The Brown Ghosts

Posted on June 6, 2024June 7, 2024 by Greg Washburn

June has crept upon us and there’s been lots going on! Writing hasn’t been one of those things though! I am so busy living life and doing things that I never write about those things in the present recently. But playing catch-up is a great way to reflect on the weeks that have sped past! May turned out to be an activity filled month that’s for sure! It’s important to note that the final day of April was spent trolling for brown trout on Lake Ontario with my friend Gary and his son. It’s pretty much a full day commitment and a long drive but super fun! We went a couple of times and came home with some nice fish on each occasion. The brown trout were tasty to a degree but will never become my favorite! I much prefer perch and walleye! But that’s another story altogether! Something much tastier would soon be filling our days!

I spent part of the first day of May working at the IRLC Ferrone Preserve with a friend and former coworker. We were joined by a fellow (Win) who had recently been hired by IRLC. One of his jobs is to develop a trail system on the 100 acre parcel that was donated to the land trust a couple years ago. It’s a very unique piece of property that’s a little unusual for the Town of Macomb. It resembles land that sits across Black Lake in the Hammond area. There are several very interesting features there that will be featured in a post at some point. For now I will leave a picture of one of the rock formations!

We had received a decent amount of rain in April. The muskrats had added to their huts several times ahead of large rain events. An interesting phenomenon that I sometimes write about here.May began with some increasingly warmer temperatures so I decided to start looking for some morels. I had been sent a photo of some small morels that a friend had found in the Waddington area on May first. I was curious to see if any were out yet in Macomb so I went out for a little scouting mission. I went to a location that had yielded some in 2023 and began finding a few! It was on! Definitely time to search in earnest!

I searched several areas but most of those I found came from the one location. But that never means much when the season is just starting. I picked a few leeks to add to my foraging adventure and cleaned my prizes for dinner! Yum! Zane would join me in the hunt a couple days later and our searching brought in a decent amount of fresh morels! We also foraged chives and more leeks. Zane made a chive and leek dip that we ate with crackers. Strong but delicious! I used the morels to top off grilled cheese burgers. They were so incredibly good!

I stayed busy that week sawing a few pine logs and putting lumber away to dry. I spent more time gathering a few morels that I usually ate with my dinner but I put a few in the fridge to save. Amy was coming down that Friday to forage with me for a couple days and I wanted to be sure to have some for her to try. It was nice to be getting some salvage logs done and taking time to enjoy the morel season while living at the farm. There were numerous other things that needed my attention as well and the days flew! I scouted out a section of ridge below a spot where I had found 14 morels one afternoon and was happy to see some nice big blondes there! I decided to use them as a training mission to get Amy accustomed to finding them. When she arrived I wasted no time getting her onto the morels! She took right to the foraging and found the big blondes easily. We hit some other locations before heading back to prepare them for dinner that evening. We found over 20 morels before stopping and we still would have all day Saturday to forage!

Saturday would find us up on my friend Gary’s property and we began finding morels shortly after we started searching. We hit the sections of woods around his meadows until about noon when it began raining rather hard. Our morning count was around 49. Back at the Homestead we washed and prepped our finds.Insects love to move inside the mushrooms! Especially ants!We got our rain soaked apparel dried out by the wood stove. We would eventually find another twenty something morels that afternoon before dinner. Morel cheeseburgers were again the main course and I soon realized how many morels I had cooked that week! Amy set some aside to take home to dehydrate for winter. We had been very successful! Life was good!

I didn’t know it at the time but that Saturday would be the end of morel season for us. It was time to take the sawmill up to my friend’s in Winthrop that Monday and the next weekend was a travel weekend. But we had been so very successful overall! Our final season count totaled around 173 morels! A couple dozen had been left in the forest to rot as we had found them too late to salvage them. And just like that the search for the brown ghosts of the forest concluded. But we had made special memories! MOONTABS as you already know. There’s nothing like the search for them really. Brush and ticks never seem to deter us! Amy actually found a tick on herself when she hit the shower that Saturday night. Luckily barely imbedded in her skin.It all seems like a blur now and it was only one month ago! But we have lived busy lives during that month. That’s how I choose to live in these days of retirement. Always moving and pushing forward. The time of the morels was not missed fortunately. It was a time that I thoroughly enjoyed! Eating morels about 6 times in one week! Cooking outside in the outdoor kitchen whenever possible. Life on the Homestead is rewarding and full. Each day full of promise and hope. It is enough!

The Comfortable Orbit

Posted on March 24, 2024April 3, 2024 by Greg Washburn

The sugar season continues to creep along. As of today we are still in a rather frozen set of days.Last week did not bring any significant sap runs.But it’s still been a memorable season. After our March 8th evaporator launch I would boil the remainder of the storage tank sap the next day. It ended up being a rainy, windy day so being inside was nice! I had company that day but that is a story outside of this one. Things show themselves here as the story gets written. I coaxed the evaporator along fairly briskly and we were rewarded with our first batch of the season! It was medium colored and very favorable! This photo pretty much it all.

It wasn’t a big boil that rainy day but there ended up being a couple batches to run off. We gathered the string again on Sunday with the help of Zane,Patrick Bourcy, and neighbors’s son and family.We made an arrangement to boil away the neighbor’s sap from their close to 90 taps. They had brought down about 90 gallons total that morning. The gather went quickly but there wasn’t a lot of sap really. I decided to boil what we had away as we still had plenty of time. A some pancakes entered the conversation and we got hungry thinking about them! So Zane ran to the cabin to grab everything we needed. A makeshift kitchen was set up and soon people were tying into hot pancakes with fresh hot syrup poured right on top! Yum!Some light snow was falling and the sugar house got a little with 7 people inside! My Uncle Art had showed up so that got us to 7.It was a fun and productive afternoon. The neighbor’s got about 2 gallons of syrup total out of their sap. It was all mixed with ours at that point but that didn’t matter as we knew their sap equaled 89 gallons.We finished with a small amount of syrup and were totally caught up for the moment. Floating along in the comfortable orbit of a launched syrup season. It’s a good place to be! The evaporator set up to batch out steady, lots of sugar wood , and well positioned with taps. Now we just needed the sap to run!

Monday would dawn sunny and clear but it stayed a little cool throughout the day. Zane helped me get firewood for the cabin cut and stacked. I was going to run out soon. By afternoon I had talked myself into setting more buckets up along the Long Narrow Meadow in a small section of big survivor maples known as part of the reserve. I was getting concerned about the smaller trees we’d tapped. It seemed like they were going to produce lightly. Some were running ok but others were just sitting there mostly idle. But we weren’t getting idle sugaring weather either. I ended up with an additional 31 bucket taps which I hoped would produce well and boast the sap intake. This put us to 535 taps totals across what had become a rather long string. My prediction still continued to be that it would take all those taps just to possibly get the syrup we needed to fill orders. Time would tell.

