Rod Caster Posted March 13, 2016 Report Share Posted March 13, 2016 It ran great yesterday. 34 buckets out by 2pm, over 20L of sap. I expect better today... gonna be a beautiful day! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 14, 2016 Report Share Posted March 14, 2016 I was away the last 5 days, but had a friend collect my sap. I wasn't expecting anything because the over night lows didn't look low enough, but I came home to 200l collected, and still have a lot of buckets on trees that are half full. I'm hoping to get another 100l when I collect tonight. So far have only boiled once. 100l that yeilded 2.5L of syrup. Nice golden colour to it though. Love the first batch! I will be boiling the next two days non stop. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 17, 2016 Report Share Posted March 17, 2016 Total so far is 9 litres finished. I'm hoping this weekend will bring one more good run so I can get up to my usual 15 or so litres. Keep in mind I doubled my taps this year, and I am running way lower on sap collection. Not a good year by any standards for my area. How's everyone else making out?? You northern guys should be ok I would think? No? S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joeytier Posted March 17, 2016 Report Share Posted March 17, 2016 -10 tonight, -16 tomorrow night so it'll be shut down for the weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 17, 2016 Report Share Posted March 17, 2016 No daytimes above zero? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 17, 2016 Report Share Posted March 17, 2016 From 34 taps Ive collected just over 100L thus far. The cold will stop it for a bit before the real run starts. It looks like it'll be a good year. I'm hoping for 10L minimum, 15 or more if the season is extended Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Boiled down 100L yesterday. Finishing it up this morning and hoping for 2.5 to 3.5 L of syrup. We have LOTS of season left! Even at -1 daytime temp, the sap is running and we still have 2 feet of snow out there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Not much happening here. Daytime highs aren't quite high enough to get a good run. Slow and steady day by day. Hope to have enough for a good boil next weekend. Looks like it may keep flowing for a while down here now. The weather forcast keeps changing in my favour. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Good, you were worried it would be a short season. You may end up doing well Do you guys maintain the forest, ie manage the trees for optimum growth and sunlight exposure? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 20, 2016 Report Share Posted March 20, 2016 Good, you were worried it would be a short season. You may end up doing well Do you guys maintain the forest, ie manage the trees for optimum growth and sunlight exposure? No....well, not yet. This is my first year in this bush. Its a friend of mines place, that I kind of got addicted to the whole maple syrup thing. We have big plans for next year. Its a 10 acre bush. Hoping for 2-300 taps next year and a new evaporator. 6x2 Lapierre wood fired. Right now we have 146 taps on buckets with a 4x2 flat pan on propane, and a 2x2 finishing pan on propane. Gotta get wood fired next year for sure. Been saying it for years now lol S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
north560 Posted March 21, 2016 Report Share Posted March 21, 2016 Well the cold weather has shut down my trees, no sap for 3 days only 3 gallons of sap so far. Hope it gets better weather soon as we will be busy with other jobs soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 21, 2016 Report Share Posted March 21, 2016 Same here. Shut down. I get a little sap at mid day for maybe an hour or two but not enough to bother collecting,and only the sunny trees. Kinda sucks. I was hoping to be going crazy this week with sap, but its not happening. I've finished 9l of syrup and have no sap at the moment. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 Cold attacked us too. Same as Sinker, my trees run for a couple hours if they are exposed to the sun. We got 3L from 110l of sap, then a jar broke and we ended up with 2.5L. What do you guys get for an evaporation rate? I got around 7L per hr. My propane tanks kept freezing up so my burner didn't run at optimum all day Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 Cold attacked us too. Same as Sinker, my trees run for a couple hours if they are exposed to the sun. We got 3L from 110l of sap, then a jar broke and we ended up with 2.5L. What do you guys get for an evaporation rate? I got around 7L per hr. My propane tanks kept freezing up so my burner didn't run at optimum all day I get about 16l/h on mine, but I put a grate over top of my boiling pan and keep my propane tank on top of the rack to keep it warm. It makes a HUUUGE difference. I also have a really good burner. Its a really old one, but it pounds out heat. I wish I knew how many BTU's it was, because any of the new ones I've bought don't even compare. I can fill my pan with 100L and finish it on one tank of propane easily. So for about 15 bucks I make about 2.5L of syrup. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 That's really good. I clearly need to watch for freezing tanks then I picked up a burner base that has a banjo style burner and is 65,000 BTU. When it goes it goes but I also need to keep my 50L pot less full to get optimum evap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
