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Thread: Planning for guests

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Location
    Washington County, VT
    Posts
    195

    Default Planning for guests

    Every year I have family and friends who assume there will be active sugaring on Saturdays in March. They make plans to come up months in advance and sure enough, the weather and sap do not cooperate. I try and tell them that I can't make any promises, but they come anyway. A guy can only take the Ben and Jerry's tour so many times!
    173 on 3/16 natural vac for 2023
    36 buckets
    2 x 5 Smoky Lake Hybrid pan on a custom arch
    RB25 from RO Bucket
    12x24 salvaged sugarhouse built by wife's grandpa
    1965 Massey Ferguson 165 tractor to haul sap.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2006
    Location
    New Hartford, N.Y.
    Posts
    2,091

    Default

    Yeah, it never fails. I had friends stop by this weekend and I tapped a tree and hung a bucket to show how it's done. Freezing cold- not a thing came out of the tree- even put it in the sun. As you can imagine, the visitors were not too impressed with that demonstration.

    For more activities for visitors, I'm thinking we need to have "active firewood production" operations ready to go if it's cold and have "complimentary" leather work gloves to hand out!
    2014 Upgrades!: 24x40 sugarhouse & 30"x10' Lapierre welded pans, wood fired w/ forced draft, homemade hood & preheater
    400 taps- half on gravity 5/16, half on gravity 3/16
    Airablo R.O. machine - in the house basement!
    Ford F-350 4x4 sap gatherer
    An assortment of barrels, cage tanks & bulk tanks- with one operational for cooling/holding concentrate
    And a few puzzled neighbors...

    http://s606.photobucket.com/albums/t...uckethead1920/

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Location
    Frankford, Ontario
    Posts
    1,045

    Default

    Take a gallon of last year's syrup, add 40 gallons of water to it - pour it in the evaporator and boil away
    Big_Eddy
    Eastern Ontario (Quinte)
    20+ years on a 2x3 block arch,
    Homemade 20"x64" drop flue since 2011

    Build a Block Arch
    Build a Flat Pan
    Build a Flue Pan
    Sweetening the Pans
    Build a Bending Brake
    Using a Hydrotherm
    How much Sap to Sweeten?

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    North Grenville
    Posts
    1,476

    Default

    Yep, never fails...a few years back my eldest bro came to visit. Sure enough the trees stopped running the day he arrived and began running again the day after he left :-)
    Been tapping since 2008.
    2018 - 17 taps/7 trees...819l sap, approx 28l syrup
    2019 - 18 taps/8 trees...585l sap, 28l syrup...21:1 ratio
    2020 - 18 taps/8 trees...890.04l sap...gave away about 170l, 30l snafu'd....23l total for me from approx 690l
    2021 - 18 taps/8 trees...395l sap, 12 l syrup
    2022 - 18 taps/8 trees....7 sugars 1 red due to #2 having surgery so had the season off....582l sap, 18.5l syrup
    2023 - 18 taps/8 trees...all sugars again. 807l sap, so far approx 14l syrup

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Feb 2017
    Location
    Central Wisconsin
    Posts
    428

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Bucket Head View Post
    Yeah, it never fails. I had friends stop by this weekend and I tapped a tree and hung a bucket to show how it's done. Freezing cold- not a thing came out of the tree- even put it in the sun. As you can imagine, the visitors were not too impressed with that demonstration.

    For more activities for visitors, I'm thinking we need to have "active firewood production" operations ready to go if it's cold and have "complimentary" leather work gloves to hand out!
    I had 9 guests this past weekend. Even though I had 180 gallons to boil, I didn't miss the opportunity to hand out work gloves. 3-4 full cords later and 1/2 done I'm not expecting many guests this weekend.
    1960 - 1970s 70 taps on galvanized buckets with Dad and Grandpa.
    1970s - 1985 Acted crazy!
    1986 - 2005 20-30 buckets.
    2006- 2017 70 buckets and bags
    2017-2019 100 bags and buckets
    2020 Finally retired!!! 75 buckets, 50-75 on tubing. RO Bucket, New 12 X 16 Shack and a 42X42 flat pan.
    2021-Adding another 125 taps along with a second RO bucket.
    2022- Shooting for 350 taps, with 100 on lines.
    Lots of Family and Friends and dogs named Skyy and Nessy!

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2017
    Location
    Ontario
    Posts
    45

    Default

    A local operation here advertises that if there's steam coming out of the top of the sugar shack, they are open for visitors. If not, just visit the store and buy some syrup. No guarantees about what days or hours they will be open.

    Not as easy to do with friends and family though.

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