Tuesday would see us needing to do a full string gather after a nice frost overnight. The sap ran rather well overall but once again the smaller trees were underproducing. We brought in some 500 gallons of sap by dark. Zane and I decided to fire the evaporator to get a night boil on. He left after helping me get started so I had the night boil all to myself. Nothing new for me really after lots of it years ago. I made some decent syrup still within the Amber Rich grade but it was close to Dark Robust grade. I ended up finishing the sap the next day with a second boil.The sap wasn’t really doing all that much so the gather was postponed until Wednesday.

Pushing up on 418 gallons when right to the top.

Zane and I gathered the entire string on Wednesday. We got enough sap to get a boil on that ran well into the evening That pretty much tied up that entire day. Thursday was a day of catching on errands and that sort of thing. Friday morning would find me going up to grab the neighbor’s syrup and run it through the evaporator. I felt that the syrup was at the final cutoff for Dark Robust. I had a busy Friday planned!A couple days up over the blue line for an overnighter and a day outing which a friend who was quickly joining the MOONTABS journey. But that is another story for another time! There was sugaring to come but it wasn’t going to happen over the weekend. We would just need to wait and see! ✍️

I Have Launched!

Posted on March 18, 2024March 18, 2024 by Greg Washburn

I have a lot of fun comparing sugaring to space flight! Launching and orbiting show up as descriptive words as I tell my maple syrup stories.It is rather appropriate I feel as there’s tense moments that follow planning. Numerous things that can go wrong. If you read the Pre-launch blog post then you know that our tap count was at 504 by Thursday March 7th. We were well positioned and in a good place. Thursday night’s temperatures would give us a good run Friday and we did our first full string gather.We brought in over 400 gallons of sap and counting what we had gathered on Tuesday things had placed us in a “go for launch” position.

Zane dumping sap on the Great Northern Loop.

While we were gathering my thoughts were wandering a bit. I had a woman who was a new friend coming down to hang out in the sugar house for the day Saturday. Rain was likely but that wouldn’t be a problem. The big question was starting up the evaporator for the first time of the season could be bad if things went wrong. I made a sudden decision that we would boil as soon as possible after the gather. After a quick dinner,Zane and I would flood the evaporator. Always a tense moment as sometimes there are leaks. But things went well and despite a couple small drips in the back pan it was go for launch! I had Zane kindle the fire and light it. It was a slow start but the flames caught quickly and soon the fire was crackling fiercely. “More fire” I told Zane. “Get this rig chooching! Get us to escape velocity! Escape velocity to me is when the steam first begins to lift off the surface of the pan as we reach boiling point. I have always tried to make it a fun moment for him! And it is exciting! The fire roars and the noise of sap beginning to boil is loud until things level off. The pans echo and even shake a little. It always make me think of a spacecraft taking off! It’s a stressful moment on the pans as the fire takes them to a high temperature quickly. I continued to have Zane had wood to the firebox. Things were moving smoothly and all systems were functioning fine. Good sap depth in the pans, sap float working ok, and no leaks. We had gone under the lights by this point. So battery to inverter power was status: normal. Then the pivotal moment! The first threads of steam rising up through the overhead flap doors. We had achieved escape velocity!

After that things settled into a comfortable routine. Getting the evaporator set up to produce syrup on the first boil takes time. The whole evaporator starts out with 💯 raw sap. As steam leaves the evaporator things begin to change. I doubted that we would get syrup the first night and we didn’t. We boiled for a few hours and I knew my special Saturday would be much easier for me to manage because of getting started that evening. I stood in the rising steam lost to the beauty of the moment. Here we were again. Another season pushing the tired iron. Pushing ourselves. The season had truly launched! I had truly launched!✍️

Maple Syrup 2024: Pre-Launch

Posted on March 11, 2024March 11, 2024 by Greg Washburn

It’s funny how things that might have been the focus of my recent anxiety can quickly disappear.When I last posted I was preparing to hike St.Regis Mountain with a couple friends but was a little hung up on the upcoming syrup season. The hike and the good company of my friends would shake off the ghosts that day! We had an excellent time and the rain would hold off until we had finished our trek! It was super windy at the top and scary up in the fire tower! It’s a hike worthy of its own post really!

As for the remainder of my time in Saranac Lake it too is worthy of its own post sometime! Certain things were happening in a strange twist of fate and my response to the moment and the energy would place me in a flow that was totally unexpected. I spent a cold Thursday at an event at the Wild Center in Tupper Lake. I truly enjoyed my company and walking around touring the facility. At the trout tank I had an interesting photo moment! There is a story coming that I will title: What The Fish Told Me.”I left for the valley on Friday March 1st with fully recharged mental batteries.Ready to tackle my problems and my hesitation about sugaring . March 1st is a tapping day typically but conditions were less then favorable. I wiped out miscellaneous details and got settled back into the cabin. Saturday was spent troubleshooting the tractor coolant issue. I found the problem quickly! A burst bypass hose on the new water pump. We had suspected it was pretty worn but the blowout confirmed it. I got online and ordered one. To date it still hasn’t arrived! Regardless I decided to set taps on Sunday and began hanging out buckets alone. I was using the Honda side by side in place of the down tractor and it worked out well. It was pretty warm which made for comfortable tapping but didn’t thrill me with the fact that there were several super warm days coming. By days end I was way up to my neighbor’s property and had hung 150 buckets by myself! A start and a commitment.

Monday would find me tapping more with my friend Gary helping out. Tapping trees and sugaring in general was all new to him but he was totally enjoying himself! He’s very in tune with nature and finds the landscapes of Macomb fascinating. The two of us did well setting in buckets and mini tube runs up across the neighbor’s property on a string we call the “Great Northern Loop”. It’s a productive string typically and we had invested some time into building the tubing runs last year. Less buckets means easier gathers. The mini tube runs are removed after the season ends,labeled,washed, and stored away.We did a few buckets also close to the trail. We stopped for a hearty lunch of venison stew that I made with meat Gary had given me. Yum!.Afternoon would find us setting buckets and mini tube runs on the “Southern Loop” on my neighbor’s property. We had a decent day and got out 94 taps bringing the count to 244.Zane helped me get the storage tank in place in the sugar house that evening. We also had to get the evaporator pans in place plus the various pipes for the flow systems. Progress was being made and quickly!

Tuesday would Gary and I tapping on a section of my farm called the land. Buckets and mini tube runs on some big maples that survived the 2016/2017 tent worm/drought events. We also hung more buckets in miscellaneous locations along the string. The buckets that I had set Sunday had begun to fill with sap even though I considered the weather against it flowing. We used the side by side and plastic totes to do a sap gather that brought in over 100 gallons of clear sap! Not a bad start really as it was very warm! On Wednesday I went for groceries and fuel plus miscellaneous items needed for the week. I had contacted my tractor dealer Monday and had the hose I needed for the tractor expedited to their location where I picked it up. I tapped two big maples behind the barn that run mega amounts of sap most years. So with those 8 taps the count was at 358. A good number but the sap was not moving much still. I went under the lights and replaced the bad water pump bypass hose. I then proceeded to flush the coolant system with vinegar per Mike The Mechanics recommendation. It appeared that my tractor repair was successful! I went to bed rather beat but feeling like things were coming together.

