Eastern Ontario 2022

[Galena]

So looking at my maples I noticed my silvers are in full bud/almost bloom, but the few sugars I have are just now showing some swelling buds.. Seeing as we've had some cold weather these past few days (it was -3/4 in Ottawa the other night) is anyone still getting good sap from their sugar maples?

My reds are only just starting to bud. Sugar maple buds still closed up tight but no fear, I'll be still be doing lots of raking in the fall!

Pulled my spiles April 7th, would never dream of re-drilling and tapping all over again. My trees have done their work for the year.

[paulslund]

My reds are only just starting to bud. Sugar maple buds still closed up tight but no fear, I'll be still be doing lots of raking in the fall!

Pulled my spiles April 7th, would never dream of re-drilling and tapping all over again. My trees have done their work for the year.

Oh no I wouldn't suggest re-drilling.. was just wondering if anyone is still pulling in sap or not..

[Galena]

Oh no I wouldn't suggest re-drilling.. was just wondering if anyone is still pulling in sap or not..

Ah ok. BTW how goes the birch tapping?

[Rodmeister]

Finally pulling taps today. Boiled yesterday for hours with only one miserable draw yet day before was best production all season, took bulk tank almost dry so fill-up overnight seems to be low sugar content. Out of bottles as well so all good. Had to store some production in bucket so best guess is around 1.4 L syrup per tap for season.

[paulslund]

Ah ok. BTW how goes the birch tapping?

I made a small batch just by boiling gently every day on the stove (birch sap spoils easily as it flows when it's warm). Burnt my last batch but I have about a L+ of nearup in the fridge that I'm going to finish this weekend. In hindsight I should have just kept the few buckets on the sugars like I usually do for end of season boiling on the stove.

It's a different taste.. not something to put on pancakes in my opinion.. the taste has mellowed when it cooled down, but when I sampled it hot it had a worchestershire sauce like flavour.. so i figure BBQ's and stir-frys will benefit from this.. I don't think I'll do it again though.. much prefer the maple..

[Galena]

...It's a different taste.. not something to put on pancakes in my opinion.. the taste has mellowed when it cooled down, but when I sampled it hot it had a worchestershire sauce like flavour.. so i figure BBQ's and stir-frys will benefit from this.. I don't think I'll do it again though.. much prefer the maple..

Yeah I tried tapping my Manitoba maples one yeat, def not worth it just for slightly different flavour. I understand birch syrup is big in Scandinavian countries, but then so are all kinds of weird pickled fish dishes ;-)

[paulslund]

So I finally managed to finish bottling the buckets of frozen nearup I had been storing.. figured a rainy day like today was a good day to do this.

Final count for the 2022 season is approx 1,530L of sap and a whopping 48.65L of finished syrup (1.5L/tap), and a final overall ratio of approx. 31.23:1! A new record for me. I think I can only go down from here.. unless I tap more trees I suppose.. which is still a possibility..heh heh.

Hope everyone had a good and summer and enjoys the upcoming winter (sledding season is soon upon us! )

Paul.

[Swingpure]

So I finally managed to finish bottling the buckets of frozen nearup I had been storing.. figured a rainy day like today was a good day to do this.

Final count for the 2022 season is approx 1,530L of sap and a whopping 48.65L of finished syrup (1.5L/tap), and a final overall ratio of approx. 31.23:1! A new record for me. I think I can only go down from here.. unless I tap more trees I suppose.. which is still a possibility..heh heh.

Hope everyone had a good and summer and enjoys the upcoming winter (sledding season is soon upon us! )

Paul.

Congrats, especially on the 1.5 L per tap and your new record!