Tap, tap, tap!

It's maple sugaring time! Yesterday we put 11 spiles (taps) into maple trees not too far from the house, and hope to put another 10 or so in, once we gather some additional buckets. We are tapping red maples, as we haven't found any sugar maples nearby. We have found a few in a couple far-off corners of the property, but nothing convenient enough for carrying full buckets back and forth for boiling. Red maples require more boiling down than sugar maples, because there is not as much sugar in the sap. For red's, it'll probably take around 50 gallons of sap to produce 1 gallon of syrup. For sugar's, it's 30 or 40 gallons to produce 1 gallon. Last year we just played around with it, and boiled down our sap inside the house. It produced way too much condensation from the evaporating water, not to mention all the electricity required, so this year we're set up with an outside fire pit that Orrin made. He used bricks to create a U-shaped enclosure that is tall enough to have a decent-sized fire inside, and a grate on top to place the pots. We had tapped the trees around 2pm yesterday, and by about noon today Orrin was getting the fire going and had collected 12 gallons of sap to get us started. We had it boiling down most of the day, continually adding sap to the pot as the level in the pot dropped.

The taps weren't running today, because the temperatures hadn't dropped below freezing last night. The optimal time for tapping is when the daytime temperatures are above freezing, and the nighttime temperatures are below freezing. Hopefully the weather will cooperate so we can be tapping for the next two to three weeks.

We're sure looking forward to the first syrup. As Oliver would say, “It's de-wish-ous!”