Thursday would see my good friend Patrick Bourcy helping me set more taps! Remember him? He’s the creator of the Facebook group Just Go Outside and shows up in many of my blog posts. We did a variety of buckets on the growing string and mini tube taps on the ridge called Green Mountain. Our count for the day was 146 bringing our grand total to 504 taps. We were in a good place and as I stood on the top of Green Mountain a stiff cool breeze from the north would boost my spirits even further. A frost was coming that night and with all the good fresh taps we had a shot at a decent sap run! The work might just pay off!

And just like things began to change for me! Gone was the decision whether we should tap at all! We had! Gone was the anxiety about the tractor issues. It was fixed! Sure it had other issues but it was useable! I felt a rising energy within myself. Sure there was still plenty that could go wrong but we were trying to have a sugaring season and that meant everything! It didn’t matter now how things turned out. The weather was out of our control but the long range forecast was somewhat encouraging.Things were beginning to ramp up and what I was feeling was nothing new. Pre-launch is a “sit on the edge of your seat moment” like no other. A time when you question why you weren’t better prepared and ready. But such thoughts don’t help out at all. It’s best to just keep moving forward! So we will!And we do! Each and every year as our annual hobby arrives on the tail end of winter. Albeit a strange winter this year but there’s no changing that. We will make the best of everything and do our best. It’s a simple place of stubborn perseverance and resolve. The MOONTABS will tally up and we no doubt experience a most unique sugaring season. But it will not have been missed or canceled. That would be somehow wrong to me. After all someone once said: there are but a finite number of syrup seasons in a person’s lifetime. Who would write such a serious but truthful quote? Someone who values life and rural heritage perhaps. Someone who loves their hobby with a passion that borders on madness. Someone who loves to create things. Someone who knows that sugaring drives the hands and engages all 5 senses and the 6th as well. I think you know who wrote the quote. The inner voices whisper at times and fuel the inner spirit. The farm property is a place of grounding and connection. The world begs explorations and adventures but I will always be drawn back to the dripping sap drops that follow frosty nights. There is a place of blissful happiness there. But first we must launch! Things are headed in that direction. More so each day now. It is enough.✍️

The Mow Dawg Returns:Part 2

Posted on October 8, 2023December 15, 2023 by Greg Washburn

Part one of this story only encompassed a short two day period! In the end a much larger story would write itself with a journey that almost seems surreal as I sit here in the campground in Cranberry Lake on a very chilly October morning! A stiff north borne wind continues to bring even more rain. It began raining Friday night and has not stopped really since then. But I am warm and dry in the Airstream. Comfortably content as I finish my maple syrup laced Keurig coffee! Today will be a day to catch up. On laundry.Cooking. And if the energy strikes my inner spirit the words will flow like the suddenly rain swollen streams and rivers here. The shift in the weather is truly amazing! The shift in myself equally so it seems. Life on the Adirondack clock is a remarkable experience no matter the weather. There is a balance that can be found for living and purposeful activities. So this is the now moment before I take you back to a warmer time and place!

This was yesterday. Today is much worse!

So in the previous story we had gotten about 300 bales off of one of my meadows on Saturday. I continued to set up my farm camp on Sunday. Monday was a tough day trying to get a bearing off the baler but we finally got it.We had a little rain on Monday night but as there was no hay down it was no big deal. The long range forecast was perfect for haying well into the following week. We got the baler back together Tuesday and the decision to mow down hay Wednesday was made. I met my uncle in the field the next day to ride along while he mowed so I could learn the tractor and the rotary mower. I had mowed plenty of hay years ago with my smaller hay bind and tractor but this set up was larger.My uncle mowed a couple sections of field and I said that I was ready to go on my own. I got behind the controls and told him I could handle it. He started to walk away then came back to the tractor. “ You are not the first person to ever tell me that and then something happened” he said. I replied: “I’ve got this! Don’t worry I will be super careful!” So just like that I became the mower of hay after years of not doing it. I took down both big sections of the main meadow near campsite. We had hay down now!

The next day I mowed again and the last two meadows on my farm were done. My uncle raked and baled up a few loads of hay that totaled about 570 bales. I stayed busy drawing wagons and started to unload the wagons. I was also mowing the hay away. We were beginning to make progress! It was decided that no more hay needed to be mowed until the following Monday. So we spent the remainder of the week getting my farm cleared off. I raked a little hay one day to speed things up as the evening dew was coming on early in September. I also used the Tedder which scatters the hay out to help it dry faster.

I had mowed my Long Meadow so it could be turned into bedding round bales. I tedded it and another small meadow by the road. I had taken the time to fill in some holes in the meadow with dirt so the equipment wouldn’t be damaged. The days went by quick! It was very sunny and warm so the hay was drying well. So hay was baled each day then drawn up to my uncle’s barn to be unloaded and mowed away. We averaged about 500-600 bales per day. By Saturday night most of the hay on my farm was done.

I was getting better at being a mow Dawg and made sure to wear a dust mask. The evenings finished about 8:30 pm after dark and I was beat! But we had accomplished a lot in a week for two guys. Sunday we went up to the next big set of fields we would be haying across Beaver Creek to mark out rocks and holes as I didn’t know the land given my own fields had been a problem. The good weather was staying with us and it looked like we would need to mow Monday.We identified several rocks and one giant hole with orange marker tape. I felt better having toured the fields.

So Monday I fueled up the tractor and greased the mower and set off to mow “The Big One”. A roughly 25 acre chunk of hay where we had scouted Sunday. I broke the field into sections and after 7 hours of steady mowing the field was down. I was beat but felt accomplished and successful as nothing was broken or damaged. My uncle had done a little round baling so there was no hay to handle. My farm was done and I was very happy about that! A night off!

Once again we had some serious hay down and it was decided to keep doing square bales. So I would be enduring a few more days of playing mow dawg. We were filling a new section of hay mow so it was easier to get loads into the barn. I was anxious to get the haying done as I still needed to prepare for my ADK trip. I was leaving Sunday! That Tuesday night after having tedded a part of the Big One I took the wheeler over to the next set of four hay fields that we would be haying.My friend lives right by one the fields so he helped me identify all the hazards like what had been done previously. I started mowing there on Wednesday and was visited by a hawk who was hunting mice in the freshly mown hay. The hawk got very close to the mower a couple of times and I saw it catch a couple mice. It got in front of the tractor one time and wouldn’t move! I was getting out of the tractor when it finally flew off.Two more meadows were down and drying.

So the cycle kept on going. I was drawing wagons from the fields with my Uncle’s truck due to the distance we had to travel. I did some more raking on Thursday and the bales kept coming. So did the nice weather. Friday I did my final day of mowing knocking down two more meadows. We were done with square bales so I was relieved! We had one final load of hay to unload and mow away. The Mow Dawg was free!

