maple syrup

[Nymph]

Anybody here tapping trees?

[MOBY RICHARD*]

I and a friend of ours have tapped in the past, but not lately as it is expensive for the fuel to evaporate the water off...

Thinking about it again just for a small amount though, like a gallon of finished product...

[south_metro_fish]

I almost forgot. I will be tapping some river maples this year for sure. It is so much fun and the syrup is better then anything you can buy at the store. My favorite is to put it on ice cream. Some years we will through it in the freezer in a huge container and save it for the summer. Then when its nice outside we sit around and drink beer and make syrup.

[mcgarth]

my dad and myself will be out tapping starting thursday,and hopefully been done saturday. im hoping for a good run this year.it would be nice to make about 40 gallons of the finished product again this year. good luck to all you tappers. if anyone has quit a few maple trees in the anoka county area we need more trees to tap and we will give you some finished product. e-mail me at sabbachl at dot com thanks

[south_metro_fish]

mcgarther is the sap running I was thinking it was a little early yet but I could be wrong? Let me know how its running.

[mcgarth]

no its not running yet but we want our taps in. because next week it should start runnig some. do you tap also?

[Comet]

I have a little sap in the bottom of my buckets. Do you think I should just throw this out until the sap really flows? Or will it be OK. I tapped last weekend and only have a small amount in the bottoms of my pails. What do you think?

[south_metro_fish]

I would through the sap in the freezer till you get more. You can add the frozen sap even in ice chunks in to your evaporation pot when you are boiling it down. Like I mentioned before we usually freeze all our sap and boil it down later.

I thought about our method a little more and remembered that we usually have 2 pans going. One larger pan is used as the main evaporation pan and the other is used to melt the sap and warm it up so it can be added to the main pan without breaking the boil.

Yes I do tap I am just hoping I can have things work out to where I can tap some trees this year. We don't have any maples in our yard but have a bunch down at the river and I am afraid my parents are going to be on vacation when it starts running. I did meet someone up here that has some nice maples in their yard that said I could tap their trees.

[south_metro_fish]

Does any one have any preference on what kind of maple they like to tap. I have been able to experience being able to tap different types. When my grandpa was still around he would manage the buckets down at the river, and he decided one year to tape his silver maple and keep it separate from the river maple sap. We boiled them down in different batches and had different results with the finial product. The silver maple's final product was more of a amber color with a different flavor, where as the river maples had a darker brown color and different flavor. It was years ago but if I remember right I liked the river maple syrup better. Any one else try any thing like this.

[mcgarth]

the lighter amber color syrup is a better quality grade.the dark has more of a maple flavor.you'll get a better price for the lighter product.we tap both sugar(hard)maple and silver maple

[south_metro_fish]

Is the sap running any place yet or do I have another week to figure things out?

[heavyduty]

mcgarth I'm looking at trying to make syrup this year. is there a place local to buy supplys or am i better off doing it online

? I know time is short so I would like to get it local and quickly if i could. looking at a small amount of taps at first just to get my feet wet. approximate how much sap can you get from one tree?

thanks for any info

[mcgarth]

the sap is running somewhat but it hasnt really started yet. to get supplies wis. has a few suppliers one that we use is in cadot wis. their name is roth's sugar bush.we will be done tapping tomorrow, i dont have any idea how many taps we put out its alot. good luck and have fun

[Fishstalker]

Does anyone know if you can tap on state or federal land?

[mcgarth]

i think you need to buy a permit to tap on state land, but im not sure

[Comet]

Heavy Duty, the trees I have tapped have not really begun yet. I use a tube from the tree to the pail. I use 3 gallon pails from a bakery. So no need to order supplies. Go to FFarm for the tubing. One source I saw said approx. 10 gallons of sap per tap. So 13 trees will supply approx 100-130 gallons of sap.

[south_metro_fish]

From my experience it changes from tree to tree and year to year. The weather plays a major roll in how well the sap will run for the year. You need good warm days above freezing preferably in the 40's and nights just below freezing. That will really get the sap flowing. If you have too warm or too cold it wont run as good. How dry everything is will also affect how well the sap will run for the year.

[south_metro_fish]

This weekend looks like it might be good to start taping. They are talking 40's for the weekend and 50 by mid next week. I think I figured out where I can tap this year finally.

[Nymph]

I got a few in today. Nothing really going yet...should be this weekend though.

[Comet]

How is the flow? I am getting a small amount each 3-5 gallons of sap from 13 trees.

[mcgarth]

only about 200 gallons so far,thats with about 1,000 taps.we dont need this 60 degree weather right now

[Ralph Wiggum]

Neighbor's trees don't appear to be flowing too much.

[mcgarth]

5 gallons of finished product so far, hopefully pick up more sap thursday. got luck everyone and have fun

[nate larson]

I am going down to Whitewater on Saturday for their maple syrup demonstration. I think Fort Snelling has one going this weekend also if anyone is interested.

[leech~~]

I think Elm Creek park does one still also?. They stopped drilling their trees out there for sap and just use water for their demo, so one time back a few years I gave them about 30 gal's of sap to cook down. They were happy as a clam!