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Maple Syrup 2018

Started by Chuck White, January 29, 2018, 08:49:03 PM

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Peter Drouin

The customers I sell slabs to say the sugar is low here too.
A&P saw Mill LLC.
45' of Wood Mizer, cutting since 1987.
License NH softwood grader.

Chuck White

Sugar content is a little low here too this year, it's running "usually" 1.2% to 1.5%!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Ed_K

 The sugar content of the only run I got was 1.6. I'm really bummed :( the temp was 22* this morning, it's 38* now and the sap isn't running. This is a real head scratcher this yr.
Ed K

Chuck White

Sap just broke loose around 3:00 this afternoon, so we'll have a bunch to gather in the morning!  8)
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Chuck White

Started gathering sap around 8:30 this morning and ended up with 790 gallons!

Fired up the evaporator after we had gathered two tubs (180 gallons), I kept gathering and we ended up with the 790 total gallons, boiled it down and ended up with 19.5 gallons of syrup!

When I left the sugarhouse this evening, some of the barrels were close to half full, but the sap flow was shutting down, so we'll have another busy day tomorrow!

Right now we have a little over half (125) as much syrup as we had last year, (245), so we're doing ok!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

cbla

Things have been slow here. I have collected 65 gallons so far in 3 weeks on 24 taps. Checked on things yesterday and had 5 mice in the buckets. First time that has happened. Hopefully I do not get anymore.

Chuck White

Never heard of mice in the sap buckets, but a few years ago we has a shrew in one and another year we had a Chipmunk!

Most of ours is on pipeline, but we do have about 40 buckets!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Ed_K

 I boiled in what I had for sap yesterday. I looked last night at tanks, and only got 40 gals of sap off 295 taps for whole day. Not enough to boil today :( .
Ed K

GAB

Quote from: cbla on March 08, 2018, 05:31:54 AM
Things have been slow here. I have collected 65 gallons so far in 3 weeks on 24 taps. Checked on things yesterday and had 5 mice in the buckets. First time that has happened. Hopefully I do not get anymore.
I've picked sap and gotten chipmunks, and mice before.  It usually happens when the pail is almost full you just need a little more to top it off and bingo, now dump everything on the ground and start over.
I do not like critter juices in my syrup!
Gerald
W-M LT40HDD34, SLR, JD 420, JD 950w/loader and Woods backhoe, V3507 Fransguard winch, Cordwood Saw, 18' flat bed trailer, and other toys.

GAB

Had a conversation with one of my brothers this morning and he told me that some of the local sugar makers (Franklin County, VT) are saying that the RO's are plugging up much sooner than in past years, the sugar content is lower than in past years, and one producer said he usually filters 7 to 8 barrels of syrup through his filter press prior to tear down and changing the filters, however this year he had to do a tear down and rebuild before the first barrel was full.  
I use filters in my miniature operation (42 taps) and I have had to clean filters more than usual.
Thank you mother nature.
Gerald
W-M LT40HDD34, SLR, JD 420, JD 950w/loader and Woods backhoe, V3507 Fransguard winch, Cordwood Saw, 18' flat bed trailer, and other toys.

Chuck White

Gathered about 600 gallons of sap this morning and boiled until about 3:30!

We're up to 145+ gallons now!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Corley5

It's cold up here.  We missed a one day run last week.  It's been cold since.  There were a few days where the trees started to bleed about 4PM just as the temps were falling again.  We're all but ready to run and the weather sounds promising for the end of the week.
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

Chuck White

No sap to speak of yesterday, so we drained and cleaned the pans then put the sap back in the pans that it came out of, front & back!