So that’s the story of how I spent two weeks of my life volunteering to help with hay! It was nice to hang with my Uncle Art and get my fields cleared as well as some others. It was nice to learn some new equipment also. I can’t say I didn’t enjoy myself either. Out on the land each day with the familiar scents of hay ground, tractors,and the bales themselves. We accomplished a lot in two weeks I feel. And I found the time to prepare for my trip. There’s going to be a lot of loose ends waiting for me in the valley when I return. But my battery is getting recharged here. Clearing the hay fields is important to the long term plans for the farm. But next summer is a long way off! ✍️

Frogging Around

Posted on July 16, 2023July 16, 2023 by Greg Washburn

Here it is the middle of July already! There’s been a lot going on lately and there’s not much of anything that follows a routine! Zane and I have taken some time for an old time rural heritage tradition here and it was well worth it! Frogging! It’s a type of hunting for many here who enjoy summer outdoor pursuits. I wanted Zane to know it was done since I haven’t taken to the summer swamps in many years. Hunting and fishing aren’t for everyone I realize. But I truly wish for Zane to experience as many hunting and gathering activities as I can show him.

Back from the swamp after a successful hunt.

Our target species were select large bullfrogs from a section of our wetlands that can be canoed. I had scouted the area days before and decided that we should should set aside other activities and go. I won’t go into graphic details of the hunt itself but will simply say we make every attempt to dispatch our targets humanely using a .22 caliber Ruger pellet gun. We pick our targets carefully as we only want the largest frogs. The smaller fogs will ensure that the wetlands will be populated by bigger bullfrogs in the future. We spotted numerous bullfrog tadpoles below the surface so that’s always an indication of a thriving ecosystem. The swamp in summer is a steamy,lush realm with cattails, aquatic weeds, and tall swamp grasses dominating the shallower sections. Leeches are plentiful and tipping the canoe over is ill advised! Small minnows can be spotted in the deeper sections as well. The bellowing bullfrogs compete for space on the weedy surface. We hunted for a couple hours to secure enough bullfrogs to make an adequate meal. Next came cleaning,washing, and chilling of the legs. I use a simple recipe for breading and cooking the frog legs. It uses a three step process of rolling the legs in white flour then dipping them into an egg bath. Next they are rolled in panko, cornmeal, crushed white saltine crumbs, or a mix of several of those ingredients depending on my preference that particular day. Pan fried outside in cast iron with super hot canola oil they are a wonderfully tasty meal! Yes they do taste like chicken!

Frying outside with the old propane stove that we deep fry fish with typically.

We shared some of our deep fried frog legs with our neighbor’s and invited a friend up as well since he never seems able to get any for himself. Zane was totally into the whole experience now so we went frogging again a few days later in a different spot. We once again secured a adequate amount of bullfrogs for a second meal which we also shared with others. We had been given a really nice largemouth bass while fishing a small remote lake with our Camp Edith neighbors so that was cleaned and fried up as well. Eating frog legs and fish isn’t for everyone but for country people who grew up with those things on the table it’s a welcome change from the routine meals of summer evenings.

Work on the farm campsite project took precedence this week and I made substantial progress on what I call “The rails”. Quite simply they are the support pier structure for the building that will be towed up onto them. Something I hope goes well as a lot is riding on the success of my engineering. Literally! The 6×6 piers are cemented in below what I consider the modern frontline

The next phase of the rail structure involves additional pressure treated planks and support bracing. There’s also some backfill work as well. Fortunately I had gotten the underground work completed in 2020 before abandoning the project because of work etc. The septic,waterline,and electrical are all in place to align with the building. There’s still plenty of work to be done! A noteworthy series of events occurred this week while I worked at the farm! Insects all always around me at the farm in the summer. Especially deer flies,horseflies,and mosquitoes. While I was fighting off droves of biting insects last week I was suddenly visited by some interesting green dragonflies. They are known as Eastern Pondhawks I later learned. An insect eating predator species. They hovered around me and covered some of my work surfaces. The biting insects disappeared although I didn’t notice it at first. There were times when the dragonflies even followed me around! It sounds crazy but I think they were an insect repellent of sorts. An ally if you will. We were sharing some sort of mutually beneficial experience. They certainly are beautiful and aerodynamic.

It’s funny how things happen sometimes. I was considering mowing the grass again around my work area as it was getting rather long. I had bush hogged it weeks ago once. But while working in front of the conex I noticed a honeybee! I hadn’t seen one this year so far at the farm. One turned out to be many! They were busy pollinating the clover and other blossoms where the second growth had regrown in the mowed areas. I decided to postpone mowing again for awhile. The longer grass doesn’t bother me since the black snakes and I have reached an unspoken agreement! They have been avoiding my busy work areas and I have been avoiding the barn. A shaky truce exists it seems. Shaky is the perfect word seeing as I am so afraid of them!

I was going to mention yesterday’s adventure but I feel it deserves it’s own post so will leave it for now! Sorry for the gaps in posting! I get very involved in all sorts of things. Some are very personal and of a family nature that I choose not to share. Life happens and time changes our family members. Health and circumstance come to the forefront at times. The rollercoaster rides of emotion can take precedence over creativity but there’s always a lesson to be learned. Always a chance to make a difference when we take the time to embrace compassion and respect others situations. As to where nature connects to the aging of our bodies and of those we love it must be given time to show itself in each unique experience. Time is the great changer of all for mortal life forms. To find our place within the timelines and attempt to understand the natural order of things is a goal of sorts. A milestone on a journey where happy memories join the sad ones and realizations must be faced. It’s nothing to be negative about really. One must simply accept certain things. Acceptance can make our hearts ache but there is strengthening peace in the past. Photos and memories of other days where we were and still are part of someone’s life journey. They will ultimately leave us. As we will ultimately leave others. It is the natural order of all life. To live our best lives is a worthy goal. To make this day something more then average if possible. And what is average anyway? Time to stop as I am heading to the forests of “Tazmania”. It will make sense eventually. Consider that a promise of sorts! MOONTABS are waiting to add to the collections.✍️

Catching Up

Posted on June 5, 2023June 5, 2023 by Greg Washburn

Spring is quickly beginning to feel more like summer recently! Last weeks hot spell was a little much as temperatures hit very close to 90 degrees! The two hottest days just happened to coincide with the two I was working on a construction project at Fort Drum. Brutal and energy sapping is a pretty good description!

There’s been quite a bit of work done around the farm recently. I finished the neighbor’s logs and the rest of my own salvage logs. The timbers that will be used for moving the wood shed are done and waiting to be installed. I got my neighbor’s 3400 Ford tractor started finally and used the wood splitter up on the warehouse landing to split up some of the stack of blocks leftover from last winter. There’s still a lot of work to be done to ever clear the landing. It probably won’t happen until fall now. It’s getting late to be messing around with firewood.

Living at Camp Edith is handy given the short drive to the farm. Returning one evening I got to see one fox kit out hunting with one of its parents! Fun to watch before they disappeared into the tall grass. I wrote a funny Facebook post about the foxes allegedly getting my sister’s chickens last summer. I imagined a criminal case where I represented the foxes as their attorney and even a courtroom scene! I should try and copy it and get it onto this page! People found it entertaining and I had a lot of fun writing it!

