April is upon us and this morning it was a chilly 17 degrees! We had a snow squall yesterday and it’s rather strange weather lately. We’ve run a gamut lately that’s for sure. As for the sugaring season? It would not be immune to the wild weather swings. Despite the deep snow that hindered us in early March, the season would change rapidly and with consequences far beyond our control. But that is the nature of the beast as it is called. Nature being the key word. And we have persevered doing the best that we could as we now reach the conclusion of sugaring season 2025. It has been challenging and memorable in so many ways. I suppose a continuation of my previous post from March 7th might best describe the highs and lows of it. Ironic it seems. For it would be the highs and lows of temperature that would shape our progress. One must follow them after all, as a sapsucker here on the rocky ridges of the farm Homestead. And in the end it has to be enough. But to truly understand perhaps the season just past must unwind here.
The old road has been conquered.
The weather stayed fairly stable following our first gather and we continued to set taps out. We also continued to bring in a little sap and by March 11th I was able to flood the evaporator. There was a minor leak near one of the draw off valves that I was able to seal fortunately as I fired the evaporator for the first time. The boiling sap gums up small leaks at times and allows you to keep going. Luck was on our side! I didn’t have enough sap to batch out that morning as it takes time to set up the evaporator on a first boil day. Eventually the sap in the various sections of pans has less water in it and batches will come on a regular timeline. Fresh sap is always trickling into the back pan as a float allows it depending on the depth I set up and the boil rate. I went out that afternoon after cooling the evaporator and brought in more sap so I could boil the next morning. On the second boil I made syrup finally. We were off and running!
First boil.
Zane and I continued to set buckets and our tap grew to 551 by March 13th. The weather cooperated and we brought in more sap and boiled again on the 14th. That day the temperatures jumped significantly and we had a prodigious sap run! We gathered sap until 8:30 pm as the moon rose in the east. We were exhausted! Saturday would find us in the sugar house for a long day of boiling. More sap was brought in and we had a pancake breakfast in the sugar house on Sunday morning after I made a batch of fresh syrup. There were 7 of us total enjoying eggs and pancakes while rain fell outside. Such moments are a big part of a sugar season. The temperatures had risen into the 60’s for two days and that’s never a good thing. The snow was melting fast and mud became the new thing for us. Things were changing fast.But we had secured close to 30 gallons of nice quality syrup. Things were going well!
Sugar house breakfast with hot syrup!
We got a tornado warning later that Sunday after I had finished boiling and had settled into the cabin for a rest. We didn’t get a tornado but got hit with a wild storm with high winds and soaking downpours.It was almost scary at one point with thunder and lightning! Not typical March weather. We chugged a long getting what sap came and by March 19th the temperatures hit 71 degrees. Zane and I decided to do a night boil to get as much sap boiled away as quickly as possible given the temperatures that would spoil it quickly. But the syrup turned dark and fell into commercial grade. We began filling one of our stainless steel syrup barrels. They hold 30 gallons when full. The syrup was sweet but had a slightly distinct after bite. We call this “buddy” as in tree buds. The warm weather we had been having was causing the tree buds to grow. There was nothing we could do about it except continue or quit. Barrel syrup has a market but we knew that it had come much earlier than we had expected. Several days of above normal temperatures was all it had taken. Unfortunate but very real. The weather shifted back to more normal temperatures and I decided to set more taps on the 22nd in a section of the sugarbush we call “ The Lane”. We do a mix of buckets and mini tune runs here. It’s a surviving stand of maples that was part of our former sugarbush. These big maples always produce well. The signs were obvious as some smaller maples began to stop producing sap. We hoped to see the syrup turned dark and lighter with the fresh infusion of clear sap.
Tapping on The Lane.
So we continued to chug a long making dark syrup and working to fill our barrel. The weather swings determined when we needed to gather and sap continued to flow but not everyday. On March 25 I pulled buckets off the Great Northern Loop as they stopped producing. Zane and I bounced around in the upper fallow Meadows and added about 35 taps on some miscellaneous maples there.Later that day I hit a section near the cabin at the base of the Gap Ridge and added the final 38 new taps of the season. We were chasing sap and trying to keep our sap intake coming in. It was working out for us. It turned cold over the weekend and there was a break in the action. An ice storm hit that Sunday though and we couldn’t get out for a cleanup sap gather until Monday.
Ice storm.
Monday would find us having a decent amount sap to gather and it was going well, until the tractor quit late in the afternoon. We tried to figure out the problem quickly but nothing worked so we used the side by side to gather the remaining sap. The next day I boiled and Zane gathered everything he could with side by side. Wednesday morning I tried to fix the tractor but still no luck . So it’s been side by side gathering ever since. A friend helped me tow the tractor out of the woods on Thursday after I finished boiling sap. But the weather turned super warm by Friday and I decided to have Zane make a final gather of the newest taps. Most of the trees had stopped running anyway. And so it ends just like that. And I will follow up on the conclusion of the season in my next post as I reflect on the season as we enter the next phase. It’s worthy of words I feel. Things have happened fast and it’s been a blur. But that’s how this hobby works!✍️
Yes it’s that time again! Sugaring season has begun! I have been preparing for a while now actually. It started with getting the sugar house plowed out after the blizzard a few weeks back. I haven’t seen snow this deep in years! It took some time and serious tractor work but I got plowed out. Trying to break out the old road that is our main sap haul road was a different matter. I got part of it passable but it was rather futile. I decided to wait and let nature melt some of the snow which happened last week fortunately. We kicked off our sugaring season by building some strings of sap tubing down on the steep ridge near Beaver Creek. I wore snowshoes the first day but it was a total pain so I just waded through the deep snow the following day. We got about 40 taps in that first location. Our next stop was on the Gap Ridge across the meadow from the cabin. It was super tough going there as well! I managed to get the tractor across the meadow after the snow started to melt. Unfortunately I got the side by side stuck! But it was easily pulled out with the tractor. We gained an additional 20 taps in the second location. Progress was slow but still progress!
