Well this year’s lesson is “if in doubt, throw it out”    I attempted to cook yesterday following a string of 3 warm days with no sap.  Well that sap in the flue pan had ample to to FERMENT!  It turned a little like stringy snot, but I thought, oh well there is a lot of sugar in there and I do not want to waste it.   Well the lesson is to toss it.  The result is when you apply even a little heat that stuff foams like crazy and it foamed over the pans and out of the hood vents big time.   Fortunately I shut it down before it really got interesting and drained and cleaned everything.

The lesson is that when you expect 2 to three consecutive warm days followed by potential sap runs put tap water in the feed tank and chase all that concentrate out of the Flue pans.

I’m still hoping for some sap runs this weekend and my 3×10 CDL intensofire is ready for the last weekend.

Cheers,

Don

The silver lining in this snow storm is that it could mean a large sap run. We saw similar weather in 2014 and 2018 and we  had large sap flows.  We picked most of the buckets today and sap is still at 3.7 percent sugar .  Sap  quality is down, a little cloudy and the moths have come out  because of the warm weather and that will change with this snow.   The 2019 maple season is almost over as there are no freezing nights after this Sunday.  I am ready for it to be spring and we have a little winter to endure yet.  We are close to an average season and this may put us above average(one quart of syrup per tap per season).

I’ve got the snowblower ready…

Don

This looks to be the last week, about half of the customers I have talked to,  have pulled their taps and have had enough fun for one year.  I always encourage folks that having fun at this sport is most important,  so pulling taps for them was the right thing to do.  I am curious what this next week and snow forecast will do for the sap runs.  In the past a late April snow is called a “sugar snow” because heavy sap runs are often associated with April snows.  We have had a blessed season thus far making about 570 gallons of syrup.  Filtering this year has been difficult and I am not sure why.  Tuesday night looks to be below freezing so I am hopeful.  The frost was still in the ground in the wooded areas on Saturday, so there is little likelihood that the sugar maples will bud before Wednesday.  The silver and red maple trees are thinking about budding and this warm rain will spell the end of there sap production.

Don