I spent one Sunday burning a brush pile and cleaning up a huge dead maple across the main meadow next to the Long Narrow meadow. I worked for hours trying to get everything burned up. I also cleaned up a couple of fallen trees that were sticking into the meadows. I hope to connect the two meadows together in time for ease of maintenance and actual haying. There’s quite a few rocks to remove and some rather labor intensive grading to do as well. Getting rid of the big tree was a big improvement to my view as I constantly noticed it and considered it an eyesore. The wood wasn’t worth salvaging so burning was a great alternative. The remains of my fire smoldered for several days but there was no danger of it spreading anywhere.

I spent some time later that week ripping up some invasive wild honeysuckle and clearing the trails along the high ground above the gap. The trails had become impassable.Blocked by fallen trees of all sizes it took me awhile to get them open again. I salvaged a porcupine damaged pine tree into a 26 foot long log that I skidded to the landing. I needed it for a project that I planned to do with Zane that Saturday.It was time to further his farm education in a real time practical sense. It involved me teaching him to run the sawmill to create lumber we would need for our project. It doesn’t get anymore practical then that!

If you’ve followed my Run Of The Mill posts then you already know much of my history of being an amateur sawyer and woodman. I felt it was time for Zane to become a fourth generation Washburn sawyer. With our new gravity log loader frame and sawmill in place there would never be a better time. We cut the 26 foot pine log into 3 pieces to maximize yield. The taper of a long log can really hurt your yield overall. We settled for a stocky 8 footer,a slim 10 footer, and a very crooked 8 footer from the top of the tree. The goal was simple: fill our small lumber order that we needed for our build that day. We needed 8 foot boards and a few 2×4’s. I helped Zane develop the “cants” that would make that happen. He caught on quickly and learned the saw scale that’s attached to the mill on craft his lumber.He was very proud of his accomplishments and said he truly enjoyed sawing lumber! It was a proud and happy moment for me! After log 3 we were finally caught up with all our saw logs! There was nothing left on the landing.

The project where we would use the lumber was behind the sugar house. Years ago we had built a lean-to there to hold 275 gallon bulk storage sap containers. We used them for a few years but once I retired I was always able to keep up with the boiling so we never needed them anymore. Zane and I decided to turn the lean-to into a storage area for all our sap buckets and misc. Once completed with walls and a door we could lock it up. So after framing in the door opening with 2×4’s we had just sawn, we sided it with the boards we had also just sawn. It was a good lesson for Zane and he was thrilled that we had made the lumber we needed to get our small job done!

The final thing we needed was a door. I had told Zane that we would repurpose the single door that was on my Father’s old woodshed when we were building our rough opening for the lean-to door. We would also salvage its roller track runner. No hinges would be needed. The upcoming woodshed improvements phase out the old single door so it would live on in a new location. Everything went well and we closed out the day at that point.All we needed was a hasp and lock to finish the job.

While we were at the sugar house I could hear the phoebes in the trees nearby. I went inside to check on the nest and there were 4 baby birds inside.The phoebe nests in this spot every spring.Pretty neat to know that the sugar house provides a safe nesting location for the birds!

Since then it’s been all about doing some work for our friend as a side project and getting back onto the commercial job site at Fort Drum last week. Zane and I cut up all the slab wood from the saw logs Saturday. It’s now inside drying out for next sugaring season. Along with some odds and ends I managed to get done. Little by little it will add up although we will probably end up needed to cut more next fall. This is going to be a busy summer. We started our next project late Saturday afternoon. It’s a challenging one! The moving of the old woodshed to a new location in the sugarbush. It all started with cleanup of old bark that covered a big section of its floor. Shoveled into the tractor’s loader bucket it was easy to dump onto a future burn pile. Sections of the floor were rotted so they were added to the burn pile as well. Next we began jacking up the structure and blocking it in place. That’s where we left off by Saturday night. Much more to do!

Saving the woodshed is not a new idea for me. Three summers ago I brought power to it as well as our recovered underground water line that goes out to the old spring. I had planned to convert the building into a combination bath house,laundry, and kitchen area. But the feasibility of the build was not really sensible.But I had no desire to tear down the woodshed as it was basically sound except for the floor aand foundation.Not to mention my Father had built it so I wanted to preserve it. Having a woodshed is handy and functional at the farm property. We use the old granary for a woodshed at the moment. The bath house project will be revealed once we begin on it.For now we will focus on getting the woodshed moved. Watch for it!

Jacking it up with a “Bulldog” farm Jack. 8000 lb capacity.

So this sort of catches you up to our recent activities! There’s no exciting adventures or mountain hikes. No camping or fishing. Just hours of tedious manual labor that will eventually usher in a new chapter of farm living. It will see the completion of the camper hookup site. Winter bathroom facilities and much more. But we’ve taken time to enjoy morel hunting. Cooking meals and desserts at Camp Edith. Day to day details of the sort that most of us engage in. I have been reading more and have watched no Tv here at camp. I took the time to do a little maintenance mowing with the bush hog at the farm as well. There’s always something to and something to fix. That’s the price of owning buildings and property. But Zane’s excited at our new progress and where it’s all headed. Follow our projects and don’t worry! There’s plenty of upcoming adventures planned. Upgrading the farm property is long overdue so it’s time!

The Thrill Of The Mill

Posted on May 19, 2023May 19, 2023 by Greg Washburn

We are just warming up again today after a cold snap of several days where the wind stayed in the north. I had to bring additional firewood from the farm twice to make Camp Edith warm enough to stay here. Wednesday night the temperatures dropped to 30 degrees! Pretty chilly for mid May.Fortunately we always seem to have an abundance of firewood to choose from at the farm. Up on the warehouse landing there was a nice selection of split mixed lengths and sizes. It was a good time to use up some of that mixed collection as I am hoping to clean up the landing later this year. It’s gotten rather messy. So I brought back smalls,weirds,and low grade pieces we call devil’s rejects. Weirds are quite simply odd shaped chunks that don’t stack well. Smalls are short chunks. Funny how we have our own lingo for firewood!

I recently got back to work on a project that Zane and I started almost two years ago. The side hill just below the log landing was a perfect location to build a gravity log loading platform for the sawmill. First I brought in some sandy roadside dirt the town had given me to level the sawmill site. Then I dragged up an old power pole that the power company had abandoned behind the barn to construct the main runner of the log loader system. I attached one end to a huge hickory tree as an anchor point and built piers out of cement blocks for the other supports. I even utilized a tree stump that I had saved for one of the supports. It should last for quite a few years hopefully.

I then backed the sawmill up parallel to the main runner and lifted it to remove the wheels that make it portable. I got it all leveled into place eventually and stationary on its six posts. This is tricky when working alone but I used the tractor’s loader for the heavy work. A small hydraulic bottle jack works well for fine tuning and leveling. I was making progress and quit for the day after spending several hours to reach that point.

