Maine Maple Season 2024

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

26” of snow in Peru. We were fortunate, light and fluffy snow, no ice and winds weren’t bad. Vacuum still OK. Spent most of the day cleaning up and helping others. Sap started running about 3:30 this afternoon. Just a short run, going to freeze hard tonight. Sap should run good most of the week!
I’m guessing maple Sunday was a bust for a lot of people around here. Feel bad for those who depend on it. Didn’t do anything with syrup today except shovel out the tanks.

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

Hell of a sap run overnight and thru today. Really dumping and sap is crystal clear and tested at 2% which is our best of the season. Collected 280 and there’s another 200 in the woods. Should run through tomorrow on vacuum. Freezes again through the weekend so should make syrup next week. Should be near full crop by the weekend.

[eustis22]

Same here in Greenwood although some of my woods taps are not generating a lot of gpt. The tubing is working well though.

[maineboiler]

Things have really picked up since the storm. Had to call off Maine Maple Weekend because of the snow and no sap. Since Monday it’s going strong even with the rain. This might make up for a slow start——

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

Cooked off 500 gallons yesterday and should have another 300 at least for tomorrow, maybe more. Still running but should slow down tomorrow.

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

Another 560 gallons of sap collected yesterday. It hasn’t froze and kept on pulling. A 2+ GPT run. Syrup lightened up to Amber in the 60’s I am guessing. Will test and bottle today. We are at full crop and next week looks good. Happy sugaring!

[SeanD]

That's awesome! We limped into an average season down here. The beginning was a gusher that put us ahead, but the minimal frosts on the back end shut the door on that idea. I was able to squeeze a little bit out of the trees in the last 10 days to get the numbers closer to something I can live with, but the overall mood in this area is this is a year to forget about. Glad to hear your season is finishing strong. That's such a great feeling.

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

Collected another 410g today and am boiling it off. Wanted to get it through quick with the warm temps. Sap did cloud up a little bit but it’s not terrible. This midweek storm should be interesting. Going to try and boil again Wednesday before it hits. I’ll make syrup through the weekend but thats going to be it for us. We’ve had a good season and I don’t feel like pushing it.

[Mvhomesteader]

Finished off the season today with boil #8. Boil 7 and 8 both had sugars around 2.3%. Of course I did limit sap in the storage pile to 2% or more, so I'm being selective on purpose to maximize my return. Up till yesterday I was seeing some nice runs with fairly clear sap, but overnight it dried up and what was in the buckets was getting cloudy. I still managed to grab a 5 gallon bucket of 2.4% to add to today's boil of 80 gallons.

In the end I produced 12.5 gallons which was 2 more than my goal for the season. I'm glad I decided to add 20 taps awhile ago when the season looked wonky so I'll consider working with 50 or so taps next year. My neighbor has a 24" tree I tapped that was real productive, and another larger one I'll add next year. Summer projects include re-bricking the inside of one arch.

Good luck to all who are still in the game and I'll see you all next season!

[mainebackswoodssyrup]

310 more gallons today. Sap is about done running and it has that end of season smell to it. Vacuum lines at 20” just down to a trickle. This may be the last boil. Syrup is getting dark, probably nearing the very dark line. We’ll see how it grades out and what we get between now and the weekend. Not interested in trying to survive the warm temps for a couple days next week. Sap quality is heading the other way now. The end is near.

Any update from Abbott or Eagle lake if you’re out there?? What about the west sumner crew?