Stuck!
The warm spell had settled the snow so I made another run at the old road hoping to break through which I did. I made it up onto our neighbor’s property and went down one of the sap haul roads for a short distance before deciding to turn back. Getting stuck would be no fun! The weather was turning cold so I took the weekend off spent it in Saranac Lake. I picked up some syrup supplies in Hermon to get further prepared. Every little bit of preparation helps. Zane and I had started to set up the evaporator and piping systems. That’s a necessary preparation also.The weather was promising Monday so I began putting out some mini tubing runs up on the neighbor’s property. We take them down each season and flush them out before storing them. They are numbered and named as to their locations. Mini tubes pick up several trees and flow into 15 gallon containers. What a time saver! Not to mention we build them where the trees are difficult to reach. Our father started building them quite a few years ago. We had quite a few at one time before the big sugarbush die off in 2016/2017. Most of those mini tube strings are worthless now. I have started repurposing them for parts.
Repurposing old mini tube strings.
It was so difficult getting around the woods on Monday that I decided to hang buckets beside the main sap haul road on Tuesday. Wading through the crusty, knee deep snow was exhausting and frustrating. Working beside the road was much less challenging. Zane showed up to help me and we got quite a few buckets hung before the rain drove us in for the day. We got back out on Wednesday and managed to do mini tubes and buckets in a section of woods on our neighbor’s called The Great Northern Loop. We got rained out again by lunchtime but went back out before dark and got more buckets done. The sunset was absolutely beautiful! We were pretty tired from wading through the snow but were happy with our progress.The tap count was growing!
Sunset while hanging buckets .
Thursday would see a lot of snow melted and mud was beginning to appear in spots. We had gotten a lot of rain and the trails were tough going for the tractor. We tapped the remainder of what’s known as The Southern Loop. It’s a fraction of the size of the GNL. After lunch we decided that we needed to get the trailer set up to gather some sap before the cold snap hit. The weather was changing fast and the temperatures started dropping. We worked fast and the wind was blowing pretty hard. Then a light snow started. We ended up with about 120 gallons of sap that we got unloaded at the sugar house. It had been an eventful day fighting through the snow with the tractor. And also wading through it! But we were once again happy with our progress. We finished setting up the evaporator. Our tap count was now 386. We plan to have over 500 eventually. I like to hold some of the sugarbush in reserve in case the weather turns cold for a while like it is doing this weekend. The wind really howled last night and we got a little more snow.
Gathering sap.
Today was a little more laidback. With the colder weather there’s no sap to gather. I put out 23 more buckets near the sugar house in what’s known as Zane’s Bush. It really suffered during the big die off. Many tree were lost and that’s unfortunate because it had held such great potential given the number of young maples. We harvested so much wood out of there after the event. There are more trees needing to be cut as some continue to die.Some are barely living but we have so much wood around the farm that I will leave them for now.
We may tap more trees tomorrow but haven’t decided just yet. The weather warms next week again and we expect to see some sap runs. Late in the week the temperatures approach 60 degrees. Not ideal sugaring weather but the snow will certainly disappear. Sugaring seasons can be fickle these days. They have become more compressed and unpredictable. But we have to accept that which we have no control over. What we can do is blitz the forest with taps for a big play for sap. Wading through the snow has been challenging. I am happy to once again be outside every day making a play for maple syrup. We are down to our last half gallon almost. Putting it into my coffee each morning goes through it! But I need that battery charging to keep my spirit energy surging! It’s great living here on the farm and engaging in my rural heritage hobbies! It is enough I often write. And it truly is a blessing to be living in this moment. The transition is underway now. Soon all will look different here. And we will have gone through another syrup season. We still don’t know how bad the evaporator is going to leak this year. It’s a tense moment for me that is coming soon. For now we will continue setting taps and waiting for the big sap runs. Then we can begin the next step. It’s going to be a push! But when wasn’t it? It’s in my blood this sugaring obsession. And I am a most fortunate man to have experienced this annual event. I may not get time for another post soon. But I will eventually get you caught up!✍️
January has moved right along but that’s understandable as I have maintained a rather full schedule. I just worked my final day on the Ice Palace project in the Village Of Saranac Lake, New York yesterday. I was able to spend more days volunteering there this year but I will follow up with a featured story of my time there in the future. It’s worthy of one. Another post worthy topic is the work I did logging with my former neighbor on January 15th and 16th. It’s a story best suited to compliment my Run Of The Mill series at some point. Today I am rather entranced by some muses on winter so I think this post will be justified highlighting some of those thoughts! It all started on the way home late yesterday afternoon. Two hours of driving home from Saranac Lake gives a person plenty of time to think!
