Warm overnight.  Only down to 40.  This morning was cloudy until sunrise, then cleared.   But there was a cold North wind again.   Without a freezing night there was no sap today.

 

Into the woods by 7:45 AM.  Cleaned the syrup pan. Got water.  Washed the 225 gallon storage tank then pumped the collecting tank into the storage tank.  But 9:00 AM  boiling and running in sap into the evaporator.   The goal for the day was emptying the 225 gallon storage tank and bottling.

 

Got a milk can of syrup on the finishing pan by 10:30 AM.   When filtering it, we did not use enough filter aid so the syrup would not go through the filter.  We only have a hand pump on the filter press and we could hardly push  it down because the filter papers were clogged.  Back into the finishing pan and try again with more filter aid.   That worked.

 

Bottled 31 quarts.  First syrup of the season.

 

We did not accomplish the second goal.   Boiled well until about 5:00 PM.  Then we got a nitre build up on the syrup pan.   That spoils the boiling.  In 1 ½ to 2 hrs we could have been done.   But with the nitre it was pointless to continue boiling.  So we ended early.  Tomorrow we will clean the syrup pan again and finish boiling.  And we have to bottle.  We have two milk can of syrup.

 

Freezing tonight.  Tomorrow up to 38.  Hoping for sap.  The coming week’s forecast is for favorable weather patterns of freeze/thaw.

 

Based on the amount of sap collected so far, 1038 gallons of sap, we are about 37% of an average season’s crop.