2021

2021 has started as a traditional one. Unlike the past three years there has been plenty of snow and cold weather. We expanded slightly to 120 taps - all on 3/16" tubing and tapped out on February 21. To take advantage of the vacuum created we actually used a ladder to tap the bottom 5-8 taps on each run so we can increase the drop to the tank by 2 feet. After the first week people all over the state are reporting lower than normal sugar content. However, ours remains average with between 1.3-1.5%. We have also noticed a reduce amount of sugar sand which had been an issue the past two years in the early season with heavy amounts.

This year our totals may seem lower than normal. Due to COVID we have not been around many family and friends and are still sitting on 20 gallons of syrup from last year. Our plan is to make 25 gallons and then another sugar maker will take over the lines for the remainder of the season. This log will only reflect what we make.

This year's log will no longer list the % sugar or gallons after going through the RO. We are now recirculating our concentrate to allow us to start boiling before it finishes processing and would be too difficult to try and calculate at different times. On average we remove 80% of the water overall.

This is year three with the same 150gpd membranes and after the first week they are still performing well.