I left the village around 3pm yesterday and headed down Route 3 like usual on bare,salted roads. Somehow a car had plowed into some guard rails several miles before the Village Of Tupper Lake. Strange as the road was completely bare! Much later on during my drive I left Route 3 in the Town of Fine to head west on Route 58. This takes me to Gouverneur where I take a series of roads that lead me to the Homestead. Route 58 has many open sections where farm meadows come down to meet the road. The wind had picked up and snow was blowing into the road in places. I remained vigilant as the bare road was deceiving at times. Snowy patches would suddenly appear and I would inherently slow down to navigate across them. My 4 studded tires give me excellent traction but there is a limit to any set of tires with the right conditions. Near the Village Of Edwards a car had slid off a snowy corner in an open spot. Good fortune for the driver as he hit nothing expect the ditch full of snow. He was about to be towed out as I went past. The wind was intense as I neared Gouverneur. After a quick stop for groceries, I continued on to the Homestead on increasingly snowy patches of road. Zane was there and had the wood stove going which was a welcome sight to me! The wind was howling across the main meadow and hitting the cabin full force. It was great to be off the roads! We had plenty of food and firewood! We were set for whatever happened you hoped! But before I could settle in I had to disassemble the Chop Shop tent that covers the outside tools. It had blown loose from its corner posts and was in the process of destroying itself. Luckily my tie down anchors were frozen into the ground and my ropes were strong nylon material. After some cursing and wrestling the tent was safely flat and secured. The tools themselves were now exposed but I didn’t bother trying to cover them in the gale force winds. I grabbed some extra firewood from the cabin’s front lean to woodshed and headed into the warm, inviting interior. Life was good!
Sometime after dark it began to snow while the wind continued to whip against the cabin walls. We enjoyed a simple dinner of hot turkey sandwiches with gravy that I was able to quickly prepare in our temporary makeshift kitchen. This is the second winter of having a makeshift kitchen and this one is slightly different then last year’s. The new addition is now open to the original cabin and heated. It’s full of stored construction things at the moment. Tools and screws mostly. All work has been sidelined lately given all the other volunteering. I have a cot set up for sleeping downstairs when Zane is home. He occupies the loft for hanging out and sleeping. It’s very warm up there! I passed the evening watching a movie on my tablet. I don’t have a tv in the downstairs of the cabin. It’s not necessary really and I often read. A quick look out the window as the wind continued its onslaught showed a decent snowstorm in progress. It was a good night to be hunkered down! We could stay warm even if the power failed. That’s something I had wanted in my cabin plan.
I went to bed fairly early but got up around 12:30 am to put more firewood in the stove. Outside it was still blowing and snowing hard. The snow looked like it was accumulating but it was difficult to tell as it was really swirling around out there! By morning I had put wood into the stove two more times. It was 9 degrees with a rather brisk breeze giving a minus 2 degree windchill according to my phone’s weather app. The sky was dawning clear and bright though. Outside the expanses of untouched snow resembled a giant art canvas. Nothing stirred except for a few birds visiting the feeder behind the new addition. Zane needed to leave and but needed me to plow the driveway first. We had gotten around 10” of new powder snow and there were scattered drifts around the vehicles and in front of the cabin. Zane plugged in the tractor’s block heater for me. Without it , the chances of it starting were questionable. The tractor is kept in the bottom of the Big Red barn out of the weather. During the colder months I keep anti fuel gel additive in its diesel tank at all times. All important steps that help us deter the winter problems that might arise. Keeping the tractor functioning is key to surviving winter.
The Main Meadow. Post snow storm this morning.
I plowed snow for a long time before I finally got everything cleared. I did a thorough job on the driveway and parking areas. This was only the second time that I had needed to plow this winter! I can’t complain about that! I also plowed up to the warehouse and made a large parking area there as well. I also plowed behind the cabin by the woodshed as we will be in need of firewood soon. The supply of hardwood slabs stored in the upper woodshed continue to disappear. given the rate that we burn them.It’s time to get to the forest for some winter wood firewood cutting. I plan to skid trees log length right to the woodshed to save time. We did it last winter and it worked well. I broke out the tractor road to the upper meadows beyond the gap ridge and skidded down a log that I had left behind last winter. It’s red elm and should dry quickly once cut and split. We have plenty of snow for skidding logs but not so much to cripple moving around with the tractor. I need to install it’s front tire chains though. That really helps its traction.During sugaring having the tire chains on is usually a necessity.
Plowing out.
It was truly a beautiful January day with blue skies and a warm sun when I was out of the wind. Icicles were melting off the cabin as I worked to bank it with snow to help keep the floors warmer. There’s more of that to do depending on the weather forecast. I decided I had enough firewood for another night and mentally dedicated Wednesday for a firewood day. It looks like we might get more snow tonight. Did I make a good decision? Time will tell. I love being outdoors but had spent enough time out I decided by 1:30 pm. Tomorrow was another day and I was happy with my accomplishments. While I was out and about on the tractor I noticed very few signs of life on the surface of the new snow. I spotted a few squirrel tracks in the sugarbush and those of a weasel. The weasel had come from the sugarbush over to the big slab wood pile next to the sugar house. It had gone into the sugar house and then out the far side.No doubt hunting mice for dinner. I could visualize it’s tiny white form hopping through the fresh snow. The winter white ermine that is brown in the other seasons is a lethal hunter! I wondered if it had caught its dinner? It moved on at any rate heading through the woods to somewhere. It’s tiny form edible to an owl or hawk if caught in the open. Not even hunters are invincible when larger predators occupy the same territory. These are hungry time I suspect. A time of great energy expenditure in the snowy,frigid conditions of deep winter. But rodents are plentiful it seemed last fall at least. And good hunters probably manage just fine. All this as darkest comes again and suddenly cloudy skies where the wind has picked up again. Inside the tiny cabin the hungry wood stove demands constant fuel. But we have it ready and inside for the night. My own body will demand fuel later. A hot dinner from the makeshift kitchen will take some time to prepare but will be satisfying next to the wood stove. And an interesting pattern of thoughts had presented themselves to me today as I took what winter had brought us into stride. And a most intriguing question. Why do we stay here in this cold,frozen place?
