It's Maple Syrup season!

Have you ever wanted to make your own maple syrup or just wondered how it is done? Tapping maple trees and collecting sap is not a difficult project but, boiling that sap down is time consuming and requires a little patience which to me is worth it in the end!

Late winter and early spring is the time to tap your trees, you are looking for temperatures in the 40's during the day and the 20's at night, it is that freeze/thaw period which helps to stimulate the flow of sap and create the pressure needed to collect it. In our area that is usually late February or early march but, this year we have seen warmer than average temps and perfect weather to start now in early February!

So how do you tap a tree?

We use a 5/16" drill bit to drill a hole about 3 feet from the ground into the tree, you want a slight upward angle to a depth of 2 1/2 inches, once you have drilled your hole, insert a spile (tap) into your hole and use a hammer... we prefer a rubber mallet and lightly tap your spile to fit snug into the tree trunk, do not insert it too deeply because going too deep may result in splitting the wood around your tap and you will lose sap! did you know it takes 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of syrup? So you want to collect every drop you can with out losing any of it!

After you have the tap secure in the tree you have several options to collect sap. You can simply hang a bucket on the tap itself and collect the sap, if you choose this method you will want to cover the bucket with a lid to keep rain, snow and dirt out!

The method we prefer is to use old gallon water/milk jugs, drill a hole into the lid of the jug to securely fit the end of a food grade tubing which is attached to the end of the spile, this keeps everything closed and does not allow rain, snow, dirt or insects to get into the sap! 

The gallon container sits at the base of the tree and we secure it with rocks or sticks to prevent it from being knocked over! Check your trees daily and harvest the sap regularly to prevent over filling of the containers and loss of sap! you can store the sap in a refrigerator for up to 7 days before using it! 

That's all there is to collecting the sap and when the conditions are right you should get a good flow of sap which will put you on your way to making syrup

You can tap any maple tree! red, silver, black or sugar maple but the sugar maples have a better output of sap production making them the preferred variety. I have heard you can also tap black walnut and birch trees but, we have not tried anything besides maple!

The diameter of the tree determines how many taps you can put into the tree;

Do not tap a tree less that 10" in diameter!

10" to 14" 1 tap, 15" to 19" 2 taps, 20"to 24" 3 taps.

You want to collect sap until the tree starts to bud out, after that the sap produced will make your syrup bitter and make sure to remove the taps at the end of the season, the tree will close and heal itself and claim your tap if you fail to remove it!

I will do another blog post later to show how to boil the sap down and make syrup!

Give it a try, this is a great family activity and there is nothing quite like having pancakes with syrup that you produced yourself!

Super bowl Champions!!!

The Steelers won!!!!

What a great game all the way to the end, both teams played great but,

we won!!!!!!!

Blog Header

My New Blog Header is compliments of my friend Robin of Robins Rest
Thank You Robin, I Love it, I will have to learn to do that someday!

A Needed Improvement

I have started to finally paint the basement! We have a very small house and use every inch of the space we have, The Basement seems to have been chosen as the Family room, Ryan's toys are all down there and the computer is in the basement, so we find ourselves spending a lot of time there, I couldn't take the dingy block walls any longer so I decided to paint!

Here is a before picture

And and After

We are hoping to frame in and finish that back wall too!

I have a lot more painting to get done and I cant wait!

it made a world of difference in the look and feel of that space, next I want to decorate and hang some pictures!

Then this space will really feel like a family room!!!

Comment moderation

Because of rude people on the Internet and the fact that I have been getting spammed, I have had to set my comments to moderation before they can be shown, I am sorry to the wonderful people who read and respond to my blog for this inconvenience. I really dislike that people have to be so ignorant and just cant keep their rude comments to themselves!

Gaelic Storm

My Daughter got me tickets to see Gaelic Storm in concert, I have been waiting about 8 years to see them and finally got my chance last night!

They are such an high energy band!

The concert could not have been any better!

The music was great !

This is Robin and My friends with Peter and Ryan

Here we all are outside the theatre, Robin, Me,Candy, Etta, Loretta and Tom

Robin and I had great seats, 2nd row, almost center stage!

Here I am with Steve

And again with Patrick!

The concert was almost three hours of jam packed Irish energy!

I would highly recommend any one who likes Celtic music to see them in concert, They are very down to earth and we even got to meet the band after the show and hang out for a little while!

We had a wonderful night out, I cant wait to see them again sometime!

Mobilize For Mike Day!

Today is Mobilize for Mike day

What is Mobilize for Mike day? you may ask,

well it is an Internet campaign to introduce people you know to Mike Huckabee a Republican candidate running for office in the next election.

Mike Huckabee is a man for the common people of the U.S.; People like you and I!

I am backing him for many reasons,

He is a Christian first and foremost and he stands strong for what he believes.

Watch his response to a question asked of him on the June 5Th GOP debate

Mike Huckabee is the only candidate who is proposing a "Fair Tax" Watch this video; Want to see the IRS disappear? to hear what Mike has to say about his plan for tax's, also watch Fair Tax Impact on Families.

I think he has clear goals for issues on Immigration, Energy Independence and keeping our Agriculture here in our Country!

Mike Huckabee supports our Second Amendment Rights;to keep our firearms.

I Believe that with a President like Mike, Our families will thrive, Our businesses will boom and jobs will come back to the U.S.

I encourage you to look at Mikes web site and check out you tube

for his campaign videos.

There are many more important issues that are just too numerous to mention them all here but also, I believe that you should see them

and make the decision for your self!

So Please visit Mikes Web site here! Mike Huckabee for President and Mobilize for Mike, get the word out!

America needs a President like Mike Huckabee!