It has been a crazy year for syrup. We started tapping in January, but then the weather turned very cold and we did not get any sap for a few weeks. It warmed up and we brought in a few gallons of sap before the weather froze up again! We still have buckets out, but we have not had enough cold nights and warm days to collect sap.
We are often asked how much sap is needed to make syrup. We usually boil down around 35 gallons of sap for each gallon of syrup. The kids check the trees most days to make sure the buckets do not have mold. They empty the sap collected to store in the shade so it does not spoil. Once we collect enough sap, we do most of the boiling down outside.
Even with the crazy weather, we were able to can 6 1/2 pints of syrup. We are hoping for more, because that won’t last very long. But we are all thankful for what we were able to get.