The hunter left it’s sign. A weasel ( ermine) leaves a most obvious set of tracks.
I first asked the question this morning as I put on layers of heavy winter clothing before plowing snow. Wool socks over regular socks into gripping rubber boots well suited for snow. High and flexible they are a winter stable. I wear my rabbit fur Bomber hat for working typically reserving my muskrat hat for more leisurely type activities although I usually wore it working on the Ice Palace. Heavy gloves are a must for my hands. All this gear takes up space in a house and takes time to don! This morning inside the super frigid, unheated barn I had stepped onto a very cold tractor that started with a whiny protest. Why do we stay when it’s so much more difficult to do even simple things? Why do we stay needing to move mountains of snow each winter? Why do we stay when it takes extra energy for everything? Fuel for snow removal equipment for our homes and highways. Fuel for our bodies for shoveling snow and wading through it. Winter exacts a higher cost in all types of energy. Fuel to heat our homes and businesses most certainly . It’s all rather perplexing when you really consider it. Wouldn’t it be easier to leave with the summer birds and head south? So I asked myself again: why do we stay? I think I know why I have stayed.
The tiny snow sculptures.
Thinking back it’s rather obvious really. I stayed as a child because home was where my parents chose to live. Home was here in this four season part of the world.It’s what I knew and I never thought or needed to question it. I was taken care of and taught how to dress for winter. Fortunately I had a family who could afford me all the attire I needed for winter. Winters came and went as I grew up. I never thought about leaving. My family never traveled to faraway tropical settings. We stayed here and tackled each winter like icy warriors going into battle with the elements. Things weren’t always easy and things sometimes went wrong. Frozen pipes and frozen equipment that refused to work would impend winter tasks severely. We endured some very cold weather. Minus 20 below and sometimes colder. Why did we stay? We stayed because our jobs and schools were here. Our families were here often as not. Grandparents and siblings. Our homes were here. Our farms and property. Perhaps our livestock as well. That’s why we stayed.But this story must return to a more personal journey for me to tell it properly. For I assume many things about other people. This is my story and maybe some of yours.
Why did I stay? The childhood part is pretty self explanatory don’t you think?But when offered a chance to head off to distant colleges in warmer states after high school? What was the answer to that. And after college? Why did I want to find employment here and make a home here? Why did I seek out like minded women and desire to share time with them here? That’s a complicated story line for me and one that will need to remain somewhat hazy for the moment. For it is a lengthy tale with many turns and twists. Difficult to fathom at times even for myself. Perhaps I avoid some truths there that I might rather not face. They aren’t dark or filled with shame deeds. They simply deal with large passages of time that has gone by now. Time. That subject that I promised by written intention to visit differently on this page in 2025. Many of my stories are from the past but when told properly won’t revolve around time as a central topic. And I have strayed from my subject as I am prone to do at times. Let’s cut to the chase.
I suppose that I could write a very lengthy manuscript on this subject as I examine it further. But a summary might be best for the moment. A glimpse through a window that might be a door. I can easily tell you more reasons why I chose to stay in this frozen winter landscape hen ones why I shouldn’t. It’s really quite simple actually. This area has always been my home. I never lived anywhere else. Sure I have traveled south in the winter and spent Easter breaks there. Many times over the years. And I suddenly realize that there’s a much larger story within this story. To truly answer my own questions I must ask more of them to deliver the answers. So consider this part one of a two part story. I have presented a case against winter here at times. Given it an almost criminal element. But winter is innocent until proven guilty. And with Mother Nature defending her seasons there will be no winning this case. After all ,we humans have chosen to live here and face winter each season. I think I am spinning in circles here. Time to rest and deliberate. It is enough. ✍️
Mid January finds with a small amount of snow on the ground but nothing major. 6”-8” of powder snow isn’t much for this time of year really. Last year on this very day we had a snow storm that dropped several inches on us after a warm spell had left us with mostly bare ground. I was recovering from my artery incident then and wasn’t pushing myself too hard. Walking mostly but we managed a few other tasks around the cabin. It was a new chapter for me then.
I have been balancing my time between the valley and the Adirondacks since the end of fall to now as I mentioned recently in my last post. The biggest news recently is that with the help of the Amish carpenters we finally finished the siding on the cabin last week. Some soffit work remains but the weatherbeaten tarpaper is now all covered. Zane and I had sawn plenty of siding fortunately so there was no danger running out. We also removed some old rusty roofing from my Uncles barn up the road at the property where I had my first house in 1983. We repaired the lean to roofing boards and some structural damage before adding 4 sheets of new metal. The old metal matches some that my Dad had repurposed from the old garage that used to be here before the 2012 house fire. He used it on the sugar house here and I may need it also for the cabin. I started out just wanting some old metal to put on the wall behind the new wood stove in the cabin above the Drury brick hearth. But then I decided that I want old metal on the ceiling in the new addition of the cabin. It remains to be seen if we will have enough to do all our work. It’s stashed outside and needs a very thorough cleaning. Maybe I will flip it upside down and show the underside which has no rust. The design on the metal is what makes it special. A wave type pattern repeats itself a long the length of the 2’ wide siding. It’s very unique! We had a couple of rather cold days last week while doing our outdoor work but we soldiered through despite!
