Funny you should bring up 1977.
I pasted a post of mine from 2 years ago for peoples enlightenment.
markcasper
Maple Addict Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Knapp, Wis
Posts: 560
1977
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Writing to find out if any one ever experienced the spring of 1977?
I was not making syrup at the time, but my neighbor was and I will share with you his story that he will freely share every spring, whether you want to hear ir or not.
Its like this: The fall of 76 was extremely dry. Not as bad as 1988, but still darn dry. The whole winter of 76/77 was VERY cold and very little snow. In fact, if you pay attention to the weather records, the months of Dec, Jan, and Feb had many record lows set that year(s).
The neighbor usually set around 1500 bags each year. His brother-in-law also makes syrup and they both had the itch to drill a few test taps as it was already March 15th of 77 and the weather had finally started to warm up. They both drilled a few holes in their respective bushes and the holes were completely bone dry, as if you were drilling into a 2x6 that had been laying in the shed for a few years. Their decision was this, there was going to be no tapping and no season that spring.
Lo and behold the next day became overcast and by evening it was raining, after a few hours HARD. Sometime that evening the cold air came in and the rain changed to heavy wet snow. It was determined that there was 2 inches af rain and 8 inches of HEAVY March snow. Later on in the morning , that being St. Patricks Day, March 17th, the sun broke out and was very wonderful.
My neighbor recieved a call at his work from his brother-in-law who had phoned him to let him know that the holes they had drilled 2 days before had erupted with sap. My neighbor left early from work that afternoon (he was a loan officer then) and headed right up to the woods. What the brother-in-law told him about was confirmed true. He had no bags put together, soon his kids came home from school and they all started working feverishly to put some bags and holders together. They headed out to the woods and managed to tap in 125 that day yet. The next day was a Saturday and all of the kids were home. They all pitched in and got 775 tapped that day. Interesting to me......about 80% of the bags that were hung the night before were running over that next morning. The trees had ran all night.
By Saturday noon, they also had to start gathering. By Sunday the 19th of March, they had the pans down and were boiling and gathering frantically.
It was like this ALL season. It didn't matter if it froze or not....the trees ran solid for 3 weeks straight. There was only one day out of the entire season that no gathering took place, and that day it was raining.
Soon, Easter Sunday rolled around, that being April 10th. My neighbor recalled gathering with the kids in shorts, with the afternoon temp. reaching 86 degrees. That was the last day of the season. They made 710 gallons of syrup out of 900 taps. The syrup was all light amber, except one milkcan full which was the last one in the evaporator.
Roughly 1/4 of the syrup had gotten real buddy towards the end. When the local vocational ag. teacher stopped for a visit, he spit it out it tasted so bad. Luckily, he hauled all of that up north and the packer bought it all, no questions.
My neighbor has told of this spring so many times.....I just had to share. He never has seen a season since, but he attributted the HUGE run due to the extreme dry winter. Plus the fact that everyhting fell into place....the trees got moisture, the temps were right and BANG. I cannot understand though, how could they run so solidly without it freezing. Only God knows I guess.
So...does anybody recall that year out in syrup land?? If so, please share. Mark
Mark
Where we made syrup long before the trendies made it popular, now its just another commodity.
John Deere 4000, 830, and 420 crawler
1400 taps, 600 gph CDL RO, 4x12 wood-fired Leader, forced air and preheater. 400 gallon Sap-O-Matic vacuum gathering tank, PTO powered. 2500 gallon X truck tank, 17 bulk tanks.
No cage tanks allowed on this farm!
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