January thaw

[Swingpure]

Normally the sap will run here in March, occasionally late February. If in January you get a 7 to 10 day January thaw, where the daytime temps went above freezing and nighttime below freezing, would the trees start producing sap and if so, would you attempt to collect any?

Just curious.

Thanks

[Super Sapper]

As far as sap flow goes it would depend on how hard the trees are froze and if there will be enough warmth to thaw them out. The larger the trees the longer it will take to thaw out. In January you have less daylight so the time above freezing will be shorter than in the spring so less time to thaw. Around here it will take at least 3 to 4 days to thaw the trees enough to flow. Then if the ground is frozen you will only get 1 run until it thaws. There are guys out east that do well that time of year on some years but around here I do not think we would get much if any. How you collect and tap hole sanitation will play into it also. On gravity you only have so many weeks before they stop giving. If you have separate trees from the ones you tap in the spring you could try it to see how it goes.

[DrTimPerkins]

How you collect and tap hole sanitation will play into it also. On gravity you only have so many weeks before they stop giving. If you have separate trees from the ones you tap in the spring you could try it to see how it goes.

Good answer. More detail at: https://mapleresearch.org/pub/m0608tappingtiming/

Basically, anytime the conditions are right (maple trees thaw after a freeze), the sap will run. The sap sugar content will very by time of season though (low in Oct-Feb), then rise at the start of the season before dropping off slowly as the season progresses. Optimally, you'd like to tap all your trees in a fairly short timeframe just as the sap starts to run as you finished tapping the last hole. Very large producers (tens to hundreds of thousands of taps) must start tapping early. If there is a thaw, the sap will run, so they'll collect and boil. However, the sap won't run as well late in the season from tapholes drilled early than tapholes drilled late. The wound response happens very quickly -- we can detect changes in the wood within just a few weeks post-tapping. Reaming/retapping/bumping is NOT a recommended practice to rejuvenate tapholes -- the wound created is HUGE compared to a normal taphole.

[jrgagne99]

Doctor, What do you mean "bumping"?

[DrTimPerkins]

Doctor, What do you mean "bumping"?

Sorry...that was a new one to me when I first heard it too. Comes from our southern (West Virginia) producers. I believe it means the same as we would call "drilling deeper" (but someone more knowledgeable about the term should feel free to correct me if I am wrong).

We've been looking at the practices for several years now. It is one of those things we didn't talk about much for two reasons. First we wanted to get several years under our belt to make sure the results held up under different season conditions. Secondly, it takes a while for the wound to develop and then for us to cut down and cut up the trees into little pieces to measure the wound size. Sometimes it just takes a while for the science to be done and come out.

Reaming involves tapping a wider taphole (using a slightly wider bit in the same taphole). Bumping is drilling a deeper taphole (same size bit, but going deeper in the same hole). Catch-all for all these practices is "redrilling", which can be either reaming, or bumping, or some combination both (using a slightly wider bit and going deeper in the same taphole). Regardless, these all tend to produce a little more sap (sap yield results vary tremendously upon when the timing of when it is done), but will create a much larger wound than the original taphole....often double or more the size.

The last in this category of "freshening" tapholes is to drill a second hole just above or just below the original taphole of the same season, either using the same or a new spout (sometimes with plugging the original hole, sometimes not). Again, sap yields can vary a LOT, but generally this does not increase sap yield by a huge amount, and more importantly, does NOT simply fall within the same stain column even if quite close to the original taphole. Maple wood is not perfectly straight-grained, but tends to twist a little. The wound created will be a completely new wound (even when tapping just 2" above or below the previous taphole), but will interact with the first to be more than double and sometimes up to triple the size of a single taphole.

Retapping is akin to when you have a wound of some type and you disturb it. If you leave it alone, it'll probably heal well and form a small scar. If you dig at it and keep peeling off the scab, the damage is going to be much greater.

Bottom line...none of these taphole rejuvenation approaches are recommended practices. We have a paper on this subject coming out in the October edition of "The Maple Digest." Stay tuned.