The repairs after the removal of the old roofing
By last Thursday I decided that I needed a day to just catch up on a few things around the cabin. The carpenters had finished their work here that they had time for by Wednesday afternoon. So I hauled some firewood and stocked up the cabin woodshed. Keeping firewood stocked for the cabin keeps me rather busy actually especially on cold days like we had last week. It’s noteworthy that I had just installed a ventilation fan in the loft floor of the cabin and ducted it into the new addition. With more insulation in place it has been heating well since. The loft is much cooler as a result. Before it was way too hot up there most nights while the back portion of the cabin stayed rather cool. I think things will balance out well now. As for the firewood, I have been hauling it down from the old granary up behind the barn where it was stored last spring. Super dry hardwood slab wood from the sawmill project at my friend Gregger’s last spring. It just needs a bit of splitting here and there. The mixed cherry and yellow birch make a super hot fire. Before too long we will need to cut and haul in some dry red elm that’s burn ready. Our current supply of firewood won’t last until spring.
The siding progresses.
By Thursday afternoon I was ready for an outdoor outing so I decided to snowshoe down Beaver Creek if the ice was ok. There barely enough snow to need snowshoes but I wore them anyway.Upon reaching the edge of the marsh where the grass is thick, I quickly realized that the ice wasn’t all that great. I struggled out through the bogs breaking through in several shallow spots before reaching the bare open sections. But even here the ice was very thin and weak! It wasn’t looking good but I didn’t want to backtrack across the crappy bog part so I pressed on. Slowly and cautiously, I might add! The ice was fickle and unpredictable. Some spots were ok but my tapping beaver sticks would detect hollow sounding spots below the snow covered surface. Death traps I call them. I managed to skirt several tricky spots and reached a deeper wider section of the main channel. After one rather close call I chose a shortcut on a smaller side channel that held me up rather well. I soon reached the area we call “The Deep Hole”. It seemed like decent ice but was slushy on top. A sure sign of thin ice being pushed down by the weight of the snow. I became even more cautious and my forward progress became even slower. I noticed an active beaver lodge and was happy to see them occupying the area. They come and go from this spot on occasion but continue to occupy it mostly. I knew that I could never hope to get across the main beaver dam that spans the creek here. It’s a challenge at times even with much better ice. I approached the dam and laughed when the dog almost broke through where she was walking next to it. I was trying to get close enough to what we call the “Big Cliff” to get photos of some large icicles hanging from a section of it. Without warning I suddenly plunged through the ice with both snowshoes! There was no cracking first or anything suspicious! Just a death trap breakthrough! I was held up by beaver stick walking sticks fortunately and for a second was expecting the shock of cold water filling my boots! But I lunged up onto my knees and somehow avoided getting wet! My nylon hiking pants were so tight around my boots that no water got in! My knees got a little wet but that was nothing. Snow on ice is the great insulator and the death traps are invisible from above. Even the tapping and probing of the beaver sticks fails me at times. Just one of my many plunges over the years I suppose.
The plunge hole!
At this point I lost my desire to ice walk any further! I cautiously and nervously backtracked my way to a channel that got me safely ashore in the stand of white cedars known as “ The Cedars”. This tiny grove has been here my entire life. Never really getting any larger or much smaller. Sometimes the beaver cut a few and years ago we cut out some big dead ones for salvage. The Cedars seems ageless although I didn’t see any of the tamaracks that once lived alongside the cedars. Perhaps they are all gone. The cedars contains a couple of boggy spring holes that never freeze. I used to trap here as a young boy for raccoon. In winter I trapped ermine under the shelter of the cedars in small cubby sets. I used wax paper to keep my traps from freezing. I once caught a red fox here also. My ermine traps were empty most of the time but I didn’t care. I became familiar with the area and loved its remote feeling of winter beauty out of sight of the road and the farm buildings. I was destined to desire to explore this area and all that lay beyond it was I grew a bit older. The marsh was my classroom and I was an interested student who showed up frequently. And the spirit of the Icewalker was forged here. Not of molten metal but of ice and snow. Adversity would thrill me here. Wet feet and cold hands. Frosty cheeks and nose at times. Those were cold winters. Some nights my Father would not let me run my small trap line because of the cold and approaching darkness. But I would return soon and resume my frosty activities. There are many memories here in the marsh of the big gorge. Perhaps that’s why I return each winter.
After a rest and the reminiscing, I tackled the cut up the side of steep ravine that would take me towards the Homestead cabin where the warm wood stove awaited. I stopped at one point and gazed back at the marsh. I was disappointed that the ice had not been better for traveling. And I pondered several things then. How many times had I stood in this exact spot over the years? How different the winters are now. How much older I had become. And how the draw to run the ice and call myself the Icewalker had never diminished. How long would I try? How many winters would gift me the opportunity? Such thoughts became too much then so I chose something far different to break the serious moment. I spoke with my best Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation downhill towards the marsh: “I’ll Be Back!”. But no one heard me but the dog and a few disinterested winter birds. But that was fine. I know that I will be back if good fortune and good health continue to favor me. And I will play the game of staying on top of the ice as I move forward to explore the further reaches of the gorge of the big creek called Beaver. I have no fear there. Just respect for this beautiful and enchanting place. I have traveled the ice here more times than I can remember now. What adventures I have had! I will be watching and waiting for signs of better ice. Then I will set out once again! And not forgetting the Icewalker’s motto: The distance in must be traveled out!” It is enough! ✍️
I have recently been writing a daily post on Facebook to highlight the past 12 months. This 12 day writing exercise has been fun but people have gotten bored with it I believe. Good thing I am into the final 4 months of 2024! I found it beneficial for myself to reflect upon the year and wanted to share my thoughts in a hindsight type series of posts. It’s sometimes difficult to gauge peoples interest. That is an aspiring writer’s challenge I suppose. For this post I am focused on facts and recent events that make up a timeline of living.
