Day #16

The collection of sample bottles is growing! Note only the last 2 have darkened much!

4 days in a row of reasonably sunny & warm weather so little going on in the woods. Today Mark, Susan, Chris, Bob, Gerri, Kelsey, Jack & Brad scrubbed & rinsed all the buckets with bleach water & dumped what little sap there was & we will wait to see what the cooler weather forcasted brings. Deer tracks in the center of wagon trail through entire north path! Some neighbors are done. We will hold out this week & see, but taps are 30+ days old and healing. Everyone is tired, all trecked to Miller's for supper (except Kel & Eliz who had to work!) Total sap:5,572 gallons Total syrup: 115 gallons!

Day #15

Upper tank that gravity feeds the evaporator.Clear plastic tube on left is gauge we watch to see how late we will be up boiling!! 

Bottom tank (an old 300 gallon milk tank) where sap hopefully keeps cool until it is pumped into the upper tank. The portable tank on the trailer holds 325 gallons so the person dumping needs to be thinkin!!!!

Wonderfully warm spring day on Thursday March 17th. Blustery day in the enchanted forest though so uninvited everyone but Bob & Cody & Nickie to gather. We added four bees to our ant collection in the filter! Collected about 160 gallons (& 12 gallons from Sandhill Rd. where the big trees in Uncle Frank's yard are newly tapped and running great!) Cathy provided the corned beef & cabbage to set the holiday mood. Boiling was very slow today. Bob, Cody, Jack & Chuck babysat the evaporator until about midnight. This is the first day the syrup looks a little darker. Total sap: 5,572.  Total syrup: 115 gallons. 

On a goofy note, everyone has been so busy today (Friday the 18th) nobody even checked trees tonight. See what the weekend brings!

Day #14

Sunday through Tuesday the 13 to the 15 were cool with an easterly breeze. Not a lot of action. Wednesdy the 16th saw some sunshine and warmth that woke the big trees up. Cody, Bob, Gerri, Kelsey,Brad, Chris, Susan, Gary, Nickie & Muff gathered 635 gallons (five from Sandhill annex) late in the evening. Ants are a sure sign that the end is near, they have arrived. Don't worry we do have a fine enough screen to filter the little boogers out. Sue is on the good list for wings, chicken & JoJo's for supper. The old guys (much to Cody's dismay) decided to quit and finish the last 200 gallons on Thursday. Kel & Nickie spent quality time stuffing marshmallows in their mouths. Susan B is still happy on day #14 amazing! Total sap: 5400 gallons. Total syrup: 107 gallons.

Day #13



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Two helpers looked tough too!

Paths are looking tough from heavy use this year.

 Saturday March 12th was another big day. Started out cool and sunny with trees dripping fast. We gathered at 9 am with Dale, John, Muff, Gerri, Bob, Kelsey, Brad, Bob, Cody & Jack getting 390 gallons. Spent a few hours doing some woods cleanup & grocery run. Muff made crockpot lasagna for lunch which turned out great and we had a nice peaceful meal for a change! Jack started the fire about 1:30. At five we went back out and collected 150 gallons more with Jim & family, Ted, Bob, Cody, Brad, Gerri, Ed, Chris and Charlie. Ted & Nancy spring cleaning & donated kindling! Cody was anxious to be done apparently as he made a fire that shot out clear out the stack. Guess we need Chuck to supervise that process! Total sap: 4,765 gallons.Total syrup: 99 gallons.

Day #12.5

sampler of available glass

basic plastic jug, quart & pint

Friday the 11th of March finds things quiet in the woods. The trees are dripping this eve but not enough to warrant gathering (and none of our faithful volunteers have dry clothes anyway!) We are taking this opportunity to order a pizza, wash clothes and open mail (yuck). Several have inquired about getting syrup & how much it costs. We haven't had much time to bottle anything lately-we normally take everything to the house in food grade plastic buckets, cool it and re-bottle it later. So.....we will begin to have some available for starters in plastic jugs by the pint & quart (picture above). The pints are $10 dollars and the quarts $15. You can send us an email with your order at rrine88@gmail.com or if you are lucky enough to know one of these crazy people mentioned over the last month in our daily adventures, just let them know and we'll make a plan to get you some. We have some very cool glass jars (as pictured above & others as well). Chuck has etched many of these and some have foil toppers or wax dipped lids that make very nice gifts. We do have a price list already for all of the glass, just let us know if you are interested. We do have other options as well, so let us know what you would like. Understand the syrup we have this year (so far) is much lighter than what you see in the photo. Jack often makes up orders around the holidays for any special requests, but he understands everyone is "in the mood" to try some now.We do not try to sell to the masses, just our aquaintances.

Day #12

Another busy day. Jenny, Kevin, Nathan, Gary, Susan, Bob & Jack gathered 290. 12 gallons was donated from the Sandhill Rd. forest (that crew considering tapping more trees-they are energetic). Sleeting when we finished. Jack boiled in the morning what we were too sleepy to finish Wed. eve. He ran out of wood so Ed helped him replenish the supply in the camp. Jenny is on the good list for bringing sloppy joes to the woods for supper!! Unusual thing is syrup looks just as light as the day we started, (typically darkens as you go!) We particularly like the darker stuff so we have delayed canning off for our family & crew until we can "mix" a little.  Jack took off about 3 gallons during the day and 8 more in the evening while Chuck fired the evap. Sue supervised Chuck's fire making skills.Walked out of the camp for the night around 1030pm to find the world white with snow-again! Glad to sleep in with school delay today!! Total sap: 4,229  Total syrup:   85 gallons.

Good thing those are new boots.



Plenty of water on Saturday.



This is the fog coming in from the North before it rained again changing to snow.

Day #11

Wow huge run today! Jack discovered buckets running over early in the day. A tree blew down across the entrance to the north path so job one was taking the chain saw out and addressing that issue. John & Gerri (who are clearly not 25 anymore) gathered between 1 and 3pm. South path more than filled the tank (325) and the north path had 290 gallons. Jack drove tractor and is well aware of what we meant earlier when we said the heater was not working! He has not reset his thermastat yet! Reinforcements arrived after work and Bob, Muff, Kevin, Jenny, Gary, Ed, Hannah, Chris, Heath & Susan gathered while Mike drove tractor. Total sap was 895 today. Bob says he is too tired to remember but believes they took off 9-13 gallons of syrup. Have to check on that! Rained all day!! Everybody pretty wet. Give you the totals tomorrow!