Best moment of my life... It’s a boy!!!! When is the right time to start looking for the boy’s first chainsaw?! AKA - a new edition to my chainsaw family
Thanks All! Up and down week here as far as farms stuff. Tuesday morning I had a flood in the sugar house because I accidentally left the valve on the main tank wide open after scrubbing the tank clean over the weekend. Lost about 100 gallons of sap judging by what the other tanks were holding and a full day of boiling. Lost a bee hive due to a stupid decision, in hindsight, I made about a month ago. Was hauling mushroom logs on Wednesday and my ATV trailer broke. The welds that hold the arm onto the axle tubing cracked. Critical break. Not even a year old. Luckily the company is standing behind their trailer and sending out new parts at no cost to me so I can fix it. So felt like a lot of set backs but didn’t take too long to catch back up. Staying positive! Sap is still flowing strong. Other bee hives are looking strong and healthy. And I got to feed the Ariens splitter a healthy portion of ash yesterday. was splitting a wheelbarrows worth and stacking it in the wood shed and then would go load up the maple arch with more wood and sap. Then back to splitting. It was slow splitting but that didn’t bother me. Filled in the empty space in the front row. Ended up being about a cord. Maybe a little over. Also was able to cut up some long ago felled oak that was amazingly still good. Couple small trunks that were in the path of the new trail section.
With this year's weather it's been more like 75:1 around here. Sugar content increases with each freeze thaw thaw cycle. Long freezes and then lots of warm weather hasn't been boosting the sugar.
Like CTRider said, depends on the sugar content in the sap. I’ve never seen a 40 to 1 in the years I’ve been doing this. This year I’ve been seeing similar numbers to what Buffalo Plaid is saying. 60 to 75 gallons of sap to one gallon of syrup. 100 gallons lost is about 1 1/2 gallons of finished product for me. Give or take.
This is awesome. I see they sell a Stihl children’s toy saw as well. When the time comes I’ll let him decide his favorite chainsaw team. Hahaha
Coming home today I get to our road and as I’m driving down I spot a pile of rounds stacked up roadside from a ways off, about ten houses down from our house. Get up to it and it’s a pile of pine and hemlock with “FREE” painted across it. Sweet, I’ll take it for the maple arch. Already cut to size and easy loading right into the truck. Got a nice, full truckload out of it. About half way through loading it up the homeowner comes out. Nice lady. We’ve seen her and her husband out in the yard when we walk the dogs and say hi but have never stopped to talk with them. Houses are spread out here so even as neighbors, we don’t really know each other. Everyone is so nice but mostly keeps to themselves. Anyways, she starts telling me that her husband is now 72 and can’t do what he used to and she has developed some bad allergies and both of these things combined prevent them from burning wood inside anymore. She points over to their wood pile across the yard and asks if I’d like the wood. Umm, yeah sure. Looks a little old and in not great condition but I can burn it in the maple arch I’m thinking. We finish up our conversation and I say thank you and that I’ll be back to take a look at the wood pile after I head home with the load of pine and get it off the truck. Head back to their house now after lunch. The husband is home. I had brought a bottle of syrup to them as thanks for the pine. He was excited about that. Proceeds to tell me that they can’t burn anymore and don’t burn in their outside pit much anymore and they’re also looking to move to West Virginia next year after he retires. He said he hates the thought of the wood going to waste and just rotting. He said, “It’s all hard wood. Mostly oak that I cut up and spilt after a storm a few years ago.” And then the bells went off in my head and I’m sure a hidden smile on my face. “Oh really....?” So we walk down to the wood pile and I uncover one of the pallets. It’s all oak. Beautifully seasoned oak. Top covered and all. About three years old according to him. He tells me to have at it and thanks me for doing him a favor! What?! I felt so bad. Told him right off the bat that I can’t just take this wood. Asked him if I could give him something in return for it. “Oh no no no.” Offer to help him with anything and everything he may need a hand with around the yard or house. “Oh no no... you’re doing me a big favor.” Then he went inside. The entire time I was running wheelbarrow loads the 30 or so yards from the pile to the truck I felt guilty. Then he comes back out with a pair of gloves and says, “well I can’t let you have all the fun now...” He grabs a huge arm full of wood and starts hauling over to the truck. The stacks of splits ended up being two full truck loads. Didn’t take but an hour to load up and run them down to my house. Maybe 90 minutes. About 90% oak. Some maple and black birch. Some BuZZsaw wood ... I mean locust. After I unloaded the second truckload at the house I went back and brought them some of our honey and thanked them a thousand times. Told them again that if they ever need a hand with anything to just let me know. Doesn’t matter what it is. I still feel slightly guilty... but they were so happy I was taking the wood. We ended up in another conversation for a while. He told me some old wood hoard stories. Said he’d haul roadside wood whenever he could. So I said to him, “Ah, so you have a little wood hoarders blood in you, too.” He laughed and said they used to have a two years supply on hand at all times. But times have changes and they can’t anymore. They’ve been there for 15 years. I’ve only been here for five. So I got some area history from them as well. They answered a few questions I had about the area. Things I couldn’t figure out or answer. All in all it was a great experience with some wonderful people. I feel so happy to live in a place where everyone is so nice. Can’t say that about a lot of this state... And oh yeah... when I was about to leave he said, “Hey, you want the wood from this small maple I cut up a few weeks ago? Came down in the ice storm.” Can’t say I’ve ever had a score like this. Their generosity is something I will never forget. Split wood ended up being a cord or so. Maybe little less. Sure helps the cause towards trying to get our three year plan done before the baby boy comes this summer.
Wood shed holds two years with winters likes this one. 1.5 years with normal cold winters. It’s 3/4 full at the moment. Next years stuff is all ready done and good to go. Most of it will be 24 months seasoned except the ash I just split to fill in the front rows of the shed. But that’ll have a good 10 months on it. Should be just fine. Have to fill in the rest of the shed for the second year stuff and then will start stacking on pallets and top covering. Got about a cord over by the sugar house, too. If ever needed for heat in the house. Soooo... still got a lot to do. Hoard pile as it sits I think will get me to 2.5 years as far as quantity. As far as prime seasoned... that’ll be a good while to get there. So need a bit more. Got a few downed or damaged trees out back in mind that I’ll cut up and haul down. Keeping an eye on the cutting crews, too. They’ve been on a stretch of private properties for the last couple weeks. Pretty much everyone has “Do Not Take” signs up and most have wood piles. So knocking and asking is probably fruitless. Won’t be long until they hit another stretch of state land though.
Wow, ready made firewood. A rare score indeed. Nice to meet and help the neighbor out. Great job Woodsman Did you ever find out about the locust near you?