 12:00. had to do a little cleaning in the sugarhouse just a mess from thrashing. Just in case someone wanted to stop in for a visit. Ended up with about 12 gallons of syrup putting me about 22 gallons so far this season. it should be more but its just been too warm down here.

There is no sense in hanging bags now they are just going to get blown all over the place this weekend and the gravity isn't pulling anything right now. I have about 250 gallons from yesterday afternoon and last night so I might just run that through the machine with what ever I get today it won;t be much to boil since the sugar has bottomed out but at least everything will be ready to go for next week. not sure exactly when the next boil will be probably tuesday or more likely wednesday to give the trees a chance to thaw. don;t want to hold on to sap that long. looks like there will be a big run next week I just hope the temps stay cooler. Can;t seem to hit that sweet spot, Pun intented, of the 25/45 temp swing. its just been too warm the temp swings are there but with warmer temps creating low sugar. I can usually boost the sugar quite a bit with the gravity sap but its just not there.

[Russell Lampron]

It's definitely a bad year for bags and buckets. I have noticed a big drop in sugar the last couple of days. I collected another 325 today and left about 25 gallons in the woods. I'm going to try to boil it Sunday if I can get the tank valve thawed. It looks it will start running again Monday and looks good after that.

[red maples]

not too bad on the sap yesterday I think the wind killed things here man it was shaking he house. didn;t get much on buckets or gravity at all. still managed 325 gallons mostly from the vac lines. cooked that out I have to say that was some of the nicest sap I got this year. crystal clear and sugar was a hair over 1.5. even after RO it was still very clear. today was weird we got a little freeze and 1/2 my woods were frozen and I got like 75 or gallons from the warmer trees even though it hovered around the freezing mark. the frozen part was where the sap ladders are so the vac pressure was right about 27-28" I think thats why I actually got some sap. other than that I am just letting everything else freeze up. better frozen.

7 day is pretty frozen. maybe big nor-easter coming on Tuesday. and maybe mid 30's wed, thursday but after the cold we are gonna have aint nothing gonna be moving probably until friday or saturday of next week then its the push to maple weekend.

Alrighty stay warm and don;t forget to change the clocks!!!

[Russell Lampron]

I had my vacuum pumping most of the day yesterday and only got 75 gallons of sap. The clouds didn't help and the temps were hovering right around freezing. I'm surprised that I even got that much.