The Taps Are In But Will Time Work Out?

Matthew put 10 taps in our sugar maples yesterday as we are anticipating a good sap flow right now. We enjoy the natural maple sugar that comes from boiling down the sap and our supply is getting pretty low from last year's harvest. We also turn some into maple syrup, but we've discovered that we make better use of the sugar form so that's what we will go for mostly. Sugar keeps almost indefinitely where the syrup has to be kept refrigerated after the jar is opened and can ruin after a few months.

Our 7 day weather forecast is showing some good maple sap days:



Other sources are predicting Wednesday night to be below freezing instead of 38, which would be better. What we want is a pattern of the day time temperature being above freezing while the nights drop below freezing. I especially like to see the days hit 40 with the nights dropping into the mid 20s. The sap flow will stop when the temperature stays above freezing for too long or when the temperature is below freezing for too long. Like life in general, the maple trees need a nice balance to flow freely!

Matthew said several of the taps were already dripping last night! Now the problem will be finding the hours needed to boil the sap down once we get a sufficient amount collected. It looks like school will be on all week, so the days will not be available for me. Tonight we have the annual meeting of the volunteer fire department where I'm treasurer. Wednesday evening I will either be going to our monthly mid-week service at church or I'll be picking up our pork and stopping over at KMBC. Thursday evening is the Bible study at our community center that I've been leading. So that leaves Friday evening and the weekend before I will be able to get to the sap! I hope we have a good sap run, but I don't want it to ruin before I can get to it!

We will just have to do our best and trust that everything will work out! Balance is the key!