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Maple Syrup Part 2- Collecting the Sap

The next step in making maple syrup is collecting the sap from the trees. We had to wait for a couple days for it to warm up enough for the sap to run. It takes warm, sunshiny days to get the sap moving, after winter has chilled and  frozen everything. As the sun warms the top of the tree, it calls for the sap that is stored in it's roots, so as the sap travels up the tree some of it gets collected by the tap and runs in to the bags. Because we only put one or two taps into a tree, there is still plenty of sap and nutrition for the tree. It's been running good so far this year.

Here are some pictures of the collection process: 


Dumping the sap into buckets to carry it.

Carrying buckets to the edge of the woods 

Next it goes through a strainer, and into milk cans to be transported back to the farm.  

There was some frozen sap in the bags today that didn't come out- so we left it to melt:


Waiting for the last of the sap to be put into cans. 

A tree stump that's just the right size... 

It was dripping away today!



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