EJB,
We kept a log so I can tell you exactly. We put the taps in on February 19th. My original post on TBN was about when to tap. Turns out the local high school has a horticulture program and they tap. So I did it one day after them.We collected sap until march 14th. Our las boil down was on march 17th. We only have 5 maples. Everything else is mostly oak. I am waiting for the foliage to turn and I will see if there are any more.
I did learn a neat trick from the Rinck Mann book. I left my sap in a snow bank and it froze. The ice is relatively pure water and the remaining unfrozen sap is now more concentrated. So boil down was a lot less time.
One easy way to collect the sap is to use a long plastic tube. I found some
at the local hardware store pretty cheap. I run the tubing from each tree to a
clean 55 gallon drum. I used to do the 5 gallon thing years ago but it was toooo
time consuming. I only tap a dozen trees and the 55 gal drum fills up in a couple
days (depending on the weather) also, I use gravity to have the sap flow downhill
to where I do the boiling. Nothing is worse than trying to carry heavy buckets of
sap uphill in winter. BTW, when you have had your fill of the syrup, try boiling it down
even more to get some very tasty maple sugar!!!! yummy
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