The next step involved skidding in another salvaged power pole that would be sawn into planks for the perpendicular runners.Shorter five feet long 3×4’s would be sawn for the removal planks that enable the logs to be rolled onto the mill. I modeled my design after the one my father and I had built years ago at another property. In time we had added a building over top of the sawmill there and it was a nice set up to work under rain or shine! Not to mention a nice place to store the mill under cover. But before I could saw I needed to get the mill running as it has sat idle since last summer. I had bought a new sale priced battery so that was a plus. While connecting the battery I noticed that the squirrels had been chewing on some of the wiring and had chewed a small hole in the gas tank! Damn rodents and their destructive habit of chewing everything. I taped up the damaged wires as best I could. I then choked the engine and turned the key. The mill started almost immediately! I warmed it up some before ramping it up to full throttle. What a sweet noise and things were going well! I did notice some organic debris flying out of the engine compartment and fished a few pieces out but saw nothing to concern me. I managed to get all the planks sawed out from the salvaged power poles before stopping again for the day.

The next time I was at the farm I got the planks in place but lacked the 6” nails I needed to secure them. Not concerned I rolled a log onto the mill and got started with the making of my neighbor’s lumber. I did a second log but started being harassed by a bumblebee who seemed intent on getting inside the engine compartment. I soon learned that there was a nest inside and although only one bee was after me I could hear others inside buzzing away. The engine smelled a little hot also. It was time to rethink the whole situation. I built a crib to stack the lumber on to get it “stickered” up so it would dry properly. Lumber stacked on lumber will mold and a stain known as gray rot will discolor the lumber. Ants also love to occupy us stickered lumber piles. The crib took a little time to build but not knowing when my neighbor was planning on using the lumber it drove my decision to build it.

The cribbed lumber on 1×1 stickers.This was day two of sawing lumber.

The cool morning Thursday prompted me to dissemble the sawmill engine compartment. Easy with a socket set as there were only 8 bolts to remove. The bumblebees were silent so that was a plus. Upon removing the engine compartment shroud I discovered a large bees nest! I pulled most of it out in one piece and the bees began to buzz in earnest! I tossed it onto the ground and gave it a good stomping. Next I lit it on fire with my blowtorch. Mission accomplished! I finished cleaning out the remainder of the nest being sure to burn it as well. I also found a separate mouse nest that I removed and added to the smoldering honeycomb from the bees nest. Inside the engine compartment I found more chewed wires that I taped up. I reassembled the engine compartment after doing a thorough cleaning and inspection. Now I could actually start sawing again. Delays like this are quite often a daily occurrence around the farm so it’s best to just shrug it off and move forward. Nature sure does challenge all we create!

I quickly settled into sawing logs after that. I had fastened the planks down on Wednesday having purchased some 6” spikes from a local lumber yard. The gravity log loader system was a success and I used the tractor to set up the row of logs that would be rolled forward onto the mill. I was feeling pretty good at this point and glad that things were going smoothly. The mill was running smoothly and I lost myself to the task at hand to the roar of the 25 horsepower Robins Subaru engine. My hearing protection is a necessity as is eye protection. The slab wood was tossed over onto the tractor loader forks so it could easily be transported to outside the sugar house a short distance away. The plan had finally come together! Everything was in place to work quickly and efficiently. I lacked but one thing: a tailer. A tailer handles the slab wood and the finished lumber so the sawyer can keep the mill cranked up and making lumber. Zane will soon be working as my tailer and as my apprentice sawyer. He wants to learn the craft of making lumber. I often think of sawing lumber as creating and I will explain shortly.

Slab wood headed to the sugar house pile to be cut up later.

By late afternoon I was beginning to feel glimmers of fatigue. Our saw mill is very manual. It uses hydraulics for the blade tensioner only. Everything else gets done by hand. Rolling the logs on is done manually. Rotating the logs also manual. Manual raising and lowering head blocks. Head blocks hold the logs in place and must be adjusted several times while sawing a log. The log leveler rollers are also manual. As are the “dogs”. The dogs hold the log or cant firmly so it can’t move around. The high speed blade can easily break if a log gets loose. As for the “head” itself it consists of a frame, the engine, belts, pulleys,debark wheel, and the measurement gauge. Our mill uses a wheel and track head system to feed the blade into the log. The operator manually controls the feed rate by pushing the head assembly forward. It’s a very effective way to control cuts and minimize making poor lumber. There’s all sorts of further information about the mill itself but I feel that readers might find it boring. Suffice it to say that the Brubacher saw mill designers really put some thought into this small, portable band saw mill! Perhaps a instructional video some day might be in order!

A small white pine cant that just made 10 2×6’s. Note the track system that the head assembly rides along.

Making lumber is a wonderful workout for the upper body! The legs get some walking in but the upper body really does the most work. I like the bullish nature of such things and my mind will detour from worrisome meandering as I focus on the task at hand. There’s plenty of opportunities for injury so focus is a good word truly.As for the logs themselves they are truly unique. Tapered and sometimes crooked. The sawyer must read the log to make the most lumber from it. Mistakes are final in regards to dimensions as well after a cut is made. I was a little rusty at first but my mind soon entered the zone of kerfs and scales. The bandsaw blade makes an 1/8th inch cut each time. Kerf it’s called. The scale rule on the head allows for that kerf automatically as it’s built into the scale. Random cuts though involve adding the kerf to each measurement. Forget the kerf and the sawyer makes inferior non dimensional lumber. It’s easy once you train your mind to the process.Working in 1/8th increments isn’t too difficult after all.

The logs headed towards the mill on the gravity log loader. The short planks span the final 5 feet. Removed once a log is rolled onto the mill.

Getting set up finally on the farm for log sawing is a great accomplishment for me! Our location should provide years of efficient and save sawing. Of course I now have been thinking about a saw mill building to cover the location similar to the one we once had at our former home several miles away. Oh what a location that was! Acres upon acres of white pine to cull and utilize. But life happened and we moved to the farm property after our father’s unexpected death. We couldn’t hold all the property. Simple finances ruled the moment. That story is blended into these blog pages here and there. Perhaps redundant but redundancy can represent the importance of certain things I feel provided it’s not over done. It’s all connected this journey of mine regardless of where you jump into the stories. Backwards,forwards, and in the present. One event linked to another in a chain of events. Nature always near the forefront. Rural heritage learned and shared as it should be. It is a story of blood,sweat, and tears. Ordinary that sometimes becomes extraordinary. I don’t always know where the journey leads or what exactly comes next. I do know that when I embrace the push bar of the sawmill and crack the throttle I will be rewarded with fragrant sawdust in tune with a racing saw blade while the engine roars with powerful purpose. I’ve spent hours locked in these moments and the memories play like movies from the past. It’s never just sawing lumber. It is something far greater. For what limits what could be built or created with such a useful piece of machinery? What might rise on the farm property that could insure its legacy and that of mere individuals? As too why are we even sawing logs for our neighbor? That’s entirely another story. Yet to be told as it’s not finished. And time passes with every season and a sense of urgency sometimes stirs up the spirit energy. Not going there tonight.✍️

The Mysterious Morels

Posted on May 14, 2023February 28, 2024 by Greg Washburn

It’s a chilly May morning here at Camp Edith and the first thing I did this morning was light the wood stove! I just moved in full time on Thursday but hadn’t needed any heat. But the wind shifted to the north yesterday and despite the sunny skies the temperature began to drop. I piled on extra blankets last night and it paid off as it was 57 degrees inside this morning.