[Sugar Bear]

Bottom line...none of these taphole rejuvenation approaches are recommended practices. We have a paper on this subject coming out in the October edition of "The Maple Digest." Stay tuned.

Humans like all beasts of the forest are far more responsive to image then to words. If what you are saying is true, and I have no reason to doubt that it is true, I recommend the paper be short on words and big on photos of tap holes left alone and tap holes revisited.

You will get much better results.

Observation is the best form of education in the world.

[220 maple]

Someone started the practice of bumping, I confess it is me, don’t have time to explain why. Many West Virginians bump taps, closest producer to me tapped mid Jan. Ran until last week of Feb. trees stopped! He bumped 2100 plus taps and made 200 gallons more syrup! Retail market average of 60 dollars a gallon, 12000 dollars! I know that is not much money but it helps to pay the bills, someday we will be out of business due to spring time heat and you northern producers can deal with it!
Mark 220 Maple

[minehart gap]

closest producer to me tapped mid Jan. Ran until last week of Feb. trees stopped! He bumped 2100 plus taps and made 200 gallons more syrup!
Mark 220 Maple

That sounds like a good addition to the season. How much syrup did he make out of those 2100 plus taps before bumping? And what was the original tap depth and how much additional depth?

[220 maple]

Let me first say that I agree with Dr. Abby at Proctor, it is not a good practice! I only bump taps if I go thru a heat and the taps stop or slow down to the point that I don’t get enough sap to fire the RO back up. Original depth is one an a quarter inches then when I bump I go another half inch. Some springs it is not required, we can have a 70 degree day here then followed by two or more weeks of perfect sap weather, another weather event we struggle with is tap holes freeze drying, something northerners nor Proctor or Cornell deals with! I bumped a few holes this Spring mainly because I tapped two weeks later than the neighboring camp. I bumped to some try something new! I had in the past bumped with same size bit as the original hole! Biggest issue I had was tap hole integrity, when bumping if you wobble just a little bit you can have a vacuum leak! I bumped this year with a smaller bit so spile was tight again therefore on vacuum leak! I don’t recommend doing this, follow the science!
I will try to get you the numbers from the neighboring camp that produced 200 gallons more, I’m pretty sure they had made around 400 gallons before bumping.
Mark 220 Maple

[Sugar Bear]

Like I said or implied earlier a few good photos making a comparison between "bumped" and "non bumped" will speak about a hundred volumes of documentation on the matter.

A doctor says "this" or wrote "this" is relatively useless these days.

But this is just the way the world works now.

Not that I am doubting any on this myself. My guess is that Tim Perkins and others are presenting the facts behind their encounters and they are accurate facts.

But Afgans stand on top of airplanes not expecting to make the flight on that spot, but be photographed there so that their desperation can be received through photos rather then words.

Words pretty much do not work anymore.

And of course the fact that the race for $$$ is more pronounced now the ever and an extra $12,000 is still a lot of money even to Bill Gates.

Human lives are measured against the dollar, why should trees not be measured against the dollar as well.

If we ever saw a video of a person dying from the Rabies Virus we would all go get the Rabies vaccine, if we had been bitten. ( hopefully we would do this anyway, whether we saw the video or not)

If we ever saw a video of a 30 year old person dying from COVID 19 we would all go get the COVID Vaccine and then the booster. But if we did not see it it did not happen.

I got my COVID vaccine because I felt Society/God were asking me to help others. I did not do it for myself. I am 57, afraid of dying but not from COVID. More afraid of dying from other peoples BS then COVID.

Their are no laws concerning the "ethical treatment" of plants.

There are laws concerning the "ethical treatment" of people and animals, although many violate this regularly.

If people want to damage their trees, that is certainly their prerogative from a legal aspect.

I would prefer not to and be informed about the matter and know just how much collateral damage I am doing to the tree and myself should I "bump" a tap hole.

After all, as a small time sugar maker, my trees are me.