The past few weeks have been rather busy running back and forth to the Adirondacks. Usually once a week on the weekends. We try to get outdoors for some sort of activity that gets us engaged with nature.We have visited some beautiful places recently to commune with nature! I will showcase some of them sometime. The day after my last post we traveled back to Adirondacks post Xmas party morning. We headed to the Vermontville area near Saranac Lake to cut a Christmas tree. It was a place my companion knew well and I liked it immediately! There was quite a bit of snow on the ground and the trees had a light covering but not so much that we couldn’t look for one properly. We walked uphill to the furthest reaches of the tree farm. I remarked that this a requirement and a sure sign that TCCS was about to afflict me. Remember TCCS? It was featured in a blog in December 2020. TCCS or tree cutting conundrum syndrome is very common when searching for a Christmas tree! Finding a perfect tree can be maddening! There’s a Goldilocks parallel attached to it quite often. Feeling confused? Not too worry! Sufferers of TCCS are totally confused in their search for the perfect tree! It’s always the same problem: this one is too big. That one is too small. Too bare and spindly. That one is the wrong species. That one is crooked… the list goes on and on! But we were fortunate! We were searching for a balsam and found a few possibilities fairly quickly actually. And then suddenly there it was! A balsam standing out in the open in the distance. It seemed too good to be true! How could such a tree have escaped the eyes of so many tree searchers?We closed in on the tree after wading through the snow. It didn’t take long to reach an agreement. This tree was fine! Not perfect but beautiful and totally worthy of gracing the house! So it was soon on our sled and on its way to the truck. Mission accomplished and with no noticeable TCCS! Later after the tree had thawed out and the snow had melted from it, we got it into its stand. It smelled wonderful! There’s nothing like Adirondack balsam scent! Now 3 weeks later the tree still stands proud and green. And for me who had not cut a tree in a couple years , the moments had been secured. MOONTABS! It was so special to share that experience with someone special!
Back in the valley the wood stove project nears completion. The stove pipe parts I ordered showed up and I got everything together finally. But the wood stove couldn’t be used until I installed a brace on the roof to support the outer double walled exterior stove pipe. This project was a little tricky and involved a few tricks. A rope and a ladder over the peak to give me a safe place to stand after getting up the roof on another ladder. The side by side provided a safe footing for the longer ladder and a solid tie off anchor for the rope. Inside I kindled the first fire once the bracing was complete and burned off the stinky oils that coated the wood stove. Things went well and we are very happy with it! It requires firewood in the 10” range and doesn’t hold a lot but it’s really an efficient unit. We think it will perform very well overall. It’s a Dwarf 5K unit manufactured by the Tiny Wood Stove Company located in Idaho. Go online and check out their cool lineup of tiny stoves!
A big part of the wood stove project was the repurposed brick extension that got the wood stove 14” higher above the cabin floor. It’s so much easier to tend the fire that way! Understand there’s even some room to store some wood. The old antique Drury brick is very classy I think and fits the cabin theme nicely. I didn’t mortar any of it and chose a stacked dry fit construction for the base support structure. Sand fills the cracks between the base bricks which are setting on Durarock cement board material. Fireproof and safe. The back wall behind the stove features Drury brick on edge glued with construction adhesive to Durarock backer. The overall amount of brick makes a thermal mass to some degree and should hold heat longer.
What is Drury brick you may be wondering? It’s antique brick that I was given last spring in Saranac Lake for free while helping with a tree removal. I Goggled it recently and discovered that it was made in Vermont from the 1880’s through 1972. I believe mine to be very old. Possibly 1900 era. It is beautiful at any rate and exceeds my expectations for the hearth I had envisioned. I have several different styles of Drury brick all mixed together and it’s a nice look!
I don’t believe that I ever followed up with the progression of the muskrat pelts we collected last winter. Zane and I received our muskrat hats just before Xmas Eve! The pelts had been sent to Minnesota in August and we weren’t sure that the finished hats would arrive in time. I am wearing mine since Monday and love the warm addition to my winter attire! Zane seems happy with his also. It was a good choice and a wonderful example of our rural heritage here. Trapping the muskrats then preparing the furs to ship and then wearing our hats to stay warm as winter continues to progress. There’s nothing like natural fur for warmth! Some people do not approve and that is their prerogative. We respect their position and simply ask that they respect ours. Wearing fur is a choice not a necessity. But trapping is part of our tradition here where I grew up. I no longer trap fur to sell but will continue to add fur garments to my collection as time passes. Gloves and a vest may be my next investment. The beaver population continues to grow in this area as no one traps them much anymore. Harvesting a few won’t even make a dent in the population. For now we don’t require any additional muskrats but these prolific breeders of the wetlands are there if necessary. Nature keeps them thinned out by some rather harsh diseases at times. Winter mortality of muskrat populations in any given marsh is a scientifically proven fact. Nature will keep a balance regardless of any trapping we might do. That goes for most of the species here. My position on hunting, trapping, and fishing is rather clear on these pages and within my posts. It will remain so.Much of my love of nature stems from my time afield engaged in numerous types of harvesting that spans decades. Plants,birds, fish,and animals. These days I rarely hunt or trap though. I prefer a different interface with nature. One of observation mainly. Call it a winding down of sorts. The nature of my sport pursuits has modified itself. Teaching Zane the rural heritage traditions has been important though. Even said perhaps as this topic has been mentioned here before. Given that there will be some upcoming changes to the blog site posts that have continued to accumulate for 4 years now, I feel the obligation to refresh certain topics.
