It’s January 29th and we are tapping. The earliest ever for us. It was 48 on Christmas. We had two weeks of Winter between January 9th and 23rd. Snow storm with 12”-14” of snow and blowing. Then below zero for 6 days. But it started warming by January 25. We have the freeze/thaw cycle now. And that cycle is forecast to continue for the next 10 days. The trees don’t know about the calendar: they follow the weather. Even if we get a cold snap in February, it will just pause the sap. The weather pattern is here now.
This was already an El Nino year which causes warmer air to push farther North mitigating the cold air pushing down from the Artic. But temperatures have been much warmer then El Nino alone. It’s climate change. We’ve been 10-15 degrees warmer then normal. The river didn’t freeze until the below zero days in January, but it will melt again.
We put the pressure gauge on a tree this morning along with a bucket and spout. No tree pressure or sap at 9:00 AM. But the sun came out and by 12:30 PM the tree was at 14 PSI and the spout dripping fast. It tested at 2 Brix. So we prepared to tap.
Into the woods by 1:00 PM. 100 taps up by 4:45 PM. Planning for 400 this season.