Eastern Ontario 2018

[Run Forest Run!]

Dang Karen, you are having a tough season to be sure.

Yes Susan, but a big plate of hot oatmeal pancakes with sliced bananas and a generous helping of yesterday's fresh batch of syrup sure put a smile on my face today! I'm ready for whatever Mother Nature dishes out this weekend but I truly hope that my trees don't take another beating.

[argohauler]

We are definitely still going. We had another good boil yesterday. We started out as a dark Dark-Robust but by the time the first drum was full we were back into Amber-Rich. Crap - we need more dark!!! By the end of the day we were all the way back to 65LT. The first 3000 gallons was at only 1.7% but the sap coming in afterwards was much higher because we ended up at a 43.5:1 ratio by the end of the day.

The sap ran decent all day and was still running some when I turned off the SP-22's at around 9pm. I expect the 2 woods on the auto-start/stop Airtech pump ran fairly well until midnight. The sap coming in was crystal clear so we won't be making dark syrup tomorrow either.

We are at a record 44 days since our first boil and still making good syrup - and still going. We might need to find a stainless steel bathtub to store the rest of our syrup if this craziness keeps going much longer!

Hi Marty. When the colour went lighter, did the flavour change at all?

[paulslund]

Hi Paul. I used the same bit (5/16) and just went a little deeper. We've been getting freezing rain and sleet since early this morning. It's so unsettling seeing the trees getting covered with ice - again.

Ah..thanks for the clarification..I"ll keep that in mind next year if it looks like they are slowing down..
Hopefully you don't get too much freezing rain.. Am I remembering correctly that you lost a/some good tree(s) a few years back due to ice damage?

[Run Forest Run!]

Ah..thanks for the clarification..I"ll keep that in mind next year if it looks like they are slowing down..
Hopefully you don't get too much freezing rain.. Am I remembering correctly that you lost a/some good tree(s) a few years back due to ice damage?

Yes, a few years back we had a vicious ice storm over the Easter weekend. I lost several trees that year - with the buckets attached. Lots of damage was done to the trees that didn't rip right out of the ground. A year before that, over Christmas, we had another vicious ice storm and lost a lot of our tree canopies. It was carnage twice.

As for me reaming the holes this year, I'll soon find out if it was worth it or not in the long run.

The ice and freezing rain is making a heck of a racket on the windows here today. Good thing I've got some syrup to eat.

[Galena]

OK math geeks here are my final figures:

Batch #1 123.8l sap, 4l syrup
Batch #2 1119l sap, 4l syrup
Batch #3 106.7l sap, 3.75l syrup
Batch#4 132l sap, 4.9l syrup
Batch#5 146l sap, 5l syrup
Batch #6 138.3l sap, 4.5l syrup
Batch #7 35.3l sap, 1.75l syrup

Sooo...overall totals....801.1l sap and 27.9l syrup. That seems pretty decent! Batch #7 really surprised me, I was expecting 1l and got well over that, and apart from Batch #3 which finished a couple hashmarks too high, all these batches Brixed out perfectly at the red line. Very, very happy!

[Run Forest Run!]

You've got some very sweet trees Susan - 28:1!

Congrats on such a great season. You deserve it!

[Galena]

Thanks Karen, yep I attribute those numbers to an all-sugar sugar bush! Now I need to get my butt in gear...fell a tree that has to come down, build and outfit a real sugar shack, and buck up a bazillion pallets so I have lots of dry seasoned wood to burn...the usual ;-)

[Big_Eddy]

We pulled taps today (in the sleet). Dumped over 100 gals of sap in the process. Most of the buckets were full or overflowing, but I'm done for this season. I beat my 1l per tap goal so that is good enough for me.
First time I've ended the season with more snow (ice pellets) in the bush than I started the year with.
Now we need some warm weather for cleaning up.

Last full pail picture of 2018

[Galena]

OMG Eddy, you dumped 100g sap...I'd've taken some :-/

[Dlee]

I was going to dump 120 gal but found a buddy to take it