Effects of tree pruning / broken branches on sap collection

[jdircksen]

I had my yard trees pruned last May to raise the canopy and remove dead wood. I’m sure some healthy branches were cut in the process. How long does it take for those cuts to seal up? Could sap be flowing out of those cuts rather than my taps? I have neighbors getting flow but mine have slowed way down, the 60*F weather and heavy rainfall is what I thought caused the slowdown but I’m surprised other people are still getting sap.

[DrTimPerkins]

Any branches cut last May should have completely compartmentalized by now. Unlikely to have any effect on sap flow.

Difference might simply be when you tapped, the side of the tree you tapped on, or the spout sanitation level you have as compared to your neighbor.

[Ed R]

If you had a lot of dead wood pruned that indicates some stress or poor overall health of the trees which can effect the productivity of the trees. If your trees are silvers and your neighbors are sugars or reds that could also be the difference, they really need a freeze reset to run well on buckets.

[jdircksen]

Thanks. I'll keep an eye on them. We're supposed to have a 2 day freeze coming up.
I sure wish I could trade my 30"+ silvers for sugars.

[maple flats]

Do your neighbors have silvers, reds or sugars? Each will run differently on buckets especially, but each will make nice syrup for sure.

[jdircksen]

Just to update on this. I've had some slow days and some fast days. I never detected sap flowing out of any cut branches, but I didn't look too hard. I've been too busy boiling this year. I've made 3x more syrup than last year. I wonder if the pruning helped increase sap flow.

[jdircksen]

My season is over now and ended completely opposite of the way it started. I originally feared the tree trimming caused me to lose out on sap. But all said and done, I collected 840 gallons of sap from 31 taps. 14.9 gallons of syrup. Basically 2 quarts of syrup per tap. Can't wait to see if next year is a repeat.

[Michael Greer]

That's an excellent yield. The trees around here were sweeter this year.

[Sugarmaker]

jd,
Awesome numbers! Most folks can only make 1/2 gallon per tap on high vacuum systems! You have some great trees to produce that much sap! At a boil rate of 5 gallons per hour on raw sap it took you about 168 hours to make that into syrup! Unless you have a R.O tucked away! You hung in there! For sure! Any of the silvers, I have tapped which was only two, were poor quantity and low sugar content. Hope you can clone those trees! Heck I worked my but off on sugars to get .25 gallons syrup per tap!

I thought the pruning mentioned in this thread was interesting. I tapped a string of maples (5) and the one near the tub had 4 or 5, 8 inch diameter branches cut off and it gushed sap all season And I got almost nothing I think it was actually taking sap from the other trees and dumping it on the ground!
Regards,
Chris

[jdircksen]

Well we have to see what next year is like. This season was 1.5 months vs last year it was only 1.0 months. Last year I only made 4.25 gallons on 22 taps on the same trees. This year I just put a 3rd tap in them.

This year my sap was 2-2.25% until the last run when it was 1.75%. I'm happy with that considering they are silver maples. I do have a homebuilt RO, so the sap I boiled was about 4-5%. And sometimes I added a 3rd steam pan on my kitchen stove. I boiled a ton, many times til 2am after working 8-4. But filtering is what I found to be the most painful this year. Just couldn't get it right. So next year I want to let the syrup settle in gallon jugs and then filter/bottle at a later date.