Spring is moving right along and we’re as busy as ever post sugaring season. We still have some clean up to do and lots of sugar wood to cut for next season. I don’t always get as much done as I want sometimes when I get caught up in the myriad of life’s small details. Perhaps I dwell too much on forward progress. But the seasons pass quickly and a comfortable balance must be struck. We manage to spend plenty of time outdoors and that’s never considered anything but positive. Zane will soon graduate high school and his future plans suddenly enter the mix in a newer sense of reality. But that’s another story for another day. It’s a story tied to my future and my own plans ultimately connected to nature. Almost intimidating at times. A journey of unknowns and possibilities. Time will sort it out. One day at a time.

What’s all this got to do with morels? Plenty! The hunt for them began last Saturday in earnest.Too early people were saying but we had scored big time May 4th 2021 so I decided that May 6th was worth a try. So off we went after changing the oil in the Honda side by side. A post sugaring task that was overdue. We headed to our usual spots and the search was on! We brought a shovel and a bucket to dig leeks as well. Also a paper sack for chives. Time for some of Zane’s chive/leek dip again! Forager pizza also but we needed some mushrooms! The search was slow at first but I finally spotted 2 in an old favorite spot!

We picked the two small morels for our pizza that we would make later regardless of our success. We checked out a new spot and were rewarded with 5 more small morels. Not a huge collection but enough for our pizza. We left several other small ones to grow and continued our search. Despite covering a large area we found no others. We collected a nice bunch of chives and leeks before heading to Camp Edith for the night. I got the water turned on there fairly quickly so it was easy to prep dinner. We had washed the leeks at the farm spring to get rid of most of the dirt so that proved helpful.

Dinner was a success! The dip was superb as was the forager pizza! So morel season had truly begun! If you want a better understanding of morels check out the blog post: Bugs,Brush,and Brown Gold that I wrote a couple years ago. It provides some insight into our foraging hobby.

I worked at Fort Drum Monday and Tuesday so it was Wednesday before I returned to search for more morels. Zane was in school and had piano lessons that evening so I headed out alone. I went to what I suspected might be this years hotspot and was rewarded with a nice collection of smaller morels. A few big ones but overall they were running a little small. A close examination of their bases revealed that they were fully rip and needed to be harvested.The morel’s stem will turn a dark brown when fully ripe. A sign that it’s about to tip over. Some morels are a darker species anyway and grow somewhat smaller. The tan ones can get rather large under the right conditions. I was on a roll and a second nearby new location yielded more! I left a number of small ones to pick the next time Zane would be with me.

I spend the rest of the afternoon searching for more morels in a variety of places but only found 7 more total. But it’s still early in the season so I wasn’t disappointed at all. I had sprayed my clothes and boots with tick repellent prior to entering the woods. I flicked a few off my pants but managed to escape any attaching themselves to me. They are the scourge of foraging and cling to the low brush everywhere. Not using repellent is a bad idea! I like a brand called Ben’s and find it very effective!

Wednesday evening found me cleaning the morels. It involves halfing them and soaking the pieces in cold water with salt. Halving and washing them will reveal any ants or other insects that might have burrowed inside the morel. It’s fairly common to find insects inside a morel. No big deal really. After cleaning my prizes I stored some of them in layers in a plastic container. Layered in moist paper towels they will last a few days in the refrigerator. The rest I pan fried with butter and a little olive oil. I add plenty of salt and pepper as well. I had a plan for them! Mushroom and Muenster cheese burgers! Yum! Of course I ate a few hot ones right out of the pan!Wow! What a treat!

So Friday came and Zane was eager to hunt mushrooms after school. We hit the new hotspot and the haul was significant! He’s great at spotting them. He uses the “drop down” technique we’ve learned works the best for finding them hidden under the ground cover of leaves and small trees. At risk for ticks but with treated pants and boots it’s fairly safe. We both had containers that filled quickly at the hotspot before we headed off to other locations. Our harvest was small at the other spots however. But we knew that the early season could change that so any location where a couple were found will be revisited again. The two spots that were last year’s hotspots have only yielded a few so far.It’s a fickle business of searching this hobby of ours! Always checking new locations and hoping for the mother lode! We cover a big expanse of ground to get a decent collection most days. The side by side speeds up the process of getting around though and helps with the tick avoidance situation.

Back at Camp Edith it was cleaning time. Zane cut one open that was full of ants! I quickly took it outside to dispose of them. No harm done and the morel was added to the salt water bath. They were pretty much insect free after that. We stored some away and cooked up the rest. Zane was eager to try my mushroom and cheese burgers! A hit so sure!

So that’s the story here as morel season begins once again. We’ll continue our searching and dodging the nasty disease carrying ticks. Last season we had our first success around May 10th. Our final harvest was May 20th. But we didn’t spend the time hunting last year that we intend to do this year. I was living in the Adks in the camper for part of May and missed some of the short morel season. I think I will head out today and search some new places.Why not? It’s sunny and cool so maybe the black flies won’t bother so much.There’s a blissful contentment in the search for the brown gold. A sudden rush when you spot one hiding in the leaves. A wonderful smell when your container gets full. A sense of connection as you clean them and add them to your dinner menu. And of course the taste bud explosion when you eat them! As I like write here these simple words: to have never known certain things is to have missed something extraordinary. The morel mushroom provides a powerful connection to nature. One of season and one of purpose. A place where spirit energy surges with new growth and something much more profound. The hunter gatherer relationship with the forest and waterways. Never to destroy or deplete the source but to enjoy a little of it. It’s truly something amazing to me. A place where bonding and teaching others builds long lasting traditions and memories. We call those memories MOONTABS !!

Coming Out Of Orbit

Posted on April 15, 2023April 16, 2023 by Greg Washburn

Sugaring season finally ended this week as temperatures hit the high seventies. Unseasonably warm for April. The time has passed in a blur since my last post but that’s just the norm for syrup season.Call it the daily grind of dedication where writing doesn’t occur.The comfortable orbit of routine held steady while things continued to slowly warm up after the third week of March. The snow steadily disappeared especially after a big rain storm one night.Things were transforming quickly!

