Wait no longer!   The mild weather, perfect for the sap to flow, came to a screeching halt with lows in the single digits and highs in the 20's.  This gave us the opportunity to focus our attention on bottling.  Today we bottled Grade A dark amber syrup in plastic pints, quarts, half-gallons and gallons.  Grade B syrup, which has a more robust flavor, is available in quarts and gallons. Our order page will be updated shortly.

The Somerskogen plastic containers are BPA free, recyclable and easy to ship (less expensive and they don't break!). The jugs are made specifically for the maple industry to preserve the unique flavor of our maple syrup.

Sap flows on Friday and Saturday were very strong.  There was a strong freeze Friday night with a nice warmup to about 46 degrees on Saturday.  The trees have finally awakened from their winter freeze and the sap flowed quickly all day and night.  Sunday morning we woke up to our 800 gallon bulk tank being completely filled with flow from the overnight hours, which is nearly unprecedented.  This means that we collected over 1 gallon of sap per taphole overnight.  Overnight temperatures stayed in the mid-30's, keeping the sap lines open.  Usually the sap will not keep flowing without both freezing and thawing but we think that since this is the first strong warm spell, the sap kept flowing.  So far we have collected over 2000 gallons of sap and processed much of it into syrup.  The syrup is a very tasty, dark amber.  

The 670 taps have been installed this year, but we haven't made a drop of syrup yet.  A cool (cold) start to the season has us waiting for the first big sap flow.  The weather forecast for this upcoming week looks promising, so we anticipate using the reverse osmosis machine for the first time, followed soon after by an increased rate of syrup production.  

The ideal weather for maple sap flow involves a quick warm up in the morning from about 20 degrees to a temperature in the mid 40s.  Sunday evening until Monday should give us those good flow conditions.  If you look at the weather from Monday until Wednesday, it doesn't look like there will be a very strong freeze, so the sap should stay fluid in the trees.  With the aid of a vacuum pump, we should be able to collect sap on those days as well.  If we didn't have a vacuum pump, it is likely that the sap would not flow much on its own.

Mound, MN (55364) Weather

Updated: Mar 12, 2011, 9:45am CST

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Today Mar 12

Sun 13

Mon 14

Tue 15

Wed 16

Few Snow Showers / Wind	Partly Cloudy	Partly Cloudy	Few Showers	Mostly Sunny
26°F	30°	40°	47°	49°
High	High	High	High	High
11°	18°	37°	31°	40°
Low	Low	Low	Low	Low
Chance of Snow: 30%	Chance of Precip: 10%	Chance of Precip: 10%	Chance of Rain: 30%	Chance of Precip: 10%