Northern Ontario 2023

[Swingpure]

With the cold morning there wasn't much flow yesterday. Hope your tapping went well with the windy conditions. On Saturday morning I was in a blizzard one minute then full sun the next. The strangest weather I've tapped in so far.

For several days now they forecasted +1 for today, but it would be above freezing for about 7 hours. This morning the forecast said it would reach +3. It rose to +1 quickly this morning in the sunshine. But it clouded over and the temperature has stalled at +1.3. The snow on the roofs is not melting and the sap is not flowing, at least not yet.

It is amazing the difference the sunlight makes. Tomorrow is supposed to be +3, hopefully the sap will run tomorrow. My original plan was for the sap from today combined with the sap from tomorrow would make for a good boil on Wednesday.

[Swingpure]

Minimal flows yesterday for me. Today which had been forecasted to be +4 is now forecasted to be +2 and tomorrow which had been forecasted to be +8 is now +4.

The season will start when it starts. The clock is ticking on my taps. Next year I will wait to tap until mid March.

The taps I tapped back in December are still flowing. I am waiting for the lines to flow well again, so I can make a comparison from the December lines with the February lines with the March lines.

[Someclown]

Mid to late March 93 taps in West Nippissing today. Now I'll just sit back and let nature take its course.
Some trees were dripping good some trees were not dripping at all.

[Swingpure]

The sun miraculously came out and it all of a sudden warmed up to 4.3° and in the afternoon the sap started to run. I collected 33 gallons at 5 pm and it was still running 4 hours later.

I will collect more tomorrow and boil tomorrow afternoon.

Some lines were streaming steadily for awhile.

Tomorrow should be a good flow day, but I am learning like fishing that the sap flows are unpredictable sometimes.

[4Walls]

This is killing me. Only 1 partial boil so far.
I saved up 870L of sap this week. Ran through the RO to 200L at 11%. Fired up the evaporator and was finished in no time at all. Drew all of it off to finish it as a batch. The early, early season stuff is my daughter's favourite. It tastes like rice crispy squares. Hardly any maple flavour, only butter, vanilla and marshmallow. Wound up with 18 L finished and my pan is sweet now for continuous flow. That is if we ever get a proper run.

[aamyotte]

I'm getting antsy as well. I have minimal sap and nothing running today.

[Swingpure]

I have collected 43% of the sap I collected last year. Still no big flows and the only thing saving me is the number of taps. We have had a snow storm most of the day so far, but it is supposed to warm up soon and stay warm for most of the night, so there may be sap in the barrels tomorrow morning. The coming two weeks still look good for flows.

I have had three boils so far, next one scheduled for Monday. I made maple syrup snow candy for my neighbour’s kids this afternoon.i enjoyed that.

Edit: It is 4:30 pm, the snow (5 cms) has stopped and it is more a driving rain, almost freezing rain. Temperatures have not made it quite to +1 yet and the sap is really running in the lines.(“running” is a relative term) A fair amount has already collected in the barrels. There may be a decent amount in the barrels come morning. I always find sap flow a little bit of a mystery.

[Brien]

I tapped 60 trees last weekend. Walked out with my son yesterday to check it out. We got 35gallons, Not that much, but I think I might go boil it tomorrow. Not much to do in this weather anyways and I would like to try a small boil in my new sugar shack to make sure everything is ok. I setup a little blower on the back of the evaporator off a battery and invertor. Not sure how long it will last. But If can at least get it up and boiling quickly that would be nice.

[Swingpure]

The lines are still running at 5 minutes to midnight. It will drop below freezing in the next hour with the lines full of sap.

I know the one barrel I have been checking has the most sap in it yet this year. Once again the most is a relative term, I never see flows of a gallon a tap, but it will be considerably more than I have been getting. I never would have expected it from a day like today.

Tonight it will drop to -1. I hope maybe a little lower. It will start flowing again by 11 am.

The line I tapped on December 27th is still flowing as well as the other lines based on my observations on what comes out of the lines.

[Swingpure]

Yesterday which did not look like a sap running day produced my greatest daily total so far of 60 gallons. Go figure. I am boiling today with 90 available gallons of sap to boil.

Last night only dropped to -2, but there is bright sun today and the sap is running. Tonight will drop to -6 and +4 tomorrow, so that will be another sap day.

I have collected 50% of the sap I collected last year.