The Official 2022 Maple Syrup Thread !

Welp it was kind of a disaster. Having hot syrup all over the floor was not how I envisioned the maiden voyage going.

First I quickly realized that the top was convex and needed to be concave. Of course this was not an issue when I did a test run with just water. So out to the garage I go to pound on that with a BFH and some choice words to help facilitate the task at hand.

Next I quickly came to the conclusion that regular food grade diatomaceous earth is not the same as filter aid. Kind of gelled in the syrup and was a flaming nightmare to filter. All in all it took me longer to filter with vacuum than it would have to gravity filter.

 

Pics of the BFH

 

My favorite !!

 

It’s a great mallet

 

Our niece in law is back in Ontario helping her dad with maple syrup right now. I think their season is a little later than yours. Sorry to hear about the disaster. I have enjoying watching this thread.

 

Woodwidow you are right, we are 2 weeks in and looking at 2 more weeks every where over 2,000 feet

 

Vermont/Ontario have the ideal climate for maple syrup. It’s weird here in Michigan. The weather says end of season but the sap/syrup is still telling me middle of the season.

thanks I appreciate that. I should be able to dial in my filter rig and make it work well. The big problem last night was the result of my own stupidity in using the wrong Diatomaceous Earth.

 

That's exactly how I describe us in Ohio. Sap still good...but we are dried up pretty much !

 

I hear that's the place to do maple syrup ! Thanks for following along !

 

Well my day of filtering was kind of a disaster too. I had eight gallons of syrup to filter and bottle. After telling you how pleased I was using vacuum ,today didn't go well. The first three times I used it this season it was great. I just couldn't get the syrup to go through, maybe because it is late season syrup. Changed pre-filters a couple times and even tried a larger shop-vac. It was a very long afternoon got all but a couple gallons filtered and bottled. Have that two gallons in a pan cooling waiting for the egg white filter ( as seen on YouTube ) . May have to rethink my filtering for next season. Hope the egg whites get the DE out with nitre ,would hate to lose two gallon of syrup

 

I don't know the differences in DE but I purchased mine from the dealer that I get my other maple supplies. Did pull all my taps this morning

 

All pulled here....sap sacks ripped off. Now time to clean everything..my favorite part lol !

 

Poor generator has been worked hard for a month and a half...so brought it home to change the oil and give her a once over. Now back to the shack to help us clean up !

 

We haven't seen a need in vacuum filtering. We draw off right into our filter bottler....we fill up the storage under it..usually after every day of boiling....then fire up the propane burner ..put the bottler set up on the base that holds the water...which gets the steam going to heat the syrup to about 185..then bottle.
When we filter..we have an orlon..on the bottom...then 5 or 6 pre-filters on top of that. So when the syrup stops flowing...we peel off a layer of prefilter...then we are off and running again. Works for a whole boiling session ! Gravity is our friend on this ! I'm just rambling now lol !
I've been in the shack too long lol !

 

Very nice bottler , I may have to look in to something like that for next year. I'm not ready to give up on my system quite yet ,it worked so good until today.

 

Hey thanks. It works for us..nothing fancy ! I've heard good things abt the vacuum filters...hope you get it figured out. Hopefully something simple.

 

Did a lot of research tonight , looks like I need more DE and more vacuum

 

Wow Walt didn’t mean for my bad luck to run off on you. Hope you get it figured out.

 

Tapped 5 trees 3 weeks ago. Got about 4 gallons of sap 2 weeks ago and nothing more until yesterday and today. Tapped 4 more trees this morning. Boiled down 5 Gallons last night and half way through another 7 Gallons this evening.

Just backyard stainless steel pot on a turkey burner so 9 trees is plenty for me. Upgraded the burner this year and tapped into my natural gas. Great upgrade over the propane.
There was another 1/4 pint more than this from the first batch.


And about 1-1/4 pints from yesterdays 5 gallons.