A perfect Friday night.
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David, I have sap/syrup envy.
I’m hoping to start boiling next week.
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Jim, I sure hope it keeps me busy. My neighbor tapped 300 trees last year and made 39 gallons of syrup. I’m hoping to make 20-30 gallons. Nature will determine the outcome.
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It wasn’t up to temp yet but it’s working well…
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Do either of you have a figure of the wood used to make a gallon of syurp. It has been two years since I made any. I think at that time I figured with my setup the wood used had a higher value than the syurp produced. I only make enough for my family and gifts for friends. I do it because I like to get out and do something in the spring and for the time spent with family by the fire.
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With my evaporator, I think I used under 1 cord of wood to make 13 gallons of syrup.
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One cord of what bill?
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I need to remeasure because the new one in the greenhouse seems very efficient. I boiled down 60 litres using two largish armfuls of spruce from the branches and 2 pieces of maple when I went to bed.
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Mine is only inefficient due to size and quantities done in a batch. It takes time to get everything heated up and going and then I am out of sap. I think the worst part is the labor for the wood prep rather than the amount of wood. I use wood the size of a 2x2 so keeping the wood prepared and the fire stoked is a full time job. I only have a dozen maple trees to tap. I have a trout stream deviding my property and the DNR has taken possession separating me from my woodlot. They won’t play nice.
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Trying something new this year. This birch is coming down this year which is why the 3 taps… we will see.
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Last year I used Tamarack. This year may be a mixture of Tamarack and Poplar. I really want to save the Birch I have for firewood.
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100 taps and in a week I collected 7 gallons of sap. It looks like the weather won’t cooperate until next weekend. The two years prior, I was making syrup by the 12th of March. I’m going to wait to put the rest of the taps in.
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I hear you Bill. I got about 4 gallons in a week. It’s just not warning up in the woods with the snow pac. Snowing here now. 1" predicted for today with 6-10 predicted for the overnight and tomorrow. Spring is a season we only read about hear. Summer comes just as soon as the snow melts
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20 taps 100 litres today/yesterday a nice rolling boil in the greenhouse
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Hey syrup guys! I’ve always wondered what you do with all that syrup. I’ve heard of pancakes with maple syrup, but 100 litres, that’s a lot of pancakes. Here pancakes are eaten with cloudberry jam and wipped cream as a dessert. I don’t recall ever tasting maple syrup.
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100 litres of sap equals about 2.5 litres of syrup… on oatmeal,in tea, in baking, etc. anywhere you would use honey and or sugar. If I have enough I make some maple sugar as well…
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Thanks David. That makes sense.
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We used to make about 50 gallons of maple syrup per year. But some people in our area make hundreds and even a few thousand gallons! That is the amount of syrup, not the sap. So some of us even sell it.
There are several grades of maple syrup. The higher grades are, of course, for putting on pancakes, etc… But there’s a grade “B” at the low end of the scale that doesn’t have a very good flavor, but still has the sweetness. Our equipment supplier buys it at a moderate price and resells it in bulk for use in making barbeque sauce.
Pete Stanaitis
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Greenhouse peak with the sap boiler going in the background
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