lakerguy

I have a elite 4 paired with my minn Kota. It has GPS but it does not however show speed. At least I can't find out how to get it to show on screen. I have a elite 5 at the helm that shows me my speed. So I guess not all GPS units come with speed is what I'm trying to say

Sap sure tastes a heck of a lot sweeter when I've removed ice that's for sure

Once your buckets thaw or partly thaw,you should dump some of the ice out and measure the sugar % of the sap then. It would be interesting if the old saying is true that unfrozen sap under ice is Natures Reverse osmosis.

Yes mine are 1/4 full,but frozen solid. I went over to my cousins place on Saturday and had a look at his new evaperator. It's a Leader 2x8 with drop flues. Automatically dumps syrup out a valve at 219.5. The thing boils sap so violently it almost rolls out of the pan. It's crazy but very neat to watch. I was there for a couple beers and it had boiled thru about 300 litres of sap. He won't start it unless he has well over 1500L of sap.

Get yourself some taps and buckets and make some syrup! It's very rewarding knowing you made it. There's enough of us on here to give you some advice gladly.

If there sugar maples you can probably count on close to 1L per tap of maple syrup. Could be less could be more. Depends on how fast spring comes in. If the temps start staying above freezing and the days get real warm the tree starts using that sap up for the buds and the sap quality goes down hill fast.

Battling the darn wind here today. Buckets getting blown off a lot

Darn right!! Forget the lame a$$ Beer Store. Give us some selection and quality.

Just curious,do you work in the beer industry?

I do feel abit sorry for them. Do I loose sleep over it? Nope.

I too have tasted some great wines,and craft beers. But the $$ it takes to play the game is absolutely crazy.

You summed it up with that one word..."shame"

Bud couldn't drive that dart into him fast enough lol

Not 100% correct,craft brewers can't just willy nilly start stocking the shelves at te beer store no matter how good it is or how well it's been marketed. Right now the way it's set up,small craft brewers have to pay around 26k per beer variety to list in about a 100 stores. Those $$ are supposed to be lowered as an olive branch to the craft brewers. The beer store is offering 3 seats to the craft brewers in total. Saporro has 5 molson and Anheuser have 13 I think. There offering local brewers the chance for free listings in the closest 3 beer stores,the irony is that would steal from their existing customers who already drive to the brewery to buy their beer.....the beer store simply wants too take those sales. It's a frigged up system. The beer store is arrogant and know they have a solid monopoly

No,and their only allowed a very small amount of shelf space

There seems to be a fast growing trend in the craft brew industry. They have a very small % of the market,but they are starting to have an impact IMO. I myself love trying new beers. Going into The Beer Store experience needs to change. Walking into the same ole same ole is getting boring. I think it would be awesome if they would allow costumers to try a samples. Give us more choices. Just seems the big 3 just sit back and watch there accounts grow.

Couple pics of my rig. I think it's evaperating about 8gal/hr. if i crank the valves open fully she boils pretty good maybe up to 10 gph. I have a fire box too for it but when I'm working in the shop,the propane gets used. I built the lp unit by just bolting together 3 Martin turkey fryer burners that I picked up at Home Depot in the middle of winter a few yrs ago for 20 bucks each on a clearance sale. I made a little manifold for the supply. I have it plumbed into my under ground line coming off our lp supply for our chicken barns. I used to have the unit wrapped in ceramic blanket but it would starve for air and not burn as efficiently. That's why it looks so old,it's been hot a few times lol. I run it in a well vented building. When its cold out I just put the unit outside on the cement and let it boil away. We mostly just make batches. The pan can be continuous flow, but I don't lie standing beside it drawing off a cup every twenty minutes. When I have almost syrup I transfer it to a smaller 18"x18" sq finishing pan where I can control the boil a bit better and finish it right.

Anheuser-bush(they own bud and labatts),molson-coors(own Keith's ,Heineken,corona ,Stella Artois) and saparro( they own sleemans ) I wonder which one of these is taking Galen Weston out for a steak dinner this weekend hahaha

Mine is only a syrup hydrometer.

Yep,it's running. I checked buckets tonight. Gonna gather in the morning. Boil on the wknd. Hopefully our first maple whiskey shots are poured Saturday night

Ha I was thinking the same thing. Braap out the back

I might tap on Mondayor tuesday Looks like she might run. Going to give the trees a couple days of mild weather for them to thaw a bit. I hate tapping frozen wood.

We don't sell either so I don't pay much attention to the rules. We do however keep our equipment nice and clean and finish every batch with a hydrometer