A sap drips life.

This story documents the life of a sap drip in the Twin Maple Sugarworks sugarbush.

One warm saturday morning about 45 degrees outside a small sap drips, drips out of the tree into the mainline. It falls down down down down down down the line until it's met by the bustling intersection of the main mainline and the mainline it just came down. But the force of the other sap drips pushing behind it and the vacuum pulling them toward the collection tank. They finally make it into the vacuum which piles more sap on top of it until it collects 50 gallons and then dumps it into the collection tank. Next, when there is 2700 gallons of sap in the collection tank Don, Wyatt and, Glynn hop in the big army truck and drive to the sugar bush. They hook up the long hose to the hose going to the tank, they hook up the long hose to the pump, then they hook the short hose to the pump, then they hook up the short hose to tank, then they turn the valve on the big trucks collection tank, then they turn the valve on the big tank, then they turn the pump on and wait 20 minutes for pump to finish loading sap into the tank. Next, they drive the big truck back to the sugarhouse and hook up all the pipes (not gonna say the exact way they do it’s very long) and wait 20 minute for the pump to finish unloading the sap. Then Don goes into the sugarhouse and turns on the RO (reverse osmosis) which takes the sap and filters off the water.(Ultimately having less water to boil off making the process shorter) Then from the RO to the concentrate tank. Then from there it goes to the arch to do most of the boiling. Into the piggyback which as its name suggests piggybacks the arch. Then into the steamaway which as its name suggests gets most of the steam away. Then into pan 1-2-3 and then through the drawoff valve into the draw off tank then from there through a little pipe into the a pumpin the back room into the filter press and from there into a barrel then to storage. Then from the barrel to a heating pan. Then from there into the canning machine and into the bottle. Then the bottle goes onto the for-sale rack. AND THAT IS THE HIGHLY COMPLICATED LIFE OF A SAP DRIP IN THE Twin Maple Sugarworks sugarbush. 

 

Wyatt_M

VT

15 years old

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