Am I alone or what?

[Buckeye mapler]

I am ready to quit! February stayed cold forcing me to retap the taps I had put in early. Then a misguidance from a landowner forced me to move my taps that I had just retapped. I get all the taps out (90) at the new place and retapped the other 40 and was set for this big run. I collected 90 gallons yesturday and 30 the day before so things seemed to be worth while. Then a careless mistake by my father in law cost me all I had collected yesturday. He went to get on top of the sugar shack to fix the steam stack. When he did he used my sap feeder tank to step up to the roof and it pushed the tank away from the wall of the sugar shack disconnecting the feed pipe from the tank. I just don't know how he did not hear it splashing on the ground. Needless to say all that I collected spilled to the ground. I found it today when I went to pump sap that I collected today into the feedtank. I am very ill right now. My toes just thawed from yesturdays collection! Who has had big mishaps like this. PLease share I need some reassurance. If you haven't, well make one up!!!!

[Doc]

Oh dude....Sorry!!!
But look at it this way, your father-in-law now owes you a favor big time!!!!
Looks like it's time to upgrade to a larger evaporator, need the truck washed, house painted, etc!!!
Sorry dude....

[maplekid]

i had my gathering tank fall off the tractor and break the fitting off of the back. mind you it was a two inch fitting on a 55 gallon drum. i noticed it laying about 50 ft behind me in the driveway at the sugarwoods. needless to say i was pi$$ed. full tank of sap all on the ground

[maplehound]

Welcome to sugaring, these mishaps occure all the time. My neighbor who makes spent thousands of dollars getting his setup the first year for him. He hauls his sap quit a distance, the first time he had a tank (1000 galons) load he headed for home, when he arrrived the tank was near empty because he forgot to close the valve..
I myself have on many occasion pumped sap down a pump line to a hauling tank just to find when I was done that the line was broken in the middle. I guess we never learn.
Today my dad and I finally started tapping. Yeasterday we rinse the pump line and had trouble with the deep well pump that lays in the bottom of our tank, it was frozen solid. Then when we got that thawed out and were ready to start pumping the water our genrator started to give us trouble. (repair man isn't sure it will be worth fixing )
OHHH the joy of Syrup Making

[Fred Henderson]

So far and counting, Backed the collection rig into the garage door driving it out of the track. Started boiling and had an off flavor after an hour, shut down, drained ( 100 gallons lost and 2 hours time) disassemble rinsed and started again. The best run so far helper took day off to go ice fishing. I may be getting to old for all the stress. Been up at 3AM the last 2 days. Seems like I have been behind the eight ball since startup. Tonight its dropping down to 19 Deg so I will have to go to the SH at 10 PM and start a small fire. With all that has happened to me I keep tell myself that God is just offering me some new challenges. Life would be boreing without new challenges. Either is will get better or worse.

[Sugarmaker]

WRU is leaking like a sieve, Looks like it wont be ready for this season. 325 gallon tank frame wouldn't fit into the new truck without a torch modification and some welding. Rear dumping station frame had to be fixed ( finally) due to poor fab work several years ago. All 30 totes near the road had to be dug out and re-set. Dump tank valve is froze. Cordless drills ran out of juice 50 taps from the end of the line.
I dumped 100 gallons of sap on the ground two years ago cause I was tired of gathering it.
I have invited another sugarmaker to bring their sap to me and proceeded to run it on the ground due to a tank valve being open
Sounds like sugaring life to me Don't you just love it!

Regards,
Chris

[kinalfarm]

got the polaris ranger stck today in the snow and dug like a dog with my hands for half hour to get it out and then went and collevted only 20 gal of sap totally not worth while!!!! and it will all freeze tonight in my truck tank and that will suck!!! plus i havent boiled yet this season no good runs yet tough start to a season.

[Buckeye mapler]

OK. OK. So I am not floating in this boat alone. I was just getting so fed up with always running into more and more problems. I guess the last rounds were kind of bringing me to a full boil! Now the weather is looking to stay warm at night so the end may be near. Well I can say this: It might be mother natures way of putting me out of my misery for this season. I am well aware of what I need to do to improve and to aleviate some of the road blocks. I know too that this stuff is common and I am not just some person not meant to do this. I remember standing on that sap tower today asking myself if I really had any business even trying to do this. It was that bad.

[jdj]

The bigger the sugaring operation, the bigger the problems!! I think alot of us make syrup because it is such a challenge.

[Russell Lampron]

Last season I started RO and was recycling sap. I had my 600 gallon tank nutted. I forgot to change one of the valves from drain to concentrate and pumped 600 gallons of sap onto the ground. The season before that i forgot to switch a valve when washing the RO and pumped the contents of my wash tank into the feed tank. I had to dump the contents of the evaporator and start over again.

90 gallons of sap is a lot for a small guy but it isn't the end of the world.