It’s great to have a functional wood stove again after using just the electric heater for all the cabin heating since we moved in. Now we have both. We have plenty of dry firewood at the moment but will need to get more ahead eventually. That’s always a great winter activity!
At this point I wish to mention my recent Christmas gift from Amy! She is rarely mentioned here as her privacy remains important. But I would be remiss not to acknowledge the work she put into something to give me on Christmas day! She painstakingly edited the entirety of my blogs and printed them into a spiral notebook that is arranged like a book! Not to mention imprinting them onto a thumb drive. I had expressed concern to her about archiving my work as blog posting moves forward. Gerry my administrator,friend, and cousin keeps all this saved, running, and functional for me! And hosts a safe site for you to visit!So many continued thanks to him! Keeping dozens of blog posts and photos up online takes up a lot of space. I came to the realization that I might need to retire older posts to make way for the new. The thoughts of deleting work gave me a strange feeling however. No doubt connected to losing my journals in the house fire of 2012 somehow. Better exam that under a psychological microscope sometime. Amy did something that I know took her hours by creating a “clean” blog post book of sorts. Something real and tangible that I can hold in my hands. Hours of my own creativity in black and white. To see it moved me. Perhaps this is the feeling that a writer gets when they see their first book in print? I openly thank her here for caring enough to do it! And for her overall support of my creative endeavors. It has prompted me to reconsider my writing hobby.And my future in general. So I began a list of intentions. Those that I list in two different categories. The two categories are “main” and “cloud”. What are cloud intentions? Lofty goals and dreams that I desire but may not accomplish in the short term. To keep it real the main intentions were kept short and sweet. Not easy by any stretch of the imagination. But a different mindset begins to show itself. And I strive for change. Wait. Have I said this before? Maybe. Time has been a reoccurring theme in my writing. Change is a reoccurring reality in my life. Nature is the central theme here. Look for some new ideas and new directions here as 2025 arrives. I am busy reflecting as 2024 winds down. It’s a journey. And an adventure. MOONTABS in motion.✍️
This post was started awhile back and there were a few technical glitches that have since been resolved fortunately! It doesn’t take long for the central theme of a post to suddenly change direction some! I originally was staying in Saranac Lake when I began writing it but am currently here at Camp Edith getting it finished. I just got fully moved in this afternoon. Amy and I have been working at getting it cleaned and ready the past couple weeks.Thursday night was our first night here and we stayed here all weekend. It’s really shaped up with some TLC! Amy has done a wonderful job transforming the functionality of the space. It’s very cozy now! I had a lot of decluttering to do!Things have wrapped up mostly on the project in Saranac Lake and I will be spending more time back here now. It’s been a rewarding experience living and working in the village. There’s plenty of work to do at the farm and some catching up to do with miscellaneous things. I recently got a gel shot in my left knee to try to relieve some of my pain and discomfort. My meniscus injury may very well require surgery but I am postponing that for as long as possible. At this point it’s still unclear how the injury even happened but it may go all the way back to last November when Zane and I tipped over the side by side one night by accident while burning off the meadows across the road at the farm. It’s the only thing that I can think of really. That was a rather wild evening of burning! But we had everything under control! Mostly… but that’s another story all together. The focus now will be shifting to resetting the sawmill and getting some logs run through it. It’s been stored in the warehouse since it got back from Winthrop in late May. I got it back out and set it back up recently one Friday night after returning from Saranac Lake.
Burning off the pond holes.
Back in February I had cut logs with my friend Gregger in his big woods up behind his home in Winthrop. I stayed in his cabin for a night and we cut logs for a couple days. We targeted hemlock for me for my Homestead cabin siding. Four trees made a rather large pile of logs. For him we cut cherry and yellow birch. With the snow covered ground we made good progress and we’re soon finished with the project. The plan was to leave the logs till spring when we could bring the sawmill up to run them through.
Stacking the hemlock.
It was mid May before I finally got the mill up to Gregger’s. I packed some food and extra gear so I could spend a night in his cabin then work a second day without doing all the extra driving. We got the mill set up and Zane came up to help out. We got a few hardwood logs run through that first day before making a nice dinner of venison and fish. Zane spent the night at the cabin with me but had things to do the next morning. Gregger and I ran a bunch more logs through the mill and stickered all the lumber up on his trailer under a tarp. Rain was a little bit of an issue but we worked around it as best we could. By the end of day 2 we had made a decent start on the hardwood log pile.
Off we go!
There was a gap in our sawmill activity when Amy and I traveled for a long weekend to the Brimfield Flea Market in Massachusetts. It was quite the event! We ended up purchasing a number of things that easily fit into her car. We tried to buy sensibly but impulse purchases of collectibles can be difficult to control! While we were in Massachusetts we traveled to nearby Connecticut to tour her former hometown. Saturday would find us on the beach at Watchhill, Rhode Island. It’s a lovely sanctuary that has preserved and will remain undeveloped. There’s nothing like the ocean to stir the inner spirit. It was our first traveling experience together and we had a really great time!