north560 Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 We boil the old fashioned way, we have a wood stove made from a water tank someone welded a square frame on the top just big enough to fit a big roast pan on it works great and you clean up all those dead trees around the yard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmokestackLightnin Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 This year I put out 40 taps and they have stopped flowing here as well. So far I have done 2 boils of around 450 litres of sap and bottled almost 15 litres of syrup. I use a propane fueled 3 burner camp stove. I have a 300 litre stainless steel evaporator and a shelf right below for the propane burner. I finish on a single burner and a large stainless steel pot. Couple of notes regarding this year, first quite a bit of sediment in the sap. I filtered twice and still had small amounts of sugar sand in each jar of syrup. Good news is that it has settle to the bottom of the jar and is not affecting the syrup. Second, a nice amber syrup so far this year, great flavor and as always really sweet. It makes it all worth it when you taste the final product. Hopefully 1 more run for me so that I can get some darker syrup that I use in marinades, sauces and brine for smoking. Good luck to those doing syrup this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 22, 2016 Report Share Posted March 22, 2016 This year I put out 40 taps and they have stopped flowing here as well. So far I have done 2 boils of around 450 litres of sap and bottled almost 15 litres of syrup. I use a propane fueled 3 burner camp stove. I have a 300 litre stainless steel evaporator and a shelf right below for the propane burner. I finish on a single burner and a large stainless steel pot. Couple of notes regarding this year, first quite a bit of sediment in the sap. I filtered twice and still had small amounts of sugar sand in each jar of syrup. Good news is that it has settle to the bottom of the jar and is not affecting the syrup. Second, a nice amber syrup so far this year, great flavor and as always really sweet. It makes it all worth it when you taste the final product. Hopefully 1 more run for me so that I can get some darker syrup that I use in marinades, sauces and brine for smoking. Good luck to those doing syrup this year. Filtering is always a PITA for me. I did one batch this year, ran it thru my wool filter with 3 prefilters. The 4 litres that came through were bottled, the rest that didn't come thru I put back in the pot, and cleaned my filter, 3 new pre filters and ran it through again. The first batch had maple sand, the second didn't. Weird stuff. The first batch I did, 100l of sap, made almost 3l of syrup that was almost like honey. Beautiful stuff, and no problem filtering it. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 23, 2016 Report Share Posted March 23, 2016 Have any of you guys tried your hands at birch syrup? I heard the sap runs fast, I might collect some just for a few drinks of the sap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Bacon Posted March 24, 2016 Report Share Posted March 24, 2016 Have any of you guys tried your hands at birch syrup? I heard the sap runs fast, I might collect some just for a few drinks of the sap. I have heard of it. I understand that it requires a 100:1 reduction compared to the 40:1 for maple. That would explain why it runs fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 24, 2016 Report Share Posted March 24, 2016 I havent tried it yet but we do tap a couple birch trees in our bush at work. They do run good. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 28, 2016 Report Share Posted March 28, 2016 Wow....sap overload here now. Collected 280 litres in the last 24 hours.....and its still running like crazy. This season is turning out to be much better than i thought and its a nice slow and steady pace.....until now lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SmokestackLightnin Posted March 28, 2016 Report Share Posted March 28, 2016 This weekend was a boomer. Overrun with sap now, boiled like crazy till the rains came. One more boil this week to make 4 for the season which is more then enough. Won't store anymore sap, just empty the pails. Hopefully it slows down soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinker Posted March 28, 2016 Report Share Posted March 28, 2016 Im keeping every last drop i can get this year. Going home to nfld this summer and most of it is coming for the ride. It will make a great bartering tool for seafood lol. S. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rod Caster Posted March 29, 2016 Report Share Posted March 29, 2016 Syrup for seafood. Good deal on both sides! I wasn't home Saturday, then on Sunday two of my buckets were overflowing. Never had that happen before. I partially boiled my sap on Sunday, I'll finish it this weekend with whatever I collect over the rest of the week. We still have 1.5 feet of snow in the bush, this season is far from over for me! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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