Backyard maple on a blustery day

I collected another 5 gallons of sap over the last few days, so am doing a boil today. 5 gallons is the minimum I want to boil, and I'd done a boil last weekend with about the same amount, which I boiled down to about a quart so it's not yet finished. I'll boil this new batch down to about 2 quarts outside, then strain it and bring it in for the finishing boil. I'll combine the two batches and finish it to 7 degrees above boiling; hopefully I'll end up with close to a quart of finished syrup.

Sugar maple tree in the front yard

About 2.5 gallons sap

It's a cold, blustery, raw day out there today, really not a nice day to be outside. When I collected sap around 1 p.m., there was a cold, light drizzle coming down, what our rancher friend from Wyoming used to call spittin.' It's now raining actively, although it's hovering right around freezing.







Because of the rain, I'm boiling under our carport rather than on our open patio as I usually do. I had three ice-cream pails of sap in the freezer, collected earlier in the week, so I added them to my 8-gallon pot with the fresh sap from the last day and a half. Took a while to melt that ice!

A woodpecker stopped by to visit while I was waiting for the frozen sap to melt. She was hungry and stayed on the feeder a long time, but was a little camera-shy so I couldn't get too close to her.

Now we're cooking!

The sap will probably have to cook for close to 2 hours before it has reduced enough to bring it inside. It already smells good!