Saturday, February 27, 2010

A sappy story...

The maple sap is running in New England!....or so I have heard. We decided that we wanted to give it try, so I did what every "from away-er" does. I bought a book. Now I know everything there is to know, right? First on the list is to identify the sugar maple tree......in the fall. What? But, it is now late February and the sap runs, NOW! OOPS. Okay, plan B. Fortunately for our family, Number 1 has a few skills and comes through for us. He has pointed out what we are absolutely, almost fairly certain, sure to be six sugar maple trees.

Okay, now what? I bought a few taps. We decided to use some plastic water jugs (they were free) to collect the sap, this will really keep our costs down.






Number 1 is drilling in the maple tree, while Trink and E-Man look on.

Today was THE day to install the taps! After re-reading the book to make sure of how and where to put the taps, we realized that the tree diameter must be at least ten inches. Uh-oh, all the trees that Number 1 found are NOT that big. Well, he was able to find two other that were big enough.

So, with taps installed and jugs attached, all we have to do is wait! I can already taste that syrup!

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