Eastern Ontario 2019

[Lespetras]

Trees running good today!
Batch #2: 350 L sap made 10.95 L syrup. Sap/syrup ratio 32:1, sugar content 2.7, nice light amber colour, minimal niter. Looks like we’ll be going down to -9 temps over night here in Kingston area, to reset the run, tomorrow +2!! Prime season is amongst us!!

[TurkeyJohn]

12 + hour boil yesterday, about 50 gallons of sap down to a bit over 3 litres of syrup....not bad for Silvers, Norways, and some soft maples...light colour, a bit thinner than I’d like, but still syrup, should be good week ahead, but long range looks like we won’t have a long season....


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[paulslund]

I did my first boil yesterday on my modified set up. My sugar "gazebo" with my two new pans. Unfortunately I made a change that is it not working.. when I have the blower on I get fire out the front door.. I think it's the chimney cap, so I'll take it off. Didn't have the problem last year, and the new chimney is 7 inch, up from 6. Out of the 125 collected I boiled down about 100 (the rest was ice..I'm melting now to check sugar..it was pretty thick). Near up is in the freezer to be added to next batch, but about 3.5l.. likely down to 2 when said and done I think..give or take. I like my new set up thought. Checked some trees and have about 1 L in the buckets.. although earlier my big ones are still sleeping!
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[Galena]

Aww cute setup Paul! Glad that you finally got a boil done. Expect the big trees to just be starting to wake up, my biggies are taking their sweet time...still! Frustrating esp when you know what they can produce. But can't do anythign about it. Surprise 3.0 is the superstar so far, chugging it out really well for a li'l one-spiler :-)

I have about 22l in holding, if weather good tomorrow and Tuesday I may have enough - 45l is my self-imposed minimum - to warrant firing up Shack Whacky on Wednesday. But now there is more white stuff drifting down! W.T.F.....haven't we had enough this year?!

[paulslund]

Aww cute setup Paul! Glad that you finally got a boil done. Expect the big trees to just be starting to wake up, my biggies are taking their sweet time...still! Frustrating esp when you know what they can produce. But can't do anythign about it. Surprise 3.0 is the superstar so far, chugging it out really well for a li'l one-spiler :-)

I have about 22l in holding, if weather good tomorrow and Tuesday I may have enough - 45l is my self-imposed minimum - to warrant firing up Shack Whacky on Wednesday. But now there is more white stuff drifting down! W.T.F.....haven't we had enough this year?!

I know right? I'm not one to complain about the snow as I'm a sledder, but nothing will re-open the trails now, and I'm getting anxious for some major boiling time!

The trees were dripping today (except the big ones still).. weather forecast has changed a lot now.. we will see some (slightly) below freezing nights every night this week (as opposed to the previous forecast of low of 5+ for Thurs/Friday). Maybe it will be a good week after all!

I think I need to put a wall on the RHS of the gazebo.. that seems to be where the wind predominantly blows from, so it blows the steam into my face all the time.

So this year instead of 4 roasting dishes, I splurged and got 2 of those new Double size steam table pans..and I made a siphon to regulate between the two pans.. Other than having difficulty sealing the pans on the top of the evap (already have a fix in mind) this setup worked great! Barely any ladling required! Now all I need is a float box! :-)

[MikeC82]

Did our first boil on Saturday. Got 2.2 Gallons/8.3 L syrup from 63 Gallons/238 L sap - which we were pretty happy with.

Nothing ran here Saturday, but yesterday was decent. 28 Gallons/105 Liters from about 1/2 of the taps. Rest still aren't running. Poor old bike was laying pretty low on the way back in with 300 pounds of sap + me on it. Starting to get worried about how much work it is going to be to collect it if they all start running... Going to be alot of back-forth and some all night burns. But cold cold next two nights.
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[BrutemanAl]

I’m over run with sap, I have to much and can’t get it boiled, I couldn’t get to the forest yesterday because my wife had to leave for work training in the city for 2 days and the boys end of season skating carnival was yesterday. After work today we are going to go over and collect the sap, most of my buckets were close to full Saturday night so I imagine yesterday they were just flowing all over the ground.

If anyone needs sap come get it lol


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[Vandy]

14 hours of boiling yesterday. Finished batch #2 from Weds/Thurs collection. Into 30Gal of sap from batch #3 (sat, sun collection) and have 60Gal in the snow bank..

[Galena]

Put my 22l of collected sap from yesterday out in the snow last night so hopefully the poor man's RO has worked and I have only liquid sweet in there and very little or none in the ice....I'm always worried though about throwing out sweet trapped in the ice. Doubt I'll get much of a run today. *sigh*

[Clinkis]

Definitly a late, slow year in my neck of the woods. Sap has ran but not great. I think still too much frost. The only bonus is sugar % is high. My bush is up about 1% then usual. Yesterday collected sap from my yard trees and they were 6.6%. I’ve boiled 4 times and made around 80L of syrup. About a 1/3 of what I had done at this point last year. I Have another 300 gallons of sap to boil off this evening. I decided to put in an extra 60-70 taps to hopefully help offset the potentially shortened season. Best of luck to everyone for remainder of the season!