It’s been a good season overall. The weather cooperated well with cool nights and days that rarely passed the mid forties initially. There was a persistent breeze from the north that held temperatures down and quite a few cloudy periods.Rather perfect for decent sap flow and our gathers remained fairly steady. The evaporator repairs held together and our syrup count increased with each boil. Things were getting done and we established an effective gathering strategy of our string that eventually reached 530 taps. We added several new mini-tubing runs on some hard to reach ridge lines and they produced well late into the season.Good sap runs would yield about 400 gallons of sap. We had a mixed crew to help with the gathering with people assisting as their schedules allowed.Patrick Bourcy creator of the Facebook group Just Go Outside brought his daughter Lilly over to help one Saturday and she had a blast! We had the gathering string figured out and always managed to get the work done. Feeling tired by the end of the day was to be expected but it was a good type of exhaustion! Some aspects of our seasonal hobby never change.

As the snow melted away it became very muddy and the sap haul roads were a mess! Pretty typical. We had to abandon our snowy shortcuts across the meadow and take the longer road route to avoid the mud. Things were beginning to look much different throughout the sugarbush with pockets of snow remaining in certain sections. Some of the trees began to run less sap and I decided that we would need to add some additional taps to keep the intake consistent. I chose some reserve trees in the two meadows on “the hill” as we call it. We would end up using the side by side to gather them to avoid meadow damage from the much heavier tractor. It worked out well.We chased the last of the snow into the sheltered pines where the sap ran clear and plentiful. Call it a boost into a new orbit of routine.

Chasing the snow to reach the reserve trees.

The signs began to show themselves as the season progressed. Yellow sap from the smaller maples and trees that shut down entirely. The larger maples of the string began to truly release their sap and held the sap quota fairly consistent. We began to start pulling a few nonproductive buckets along the string and Jen nicknamed them “ kicked buckets”. A name that stuck. Zane and I would sometimes work alone on the late gather after his school day had ended. I would yell “kick it” whenever I decided to pull a bucket. It’s a favorite beginning to several songs I like so that’s why I was doing it. He quickly tired of it even if I didn’t. Levity is an important part of making tedious work less boring I feel. A strategy I have used for years on the construction sites to survive the long days of often menial task. Zane and I would talk about all sorts of things while we worked. I enjoyed this part of my days. He’s my apprentice of all things rural heritage. He’s still young and has lots to learn but that’s the way of things.

Lids dropped in by gatherers. Sign for a kicked bucket.

I watched the weather forecasts closely and tried to gauge whether we would meet our goal of 100 gallons of syrup. 530 taps should have been plenty to accomplish that but the weather was changing quickly and sugaring is a fickle business at times. Years ago it was very different and the seasons seemed to last longer. The old timers rule of one quart of syrup per tap for the season no longer applies these days. 400 good taps can produce 100 gallons of syrup with an ideal season. We tap more these days to compensate for a much more compressed season. The quality of the syrup has been superb! Amber Rich grade held for much of the season but eventually the Dark Robust grade was reached towards the end. Very normal and we began filling the 30 gallon stainless steel commercial barrel to sell on the open syrup market. The commercial grade syrup will usually generate enough cash to cover our operating expenses. As I watched the forecast I realized that we might not hit 100 gallons of syrup. Time was short now. But one small window of opportunity was coming before the season reached its conclusion. 4 frosty nights and sunny warm days. I knew our old string would continue to produce sap but not enough. Kicked buckets were continuing to be brought in. We would need to call in further reserve trees for a few days.They would be scattered and few but they were available in the area we call “behind the barn”.

A huge reserve tree on the Tail End String.

I set out on a Thursday morning and pulled in 50 plus kicked buckets from the original string. The reserve tree string on the hill had been a good decision and they had ran well. They were time consuming to gather but kept a nice flow coming in. I knew it was a lot of work to tap more trees for just a few days of sap flow but was gambling for a payoff. I suppose part of me wasn’t ready for the season to end. That stubborn side that likes to achieve goals. Bullish and foolish at times. Prone to impulsive decisions that add more work to an already busy routine. I had considered the options carefully I felt so I set the plan into motion. Using the pulled kicked buckets I set tapped 54 new taps on some nice big survivor maples that had beat the 2016/2017 die off.They had once been part of a couple different strings that we had ran years ago. So spread out though that it wouldn’t make sense to tap them under normal circumstances. These were not normal circumstances. I called them the Tail End String.

Bringing in the kicked buckets to redeploy.

It was a very warm day for tapping and the sap burst from the fresh taps like it was under pressure. Very encouraging and I was fueled by the possibilities. 54 were added before Zane showed up to help gather the old string. We pulled in a bunch of kicked buckets and about all that remained were our mini-tubes. We left scattered buckets along the string that were still producing but our number of old taps was greatly diminished. The new plan was in place and the sun set on another day.

The weather cooperated and we were able to continue to bring in additional sap due to the new taps. Last Monday we brought in everything that had been our original string gathering sap along the way. The new taps were kept in until Tuesday for one final gather. The Tail End String was a success. Tuesday’s boil yielded a few gallons of super dark syrup that I plan to use in crafting our Moonbeams hard cider that we are working to create. Wednesday found me working late getting set up for the final boil where water is ran through the evaporator to push the final gallons of syrup sap through. The final boil yielded an additional 4 gallons of syrup by 10:30 pm before I literally tapped out and had to quit for the day. It was over! At least the tapping,gathering,and boiling part of sugaring. Next was the cleanup. Just another part of our labor intensive hobby!

In reflection I realize that this brief post doesn’t even cover the reality that was the syrup season of 2023. It doesn’t accurately describe the true emotions,the routine,or the mind numbing fatigue that ensued. But those things exist in other posts written in different times and under different circumstances. The true connections of this season still haven’t had time to completely catch up to me I feel. The magic happened and it exists in the numerous jugs of carefully crafted product that brings smiles to our customers faces. It lives in their comments to me. It lives in our hearts,photos, and in our memories. For in the midst of the conclusion of this sugaring season something more was thrown into our schedule by some sudden decisions. It’s destined for an upcoming post. It was a push but also successful in its purpose. Some things in life can not wait forever nor should the voice of spirit energy be ignored. The forward momentum begs its place in schedules.

The sugar house woodshed is almost empty! A sign of a successful season.

I dedicate this post to the members of the newly formed Macomb Sapsuckers Local 1545. A joke of sorts but one of recognition. Without the efforts of our volunteer gathering crew none of this would be possible. I thank Zane for stepping up and partnering with me. I thank Jen for pitching in for her fifth season of tireless assistance. They are the big two workers of our tiny operation. I also thank Rebecca and Randy Reynolds,Gail Gardner,Patrick and Lilly Bourcy,and Scott Force for helping us achieve our goals. I also thank our neighbor Tom whose woods produce a good portion of our sap. I cherish my unwritten agreement with him that we honor each season now. Fairness and honesty bring favorable outcomes. We truly shared some memorable moments together! As for me I am stronger and more fit then I was on February 27th. The first day. Proud of what we accomplished. Tired and ready for a break from the routine. And as securely grounded in my rural heritage as ever.We made things happen! Our tired iron held together once again. Who knows what comes next. But spring will come again next year and the sap will rise again. And I hope to be able to begin the whole process again.I leave you with my personal quote. “For each person there will be but a finite number of syrup seasons to enjoy ”.Best not miss them in my humble opinion.✍️