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[Sugaring] Trying to plan the day and winding down
The weather is white today…
The sugaring season is winding down. Several of the buckets on the trees yesterday were pretty much empty, with just a small amount of bright yellow or cloudy white sap in the bottom. That kind of sap we normally just dump on the ground, and then move on to the next bucket. At the same time, a few of the buckets had filled all of the way to the top again.
The original plan for the day was to boil the sap gathered yesterday (about 23-25 barrels), but we weren't sure if there would be enough sap gathered today to boil on Saturday (we usually gather later in the day than my father has been running in the evaporator, taking into account my regular job schedule). My father suggested that we gather early, around Noon, gathering in the tanks for the pipelines, and then he would boil later in the afternoon.
He then found out that the young lady who has been helping him with the canning part of the process wouldn't be able to help this afternoon, so he's pushing the boiling off until Saturday. Since the sap has been run through the sterilizer, that should be OK, and we can go back to gathering later in the day, getting both the tanks and the buckets.
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helwen has been trying to let rtropeano know when we would be boiling next, so that she come up (probably with her family) to watch the boiling process. She sent off a message this morning between the two decisions about when to boil (today or tomorrow), and then had to send off another message with a correction.
Farming is not predictable. ;-)
As I said, the season is winding down. You might say it's coming to a screeching halt, actually. A number of the taps have simply stopped flowing (which is normal), the syrup is getting darker (although not yet Dark). The forecast for the next week has highs in the 50°F range, with most nights barely getting low enough to freeze (too warm for good sugaring). This may be our last day to go out gathering. The next step in the process would be taking down the buckets and pulling the taps, then washing all of the equipment and putting it up in storage.
We say that the season is
I expect that we'll be doing some work related to sugaring during the summer, preparing new pipeline to replace some of the older lines, checking the buckets for leaks, fixing some covers and spouts as needed, checking and adjusting the pumps.
It has been, as I noted, a good season. Time for the next season to take primary attention.
The sugaring season is winding down. Several of the buckets on the trees yesterday were pretty much empty, with just a small amount of bright yellow or cloudy white sap in the bottom. That kind of sap we normally just dump on the ground, and then move on to the next bucket. At the same time, a few of the buckets had filled all of the way to the top again.
The original plan for the day was to boil the sap gathered yesterday (about 23-25 barrels), but we weren't sure if there would be enough sap gathered today to boil on Saturday (we usually gather later in the day than my father has been running in the evaporator, taking into account my regular job schedule). My father suggested that we gather early, around Noon, gathering in the tanks for the pipelines, and then he would boil later in the afternoon.
He then found out that the young lady who has been helping him with the canning part of the process wouldn't be able to help this afternoon, so he's pushing the boiling off until Saturday. Since the sap has been run through the sterilizer, that should be OK, and we can go back to gathering later in the day, getting both the tanks and the buckets.
Meanwhile,
helwen has been trying to let rtropeano know when we would be boiling next, so that she come up (probably with her family) to watch the boiling process. She sent off a message this morning between the two decisions about when to boil (today or tomorrow), and then had to send off another message with a correction.Farming is not predictable. ;-)
As I said, the season is winding down. You might say it's coming to a screeching halt, actually. A number of the taps have simply stopped flowing (which is normal), the syrup is getting darker (although not yet Dark). The forecast for the next week has highs in the 50°F range, with most nights barely getting low enough to freeze (too warm for good sugaring). This may be our last day to go out gathering. The next step in the process would be taking down the buckets and pulling the taps, then washing all of the equipment and putting it up in storage.
We say that the season is
6 weeks long, because that's about how long that the taps will run with sap, but that's only for the sap run itself (it's been closer to 5 weeks this year, but it has been a good 5 weeks). There's set-up time before hand -- we needed to go out clearing the pipelines of snow starting about 1½ weeks before we started tapping, we had to clean the evaporator (we clean it both at the beginning and end of the season), connect equipment, &c, and then there's clean-up time afterwards (wash buckets, sort equipment, put things into storage). And this all overlaps with other farming work (feeding the cattle and the chickens, gathering eggs, cutting and splitting firewood, general around-the-farm repairs).
I expect that we'll be doing some work related to sugaring during the summer, preparing new pipeline to replace some of the older lines, checking the buckets for leaks, fixing some covers and spouts as needed, checking and adjusting the pumps.
It has been, as I noted, a good season. Time for the next season to take primary attention.