Mar 9
It was a lovely Sunday afternoon for a walk in the woods. The sap has been consistently running since tapping one week ago today. This week the weather brought us 4 inches of snow, 0.3 inches of rain, wind gusts up to 45 mph, sunshine, frozen ground, and still days. Most of the meteorological possibilities were experienced; Variety is the spice of life during March in Ohio.
Many folks were looking for entertainment mixed with exercise today. Adam, Katie (Brynn and Henry), Nancy, Liz, Alex, Esme, Burke, Mabel, Tyler, Jasmine, Jermey, Jake, Jackie, Gerri, Muff, Brad, Cody, Amy (Emma and Oliver), Heath, Hailey, Michael, with Dave driving, Bob maning the camp. Dale, Karen, Dorothy, Kelsey, and Susan R. kept the party going in the camp. Mike stopped in and Bob enjoyed visiting with him while trying to man his station.
We attempted to support our local Maple Syrup Festival at the Snavely’s, but it appeared they had fantastic attendance and finding parking was nearly impossible! Knowing we had copious amounts of sap to deal with at the home farm, we decided to head home and prep for camp. Shout out to the Snavely family for a successful event! We’re sorry we missed you today!
Boiling started at noon as we still had a great deal of sap in the camp from yesterday. The guys cut wood, cleaned out the fire box ash pit/flues, recleaned the holding tanks. Today’s camp discussion focused on Dave’s pitch for matching hats. He feels these are a need and he is exploring this option. Cody, Brad, Dave, and Adam played a joke on Bob, convincing him that Dave was dumping massive amounts of defoamer in the evaporator until Dave got yelled at and his hands smacked. We marvel that the more people in the camp, the less likely anybody is to be aware of the temperature in the take-off pan (218 F is the magic number).
Evan and Kelsey hijacked Muff’s side-by-side to run the finished syrup to the freezer storage. We are grateful for Muff’s understanding when she returned to camp to find her vehicle parked behind the camp and parked in by Dale’s truck.
While gathering tonight, Henry had the most fun of anyone, mud is magical stuff. He suffered some disappointment as he stopped at every mudhole and tried to look for fish. Brynn and Oliver made it through most of the woods in backpacks.
Kelsey and Jackie made pancakes on the Blackstone as fast as Amy could make the mix. We discussed how many of us have only a little syrup in the fridge at home, ironic, but true. We typically refilter and bottle at a later time rather than straight from the camp. We will add that to the list of things to do this week.
The total collection was 970 gallons tonight. It took a little engineering to get all of the sap in again. This is a great problem, nevertheless a problem. The camp was warm and filled with laughter. Bucket seating only for dinner tonight.
*There is a discrepancy in our total gallons of syrup reported from the camp, we believe a sleep-deprived Bob is to blame. It was requested that this number be updated after some much needed sleep and intellectual contemplation. Check back with us tomorrow to see how far off we are.
Total Gallons of Syrup today: 12
Total Gallons of Syrup to date: 52*
Total Gallons of Sap today: 970
Total Gallons of Sap to date: 3,865