Last fall we posted twice about our new pumphouse and new vacuum pumps. Here are a few pictures of the double pumps installed at our Roemer and Brass road properties.

We ended up running dual pumps while tapping. This doubled our vacuum from ~5-10 to 10-20″ on the days we were drilling. We then left all of the pumps on for the initial leak check pass, taking our vacuum from ~18 to 23″. After most of the leaks were plugged we found that we could turn one pump off and still maintain 24-26″.

In addition to the improved vacuum levels, having the extra pumps ready to go completely eliminated downtime due to equipment failures. This year we had two burnt out motors (they were initially bought used and in unknown condition), a bad bearing, plus we overfilled a gearbox with oil, yet we always had a pump running!

What a year 2024 has been! We’re currently pulling spouts and tying up loose ends. Here are some highlights from our 9th season

• 68 days, January 15th – April 1st. Second longest season (2018 went 89 days with two extended freeze ups)
• Most sap ever collected, beat our previous best in 2023 by 13%.
• Sugar content down 13% from last year, and down 21% from our high in 2021
• Tied for most syrup produced. We still have to get the last bit out of the evaporator tomorrow, but we’re pretty certain we’re within a barrel or two of last year
• Retapped ~2/3rds of our trees mid-March. Increased total sap by ~25%

Thanks to our incredible team, none of this would be possible without everyone’s hard work!

We’re still going strong despite the warmest season we’ve ever had! While the freeze on the 10th did fill the trees with sap, our tap holes were too far gone to collect a meaningful amount. With a decent long term weather forecast coming, we decided to re-tap around 2/3rds of our trees from the 12-15th. Since then we’ve had two good runs with another one coming this evening. We’re definitely making commercial syrup at this point. Mondays boil had a sour sap off taste, but we boiled 12 ounces of concentrate Tuesday night and the sour sap taste was replaced with a slight buddy flavor. The color also disappeared, late season sap is usually more acidic which prevents some of the caramelization chemical reactions from taking place while boiling.