Filed under: March 2015 | Tags: coal miner, fire, firebox, making maple syrup, nerves, Tea
Letting her rip
March 17, 2015
St Patrick’s day boil. We gathered this afternoon. We didn’t get as much sap as I thought we would. The temperature was warm yesterday, but no sunshine. The good news is that lots of snow melted! I think from here on out, the sap should run like mad.
Anyway, I fired up today with the small amount of sap that we had. I had a great boil going. Everything was working out well. I knew that I was about to run out of sap, so I slowed down. I quit adding wood to the firebox. I sat down for a bit and watched the steam rise to the roof. I started thinking that wow, I really had a head of steam up.
I climbed the ladder to check the level in the head tank. I reached into the tank to feel because the steam fogged my glasses too much to see. I rammed my fingers into the bottom of the tank, twice! First because I couldn’t see, the second time because I couldn’t believe it! The tank was empty!
I ran for the door of the sugarhouse, the steel shovel and my OS buckets. I started shoveling the burning wood out into the water puddles outside. I worked like a coal miner who owed a bundle to the company store. I had the fire pulled in record time. My OS buckets amount to 3 five gallon buckets of sap, kept for just this purpose. The OS stands for “Oh Sh*t” buckets…and believe me, first you say it…then you do it!
In just a few minutes the crisis had passed. The level of the hot sap was deep enough for the heat left in the firebrick. The fire removed from the firebox, the danger of burning everything up was gone. I sat down and watched the whole thing cool down. I sipped a cup of sap tea and petted my dog. My nerves were returned to normal, everything was well, thanks to yanking the fire 😮
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RicelandMeadows 
Good reead
Comment by Owen Carpenter January 7, 2023 @ 6:43 pm