Category: 2025: Season 108 Page 1 of 5

Into the woods by 9:00 AM to finish cleanup. Finishing pan washed. Floor washed. Tanks in the building. Equipment back to the farmhouse. Still need to organize equipment in the basement, but all the equipment is here except the R/O. We need help with that.

The R/O will stay in the garage this year. We’ll use an air compressor to blow out the components to prevent damage from any remaining water.

We’ll work on transplanting some maple trees next week. We must rejuvenate the trees around the syrup building. There aren’t any young trees.

Completed by 2:00 PM.

Into the woods by 8:30 AM to clean the evaporator pans and firebox. It was an easy cleanup. The inside wiped clean. The bottom was even easier. We’ve developed a good routine for cleaning the pans that starts with the last boil where we add water and cleaning solution to the flue pan while finishing the last syrup in the syrup pan. The polishing pads for stainless steel are the other crucial part of cleaning the pans.

For tomorrow, a quick cleanup of the finishing pan, wash the floor, bring in the tanks, and return equipment to the house.

Mostly sunny and low 50s. A good day to clean the evaporator. It was worth waiting because we didn’t get cold hands.

Back to the farmhouse by 3:30 PM.

Measured the amount of wood used this season: 5 ½ cords. Expected more because we cooked three times without the R/O and the R/O was under-preforming meaning we had more water to cook out.

Warmer weather forecast for tomorrow. Plan to work on cleaning evaporator pans

Storage tanks washed. Hauled ½ tank of water into the woods to use for final cleaning.

All the buckets and covers are stacked and racked in the garage.

Still waiting for warmer weather before cleaning the evaporator pans.

Brought back to the farmhouse and rinsed the R/O hoses with bleach solution. The bleach solution sanitizes for off-season storage.

Thinking about replacing the woodshed before next season. The woodshed has had additions to expand it, but those additions weren’t well planned. The south side addition is more of a lean-to that seems to defy the laws of physics to stay standing. The east side addition lowered the roof line to under 6’ causing a hazard to hit your head. And the floor is uneven causing tripping hazards. Without lights in the woodshed, it’s a challenge getting wood when it’s dark outside.

Low 20s overnight. Sunny and low to mid-30s during the day.

Drained water from bottler then brought back to the house. Collected six buckets we missed yesterday. Made a trip to Menards to purchase a new flex house from the propane tank. Propane leaks from the fitting on the old hose.

Also drained the R/O feed pump. It takes too much effort for this simple task. The drain is in the 7 position on a clock surrounded by other parts of the R/O. It’s difficult to reach with a wrench to drain at season end or tighten at season start.

Mostly sunny. Mid-20s overnight. Below normal temperatures for the coming week because the jet stream dipped. Snow flurries for tomorrow morning.

Into the woods by 9:00 AM to collect buckets can covers. The small utility vehicle got stuck in the mud. It doesn’t have the clearance to get over the ruts created by the mud. Pulled out the H. Used the H to get the remaining buckets and covers. Finished collecting buckets and covers by 12:30 PM.

Rinsed the buckets with fresh water to help with washing for next season. The buckets are now stacked in the garage to dry. We’ll rack them next week.

Back to the farmhouse by 5:30 PM.

We made 73 gallons of syrup this season, but only bottled 71 gallons because 2 gallons went to the floor on March 20. With 410 taps the statistical average would be 75 gallons based on a yield of 1.5 pints/tap. The sugar content was down to 1 Brix on the last two runs of 265 and 475 gallons of sap otherwise we would have made more syrup.

Into the woods by 7:45 AM. The first batch bottled was actually from the last boil. The syrup was dark amber, but not grade B. Happy about that. The next batch was slightly lighter in color.

The new order of filter papers for the filter press has a slightly different composition causing them to filter differently. More syrup was trapped in the filter press. We were concerned the syrup could be cloudy because it didn’t seem like the filter paper removed all of the filter aid. Fortunately, the syrup was clear. We’ll need to monitor this next season.

Remaining work: bring in the buckets and covers; clean evaporator pans and firebox; bring back R/O and other equipment.

Back to the farmhouse by 1:00 PM.

Another milk can bottled. Into the woods by 8:00 AM. Back to the farmhouse by 12:15 PM.

Approximately 5 gallons remain to bottle in two milk cans. Projecting around 72 gallons for the season. One milk can has around 3 gallons. The last milk can, around 2 gallons. We put the last syrup into a separate milk can because it will be very dark: likely grade B. Its been quite a few seasons since we made syrup that dark because we could cook syrup faster with the R/O so it didn’t get that dark.

We’ll try to bottle both milk cans tomorrow. Estimating it will take 6 hours. It’s two smaller batches so will finish on the propane burner faster. We’ll finish and bottle each milk can separately so we don’t mix in the very dark syrup.

Cloudy and mid-40s today.

1 ½” of snow overnight. Changed to sleet at by 7:00 AM, then changed to rain by 9:00 AM. Rain ended by Noon, but stayed cloudy. Temperature in mid-30s. We didn’t go into the woods because of the cold, wet weather. We’ll bottle tomorrow when the weather is nicer.

Moved all the bottled syrup into the basement. When we brought the syrup in from the woods, we stacked it in the 1st floor living room.