Brimfield Flea Market.
May was moving right along and there was only one week left before the Saranac Lake deck project was slated to begin. It was obvious that Gregger and I could never finish sawing his hardwood logs and all of my hemlock. I decided to truck all my logs to the Homestead instead. So we sawed during the day and I hauled a load home every night. We cut up some of the hardwood slabs to weigh down the truck also. Cut into 10” chunks they were stored in the Homestead woodshed each night to dry for the tiny cabin wood stove to be used during the next heating season. We completed all of Gregger’s hardwood logs and some hemlock he needed before finally beginning to concentrate on cleaning up his landing. I hauled a couple big loads of slab wood to the Homestead for sugarwood as part of this process.It was time consuming and tedious work but one with a larger purpose. I was beginning to get a little road weary but stayed with the pace. The final morning would find me following Gregger as he trucked the sawmill back to the Homestead.
Headed back.
I had received an offer to pick up some hemlock logs from a friend of a friend over by Sixberry Lake awhile back. I had picked up one load the day we returned the sawmill to the Homestead and dumped them off in the meadow near the warehouse.The fellow who gave them to me wanted two 14’ 6×6’s in exchange for the logs. A very fair proposition to which I readily agreed! I hadn’t gotten them done however and his July deadline was fast approaching. I picked out three decent logs but ended up needing four as one turned out to be “shaky”. Wind shake causes the growth rings in hemlock to break out when sawn into lumber. It’s not super common but sometimes happens in hemlock. The boards and timbers fall apart when shake shows up. It’s a frustrating thing when it happens and often those pieces of lumber end up in the sugar house for firewood! I ended up making the fellow three decent 6×6 timbers and one decent 4×4 timber. It seemed fair. I loaded them onto the trailer and delivered them to him where he then loaded the second load of logs for me. Prior to that I had moved all the piles of logs in the meadow up onto the landing log loading platform above the actual sawmill.
Prepping for 6×6 sawing.
Prior to delivery of the timbers,Zane and I spent the better part of Monday last week getting some pine logs that were on the log loading landing run through the mill. The pine sawyer beetles had begun to bore into them just under the bark so it was time! A couple months later it would be a different story as the beetles would have gotten inside the logs boring destructive holes through them. Nature at its finest! Sawyer beetles serve as a frontline decomposer type process that helps dead pine return to the soil. It was hot and dusty work but we managed to produce some very nice lumber. All the slab wood was dumped off the tractor loader into the big outdoor pile right outside the sugar house woodshed. Another job for another day or days most likely! We may be a little behind schedule!😂
Moving slab wood to the sugar house.
I finally got tired out from sawing and hand peeled the last three pine logs. They won’t be bothered by the beetles with their bark gone. The lumber was stickered and stashed away in the old woodshed and in the warehouse. We had to stack and haul all the dry sap buckets that had been sitting in the woodshed for weeks first though. That’s done finally at least. Lots of task oriented work to get done. I finally called it quits but felt very happy with our accomplishments. We had done a lot! It felt good getting caught up a little and working with the sawmill! Nothing like accomplishment to stir the inner spirit and charge the batteries! All that slab wood will be used for making maple syrup. Talk about repurposing! It all seemed a little time consuming. Last winters log cutting in Winthrop. Sawing logs there as payment for the hemlock logs I got from Gregger. Hauling those hemlock logs to the Homestead from Winthrop. Then turning around and going after more hemlock logs at Sixberry Lake. And all those hemlock logs still needed to be sawn! Was it really worth all the time and effort? Why not just side the buildings with vinyl siding or rough cut pine? It represents something much larger to me however. It’s all connected in some way that many people might struggle to understand. Hemlock is gone from the farm property where it once thrived. Locked in the buildings themselves in the form of timbers, rafters, and siding. To use hemlock to transform the farm buildings and the tiny cabin seemed justified in that moment to me. Who would buy siding or lumber when the means to create it lay within my grasp? What price do I place on my goals and dreams? I have insisted on hemlock siding for my building projects and hemlock we shall have in large plentiful quantities. I will create each piece with a driven mindset of determination. The time I will have invested in creating the lumber will be significant. But so will be the MOONTABS that led to its creation. That is the very level of resolve and stubborn perseverance. There is prideful rural heritage in the tasks at hand and in the deeds themselves. It will be remembered and visible long beyond this moment. That is where the message lies if indeed there is a message at all. Perhaps I simply underestimated the very magnitude of the job itself. What does it truly matter in the end? When all is finished and slab wood burns in the evaporator from those same logs what will I think then? I will know that answer I hope if I am to be so fortunate. I will be residing within those hemlock shrouded walls of the tiny cabin and standing in front of my boiling evaporator yet another March day. Why ask so many questions anyway? What is time anyway? I will never get it all done anyway say the teachings of Abraham-Hicks. It’s an inner calling these things I desire to do. It is enough.✍️
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!
The cliffs along Lake Ontario.
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!
Gracie scopes out the arch formation.
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!
Found them!
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!
Morel cheese burger!
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!
Foraging headquarters!
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!
Nice haul!
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 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.
Syrup sample one passes!
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!
Steam away!
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.
“Girthzilla”
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 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!
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!✍️
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!
Power trio!
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.
This trout had advice for me!
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!
The crude map of the different strings.
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.
Gary with a nice haul Tuesday!
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!
On Green Mountain setting mini tubes.
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.✍️
