To Tap (Trees) or Not to Tap

That has been my burning question for the past three weeks.

This winter has had such up and down weather I could have put taps in my maple trees any month since December.  Now that it's tapping time according to the calendar, I'm wondering what this year's sap run will be like, and if I even want to tap.  I have plenty of syrup left from the 2011 season.  I don't need to tap in order to have enough syrup for this year. 

However, that part of me that got bit by the syruping bug two years ago wants to tap. 

Then, the realistic part of me speaks up again and says "Yeah, but it's a lot of work, and will you have time to do it right?  Besides, you still don't have a real set-up for boiling off.  Do you really want to use the turkey fryer again?" 

Then the addicted part of me counters "But it's tapping time.  And what if next year is a really bad year?  Then I'll wish I had made syrup in 2012."

I decided maybe I'd just tap a few trees.  Enough to make a little bit of syrup this year, but not the whole 14 taps I had in last year.  Five or six sounded like a good number.


So,in late February I started saving up milk jugs as we emptied them, washing them out well and trying to amass enough to hang on trees when the prolonged weather forecast said it was going to be perfect weather for tapping.  Tapping in this part of Michigan usually happens in late February or early March.

Then we got a cold snap, and the high temp for several days was not above thirty degrees.  Then it warmed up, straight to fifty degrees yesterday.  Today it's supposed to hit 65 (and it feels like it will).  The buds on the maple trees are looking pretty swollen.

I might not have to decide whether or not to tap trees.  Looks like our forecast has only three days with nights close to or below freezing in the next 10 days.  The trees might be too far budded out after this afternoon to even mess with setting taps to get 2-3 days of sap before the temps get too warm again and the trees burst their buds.  Apparently I should have set taps on those warm days in January and not worried about the trees being too healed by the end of February to get sap during the traditional tapping time.