Maple Syrup Season

Welcome to maple Syrup Season!

Well, thanks to a very early spring and temperatures above zero during the day and just under freezing at night, it’s time to tap those maple trees.  The first sap is more clear and more usable so we had to get on it quickly,  Today we went out in the blazing sun with the measuring tape, the drill and the spits/buckets.  Normally you would tap south facing on the trees, but upon further inspection these trees have been tapped and scarred extensively on that side. Apparently it matters at the top of the tree as well facing the sun for the sap to start flowing, so we are fine.  

After measuring the trees, 10 inches or more is a good diameter to tap, so we drilled two inch deep holes and hammered in the spigots. Even after the drill was coming out, the sap was already coming out and running down the tree trunk. Wow! 

So now, we attach the buckets and wait!  The next door neighbour and his kids have tapped some trees and in four hours already have half a bucket full of sap on one of their trees! 

So,  here we are, all done tapping and just have to wait. We should be getting one gallon of sap per bucket per tree per day, we have five buckets going, so we should have forty gallons in about 8 days! It takes 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup. Crazy.  Tapping usually at its best lasts a few weeks, so we will have some syrup up in this house very soon. So exciting! Thanks for tuning in and have fun in this beautiful weather the next couple days!