2019 Tapping Season - Connecticut

[Person25]

Boiled my first run of the year Saturday, 85 gallons sap, 2.25%, 1.75 gal syrup, heavy niter in the pan. . Gathered 60 gallons sunday afternoon on 30 taps,they ran most of the night into Monday. I checked this morning around 8am, they were still running. I left my buckets half full as of 8am so they wouldnt blow away, if they ran today should be about 90 more gallons out there. That’ll be a lot of boiling for me this weekend, got me thinking about expanding tap count but not before adding an RO and investing in some tubing. I’ll have to check tomorrow to see if anything has gone with the wind. Also, I pulled two taps that had gone dark yellow on me Friday, back to clear Saturday, and yellow on Sunday. Sugar yesterday was down around/under 2%, but we should get a good recharge with this little freeze. Might just leave them hanging for this cold spell with a little weight in them, till about Friday when it looks like we might thaw out for the day.

[snoskier16]

It appears as though the maple gods are not happy and we need a sacrifice...

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Thankfully I got all of the sap out of my tote and run through the RO as this freeze would surely lock everything up.

On a positive note, it looks like I can get some other things done around the house this week...

[Cjadamec]

If it really stays that cold for that long I might have time to rig up an AOF setup for my evaporator. Judging by the smoke coming out of the stack I have a good amount of unburned gasses.

[CTfarm]

I'm boiling off the rest of my sap I collected and drawing off a couple of gallons before the cold spell. Last stick just went in the arch.

[Sugar Bear]

Well here we are in CT on March 1st and my taps ( about 32 of my 40) are already a month old, while I have already made 4+ gallons of Vermont Calibrated maple syrup on them so far, I would wager anybody ( Doctor, Lawyer, Einstein, anybody that knows more then I do which is most people ) that the main spine of the season with the best sugar movement is still ahead of us even here in southern CT. As I said tapping early is overrated, From NC all the way up to the base of the shield. The closer to the shield you are the more overrated early taping is. Obviously if you have more then a few hundred taps you need to start well before things begin.

Hope you had a good time in Arizona to the guy who went the third week of February but wanted to tap before then. I hope you were not suckered into tapping early like I always am. February had three runs of sap here in southern CT and only the last one in late Feb was profuse and meant any business.

[snoskier16]

Sugar Bear, I’m pretty sure that we all hope you are right! We tapped early to catch the week of warm temps, but since then have been really slow. With lots of new systems to test out, early was our way of making sure everything worked before the big runs hit. We have syrup that we otherwise wouldn’t have if we waited so I suppose the tap early or wait debate will continue for another year!

[Person25]

Boiling today, about 60 gallons stock piled in the cooler since Sunday last. Tomorrow I’m going to run around and pull all my buckets in to warmer temps since they are all full but frozen solid. Will keep me busy at least while we wait for some warmer days.

[Sugar Bear]

Sugar Bear, I’m pretty sure that we all hope you are right! We tapped early to catch the week of warm temps, but since then have been really slow. With lots of new systems to test out, early was our way of making sure everything worked before the big runs hit. We have syrup that we otherwise wouldn’t have if we waited so I suppose the tap early or wait debate will continue for another year!

I tap only Rocking Sugars, so I guess those that tap Reds face a different analysis when it comes to the when to tap decision. For certain. But this year I would have waited to February 15th rather then February 1 to tap my rocks. My first run put out 32 gallons of sap, my second put out 75 gallons of sap and my third put out 90 gallons of sap. Tapping Feb 15 would have caught run two and run three and would have left me two weeks younger on the taps.

While they do put out some good syrup, Reds do crazy and unpredictable things at almost any time of the year ( many of them not related to sap ). If i were taping reds I think I would be tapped by Jan 20th of almost any year.

O and by the way that first 32 gallons of sap only produced .54 gallons of syrup so it was about 1.65% sugar. The others were both around 2.25 percent sugar. Much better on the fire wood pile with regards to amount of syrup for the flitch. ( flitch is a legal tender word by the way ... not certain why this blog red lines it )

[snoskier16]

O and by the way that first 32 gallons of sap only produced .54 gallons of syrup so it was about 1.65% sugar. The others were both around 2.25 percent sugar.

My first run was 250+ gallons of sap at 0.89% sugar so without the RO boiling that would have been a waste of time. Sugar has been going up with each "run", but we've yet to see anything of that volume since the first days that the taps were in. It was nice to see the vacuum pump turn on today and see some sap moving in the lines!

[Mike Van]

I tap only Rocking Sugars, so I guess those that tap Reds face a different analysis when it comes . ( flitch is a legal tender word by the way ... not certain why this blog red lines it )

A flitch is also a slab of lumber with bark on both edges.