RicelandMeadows

March 11, 2023

We have been crazy busy here! We completed the hog butchering on the day that hindsight would tell us we should have tapped our maple trees. We missed the first run, but did scramble and have been on track since. The photo above shows a sample from our first boil of 2023.

The contraption sitting on our evaporator with all the pipes, is a preheater. It preheats the sap using the steam. The heated sap enters the evaporator at 180 degrees F. A byproduct of this is hot water from the condensed steam that is collected in the round tank to the left of the picture. Having hot water and plenty of it, is a wonderful thing.

The preheated sap helps me burn less wood too. The steam from the boiling sap, usually just vents out the building, but this allows us to make use of the BTU’s that would otherwise be lost. It has upped my efficiency too, allowing be to boil faster, using less wood. There is still plenty of steam to fill the sky and make me remember my grandparents sugarhouse steaming away in my childhood memories.

I am using our son’s horses to gather sap this year. Our main team Amee and Abby are both on maternity leave. These youngsters have been doing a great job. We haven’t had much snow, but the mud has been plentiful.

A quick shot of our midseason lineup. We are about halfway through the season I think, but Mother Nature will let us know for sure. We got a little “sugar snow” this weekend. “Sugar snow” is a term I grew up with describing a snow while we made syrup in the late spring. We have seen buzzards, robins, a wandering ground hog and just today, red-winged blackbirds. These are all signs of the coming spring. The season will come to a close for us when the maples start to bud out or when I run out of firewood. I am pushing the wood pile to the limit. I want to completely clean out the stored wood. I will fill it all again with wood cut last fall and split when we fill the woodshed. Good dry, well seasoned firewood makes a very hot fire, the very thing needed to boil maple sap.

Our mares, hanging out waiting for their babies to arrive. It looks to me like they are ready for the big day. They are both just due, so in a couple days, we may have pictures of foals to share. In the meantime, I will keep working in the sugarbush and around the farm, waiting on the warm greener days of spring. Tonight we “spring” ahead with our clocks allowing for more daylight in the evening… I think I’m ready.