2019 Missouri Tapping Season

[unclejohn]

The trees ran like crazy over the last few days before this most recent arctic blast. Harvested 120 gallons yesterday but had to leave a bunch of ice in the buckets and bags. Looks like some good days coming up again once we thaw out. Hey River, tell us about your walnut syrup!

[unclejohn]

That batch made 2.75 gallons. Trees ran well yesterday. With today and tomorrow above 50 degrees, our final collection should be a big one and the ice in bags and buckets will serve to concentrate sugar in the rest of the sap. We will probably pull our spiles out after this collection; 20 gallons of syrup is enough, and we're getting low on firewood and tired of the mud. good luck to Missouri sapsuckers- I think there will be a few more opportunities for good flow. Also, the boxelder syrup tastes nice, but it was about a 60:1 boildown ratio. John

[Jjuhl54]

Checked ours trees today out of 12 taps we collected 30 gallons of sap

[unclejohn]

nice going jjuhl. you will find that like our family, the interest in making syrup keeps growing and you will need to find more trees and collect more sap each year. Because the stuff tastes soooo good! Today it was 60 deg in mid MO after a night below freezing. So the conditions were right for good sap flow, and also making lots of mud in the woods. The trees had absolutely amazing flow. We gathered 300 gallons from our 200 trees in the last 2 days and ran out of totes, so some of that sap is going to freeze on the trees and hang there til a thaw. We started a boil today, and will likely continue adding sap for the next 2 or 3 days while it boils down. Good luck with your trees! john

[Jjuhl54]

hey unclejohn starting out small operation 12 taps with 4 gal. bags, from feb. 13 2019 thru feb. 14 2019 we have collected 40 gallons,try to get it boiled down to make room for more. We have 3 lp cookers going to boil sap and we keep the sap in walkin cooler, would like to post some pics have not figured that out yet.

[Goggleeye]

Got a feelin' the big sap's a comin. How do I know, you ask. By the size of my firewood pile. You'd think after 10 years of doing this I would have sense enough to have enough wood cut ahead of time to last the entire season. But no. Splitting most of the day today. Also accidentally locked the wife in the sugar shack and drove off to church back in January. I'm really beginning to question my mental well-being. Man, have I got to get an RO for next year. Going to need it if I add more taps. Must add more taps. And mainline.

[BAP]

Got a feelin' the big sap's a comin. How do I know, you ask. By the size of my firewood pile. You'd think after 10 years of doing this I would have sense enough to have enough wood cut ahead of time to last the entire season. But no. Splitting most of the day today. Also accidentally locked the wife in the sugar shack and drove off to church back in January. I'm really beginning to question my mental well-being. Man, have I got to get an RO for next year. Going to need it if I add more taps. Must add more taps. And mainline.

Was it an accident you locked her in or was it on purpose so you could get to church to confess your sins of spending more money on sugaring equipment that you didn’t want her to know about? LOL.

[esetter]

I believe its all over but the crying down here. Warm temps and a 3 day trip out of town for work has likely ended my season. Hope you guys get a big flow at the end!

[unclejohn]

Our last batch yielded 8.25 gallons of beautiful dark flavorful syrup. We have pulled out our taps as we have made enough syrup for the year. I think there will still be a few more good flow days, but the ants will get it. Here's our season by the numbers:

#of trees tapped: 210 (150 sapsacks, 60 buckets)
Total syrup production: 25.8 gallons
sap collected: 996 gallons
# of boils: 5
Firewood used: about 2 cords
# of times I fell in the mud in the woods: 2
injuries from falling in the woods: 0
injuries from cutting/splitting firewood: 1 (smashed little finger)
#of buckets turned over by raccoons: 0 (that's a big improvement from last year, now that we've increased use of sapsaks)
#of times trailer stuck in the mud: 1 (very muddy conditions, pulled it out next morning when ground was frozen)
#of broken bottles or big syrup spills: 0
spiles I may have left in our trees: 5 ?? I will have to take a walking tour in a few weeks to get them collected
Friends I will make giving them some syrup: many

Its been a great year. Now gotta get some veggie seeds started. I will keep reading the posts to see how other MO producers are doing. John

[Goggleeye]

Was it an accident you locked her in or was it on purpose so you could get to church to confess your sins of spending more money on sugaring equipment that you didn’t want her to know about? LOL.

I think some of my sandwich ended up on the counter when I read your comment. Actually, she's pretty supportive of my maple addiction. Only thing she was mad about was not having enough wood until I got back. So she devised a way to climb out - set a chair out the window and one inside the shack. Only problem was the window edge was rather sharp and her legs were about 3 inches to short.