Most likely we won't get enough sap today to amount to anything!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Corley5

Sounds like the sap might run in these parts Thursday or maybe Friday.  It's cold.
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

celliott

Cold here too. Got a little today but been slow. 
We've been putting up more tubing and pipe. Last week we got 1725 new taps online, drilled and going to the tank. Now we're trying to stretch for another 1000. Nothing else to do and we got trees to go online so we'll get them.
Chris Elliott

Clark 666C cable skidder
Husqvarna and Jonsered pro saws
265rx clearing saw
Professional maple tubing installer and maple sugaring worker, part time logger

Mapleman

Winter's come back with a vengeance here these past couple of weeks.  We got 10" of snow two weeks ago, 22" last week and another 8 - 12" are forecast for tonight and tomorrow.  Doesn't look like any runs until maybe the weekend.  Still, it been a good year so far, We've made half our crop already.   And if it isn't going to run, I'd rather it was because it was too cold than too warm....
"The older I get, the better I used to be."

Chuck White

It looks like you guys out towards the coast are really getting hammered by that Noreaster!

It started snowing here about an hour ago!

Today we drained our flue pan and then fill it to 3" with perm water and boiled the stuff from the flue pan down, in the front pan and now we will boil it down in a finishing pan tomorrow and won't have any sap until the weather breaks and the sap runs again!

We have "well over" half of our last years total already, so we're lookin' good!

We expect to hit over three hundred this year, last year was our best, at 245 gallons!

Looks like everybody is doing really good this year!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

Ed_K

Since the last snow saps been running constant but not a full flow. I'm sending my excess to Rita's niece and boiling in 100 gals a day as I found I'm not strong enough to boil a 12-14 hour day like before. Some day I'm going to figure out how to boil 40 gals an hr on my 2x8 but yesterday I did get to 28 gals >:( :embarassed:.
Ed K

coxy

glad to here thing are going pretty good for you 

Chuck White

Went to the sugarhouse this morning, planning on finishing off what we boiled down yesterday, and to our surprise we ended up gathering almost 400 gallons of sap!

So........... we boiled and got just shy of 5 gallons of syrup, so now we're at 160 gallons of syrup!

The thermometer is riding right on the edge of "freeze and thaw", so it is likely that we'll have more to boil tomorrow!

Sometimes the sap will run even when the weather says NO!  :-\

That's ok anyway!  :)
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

coxy

what are you guys in the north going to do with all your money from that syrup  :D 8) oh i know buy more eggs  :D :D

Chuck White

I am not a financial part in it other than I go up there and help and in the end I get paid!

My brother and his SIL primarily use their income for taxes and replacement parts, and expansion!

We are up to 160 gallons now!
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

GAB

As a continuation to replies 96 & 97.
Yesterday at the sugar house in Franklin, VT: at noon the draw off temperature was 219.1*, at 3:30 it was 219.6*, using the same hydometer the entire day.  The barometric pressure had to of changed.
Gerald 

W-M LT40HDD34, SLR, JD 420, JD 950w/loader and Woods backhoe, V3507 Fransguard winch, Cordwood Saw, 18' flat bed trailer, and other toys.

Chuck White

The barometer can be up and down all day sometimes!

Also, many things WILL affect your boil, some of them are: barometric pressure, cloud cover & humidity!

Sap run can be affected by those same three, plus:  wind, temperature, snow on the limbs or stuck on the side of the trees!

 
~Chuck~  Cooks Cat Claw sharpener and single tooth setter.  2018 Chevy Silverado and 2021 Subaru Ascent.
With basic mechanical skills and the ability to read you can maintain a Woodmizer  LT40!

GAB

Quote from: Chuck White on March 14, 2018, 10:31:48 AM
The barometer can be up and down all day sometimes!

Also, many things WILL affect your boil, some of them are: barometric pressure, cloud cover & humidity!

Sap run can be affected by those same three, plus:  wind, temperature, snow on the limbs or stuck on the side of the trees!


I do not disagree with any of the above.
Gerald
W-M LT40HDD34, SLR, JD 420, JD 950w/loader and Woods backhoe, V3507 Fransguard winch, Cordwood Saw, 18' flat bed trailer, and other toys.

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