April 3, 2020 - Friday morning

38 degrees/partly cloudy/calm winds

Pentoga Road

After a night of hard and uninterrupted sleep, I think I'm ready to head to the woods for another day of mapling... er, sapping... how about just collecting and boiling sap?

Sargie and I collected twice yesterday and the truth be known, we should have collected yet another time before sunset. The trees were leaking water like a faucet with a bad washer.

Sargie was willing, but I was all done in. My energy tank was empty. Earlier, while on the four wheeler, a five gallon pail filled with sap had started to spill while ferrying it to the barn. I reached around to grab it and as I turned back ahead, was thwacked in the chest by a low hanging limb. 

I almost fell off the ATV, spilled half a pail of sap, and managed to get wet, all in one motion. I know if Mama had been able, she'd have reached down from Heaven and washed my mouth out with soap. I wasn't so sure that Sargie wasn't going to. 

It was time to hang it up for the day.

I started the boiler yesterday morning and kept it going all day. I remain disappointed in the sap/syrup ration. We boiled down one batch and barely canned a measly gallon.

It tastes great and the quality is superb, but the sugar content this year is extremely low. For sure, I'll be making a reverse osmosis unit before the next maple season to help separate the water from the sugar. We're going through a lot of wood and a ton of work for very little show for our efforts.

Sargie took advantage of a pause in the action on Thursday to whip up a huge pot of chili. As always, it is to die for good. I had a small bowl for lunch and two HUGE bowls for supper.

Sargie's chili is one of my favorite food groups along with her seafood Alfredo and a half dozen other goodies she makes every now and then.

 I kept busy either shoving wood in the fire box, adding sap to the tank above the boiler, or in the shop and red shed, sorting milled lumber. Some I burned, but most I kept, sorted, and stacked. 



Today should see the end to the lumber saga. I sure hope so. I'm about all lumber'd out.

I conducted the first annual spring goldfish count yesterday and am happy to say all made it through the winter months. I need to call Hambone and tell him his fish are doing well.



I should also give Cosmo and Mike a jingle and tell them their filtering system is working unbelievably well. The water is crystal clear and looking at the fish eleven feet down is like peering into an aquarium.



Though we collected twice yesterday, the sap bags should have been emptied again last night before dark. I'm going to skip my morning walk and do that first thing. 

I think I'll pull the taps Saturday morning and bring the maple season to a close. In some ways, it's been disappointing, the sugar to syrup ratio and all, but in others, it's been a great success. I've wanted to purchase an evaporator for many years and mostly out of necessity, (lack of time and labor) I was forced to this year. I've not regretted doing so.

Getting a rare break, Sargie's relaxing in the sun and talking on the phone.

My mind is turning from maple syrup to gardening and chores that need to be done to the house and the yard before summer arrives. It's time to close this current chapter and begin the next.

It must be spring. I saw my first butterfly yesterday.

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road... 

Today's random Alaska picture:
I was riding down the main street in Nome on my snowmobile when I saw something that looked like an antler sticking out from the bed of a parked pickup truck.
It was someone's pet caribou.