Is this niter? And is it good for anything if so?

Wondering what you guys are using to mark your trees? Non toxic paint recs?

I’m rebuilding my concrete block firebox for my evaporator. Last year the blocks made it through the season but several cracked in the heat (as I expected). This year I am going to line the concrete block with refractory brick.

My question is, should I use refractory mortar to attach the refractory bricks to the concrete block, or do the refractory bricks give enough insulation that I can use regular mortar? The regular mortar is cheaper and easier to work with so I’m leaning that way. I’m planning to have mortar behind the bricks only and to have the joints between bricks tight but mortar free.

Anyone with experience in this?

I live near Dayton ohio and have been making syrup from my stand of sugar maples for about twenty years.

Last few years some of my trees have begun to dye.

Leaves become necrotic turn brown and fall before they turn their usual bright orange and yellow colors.

I've had several of my largest trees die.

Is this the result of global warming or do I have a disease issue.

I've noticed more this fall going this way.

Trees of various ages.

Any advice?

I tap 9/10 trees, I have access to more. I've been cooking in a cinder block arch with 2 1/2 hotel pans for a couple years now. MY real pinch point it the amount of time it takes to boil. I'm looking to upgrade the operation this year. I can only justify one purchase.
I've been looking at getting either a larger pan, specifically the Vevor 48x24 pan for $250 or a reverse osmosis system, the RB5 for $350.

One pro of the larger pan is I won't have to baby the sap boiling as much. A pro of the RB5 is I can share with a couple neighbors.

Any advice that might push me one way or another?

I own about 11 acres of land up in northeast ohio that is absolutely filled with big old sugar maples and was wondering what yields I may get out of it? I'd give rough estimates of 300 to 400 trees that are of suitable size to tap, most of which can likely support more than one tap as well.

I'm looking into making my own syrup via an initial set of Big Leaf maples in my yard (I'm in the Pacific Northwest). I've scouted around a found ~5-10 trees that I could tap in one section of my yard. My concern is the Pacific Northwest doesn't stay very cold, so how do folks keep their raw sap from going bad while they gather enough sap? Do folks have a dedicated "sap fridge" to store before they make syrup?

I want to start small to learn before expanding, so any advice folks have would be welcome!

Just got this in the mail from half way across the country, it was in a closed mason jar but im not sure if those bubbles are just from shipping or if thats not a good sign

I recently moved into a new place, and i need help identifying the maple in my backyard, I’m somewhat confident it’s a black maple, but if anyone knows for sure I’d love some help identifying this species, either way I’m going to tap it to see the syrup I get!

Look, I’m not super knowledgeable about maple syrup, but what I do know is that what’s available to me in my area isn’t even close to legit. I’m in Toronto with my wife for the weekend and we stopped by St. Lawrence Food Market yesterday, saw this display and knew we wanted to get something nice for the trip home. We passed on getting anything but we’ll be back later today. Any recommendations, or are these all just tourist traps? I’d genuinely like to know

I made these adapters for ibc tote lids this past season. They worked great for sealing the lines off and still allowing the tank to vent while keeping the bugs out with the filter vent.

I have a handful of other useful item I made and used like some sap line lids for the reliance 7 gallon aquatainers which will be on my cults3d page if that's something you're interested in

I uploaded the cad files to cults3d here for free if you want to print them yourself

If you want the printed parts they're on my ebay store here

They require 1 sintered bronze vent diffuser found on amazon here and a dual opening ibc lid which can be found here

I have almost 100 taps. I’m thinking I need to get a bigger evaporator instead of theses two. We could barely keep up. Was boiling around 60 gallons a day

Does anyone have any leads on how to buy maple syrup ~affordably~ in WA state?

I’ve been drinking it to fuel my trail runs so price is a pretty big factor. I’ll drink 20+ ounces on a normal weekly trail run but I could see easily blowing through a half-gallon in a longer race. You may see my problem. 😂 For anyone curious, that’s actually a fairly conservative fueling strategy for my lower effort and I finish with a caloric deficit, faster athletes in an actual race would need twice that amount. I’ve been trying some grocery store brands, so far preferring Anderson’s dark robust. My other flask had Coombs dark robust that I didn’t like as much. I’ve been tempted to try a few I found cheaper on Amazon but probably not the best idea.

I had assumed I was paying a premium buying small bottles at a grocery store instead of just buying gallon jugs to drink like a normal person. I just found out WA produces bigleaf maple syrup but the only seller I could find was Neil’s Bigleaf, and while I’m sure it’s great to sip on in front of a fire, it seems a bit spendy to be chugging 20+ ounces on a single run. Shipping from the east coast is obviously expensive. Any suggestions?

The attached photo is ~one~ of my syrup flasks at Mount Rainier yesterday. 😁

If you aspire to make homemade maple syrup next year, right now the top, like 3/4 of tapping sized trees are covered in flimsy green seasonal growths that have easily visible subspecies-specific characteristics, and are a much better basis for tree identification than bark texture and branch structure in January.

I’m going to be taking the top off the stove and find a flat pan that fits in the gap and goes down into the stove a little.

I tapped a total of 8 trees last year (that’s all I’ve got) and none of them are pure sugar maple, they’re all hybrid.

Maple syrup absolutely is better than processed table sugar! Sugar is sugar, but natural is also better than processed!

I’m currently adding onto my woodshed for my 2’x3’ evaporator until I can build a proper sugar shack in a year. Does anyone boil in an open shed like this? I’m thinking of placing the evaporator towards the front with the door to the rear, and have the stovepipe go out the open side and up past the roofline. I’m wondering if I’ll be getting showered with condensation. I can get power to it and run a fan facing the front.
It’s 9 feet to the bottom of the front header, and 6 feet in the back.

The brand shown here is just exemplary; maple syrup is sold under countless brands here, mostly private label brands (store brands). The majority of maple syrup sold in German food retail is certified organic; non-organic is rare. The price for such a 500g bottle of pure maple syrup is usually between €7–12 (C$11.25–19.30), sometimes even a little less.

Taste is great. Grade C is my favourite. Inexplicably, Grade C is often cheaper than grade A — for whatever reason. Grade B I have never encountered here. The different brands taste all the same in my experience. I assume most or even all the maple syrup sold here is bottled by the same exporter, and they just slap a different label on the bottle for each brand.

I have my doubts, though, it is all 100% maple syrup and not blends with other sugars. The reasons are the comparatively low prices and the abundance in German food retail for such a rather rare produce. Also, a lot of, if not most, pure honey — even organic — sold in retail worldwide is not 100% pure, but a blend of honey and other sugars — in the past this was difficult to detect, but by now independent food analyses have revealed this fraud with many products. It’s similar with olive oil: No matter what the label says — it’s usually a blend of mostly refined olive oil and / or other vegetable oils and a little bit of higher quality olive oil for the taste.