Squishy-Squishy-The mud is here.

Ahh, Spring. That beautiful time of year when everything is brown or snow colored like Wyatt after a dirt bath. As the white stuff recedes, we see all of the things that we didn't get done before the winter. Like all the hoses neatly coiled in a fine rats nest, only broken by the slashes courtesy of the plow. Or the shovel half buried that we have spent most of the winter looking for. It goes on and on, and as much as I enjoy a clean farm, I have to just ignore it as maple syrup calls and until all the snow is gone, it is a futile effort to pick away at the small stuff.

Do I have something in my teeth?

Maple season has been good so far. We have already made more than all of last year and production continues, at a slower pace due to weather that was too warm, which had the sap stop flowing and now it hasn't been getting warm enough during the day to make much of a run. I am enjoying the brief break though as a chance to catch up on bottling, labeling and delivering to customers. The warm-up was preceded by a marathon boiling session to ensure that none of the sap went bad and there is only one sure way to make that happen-turn it into syrup! Thanks to all the friends who came by to visit and partake in the New England tradition of watching the sanity of the sugar maker slowly disappear. It is entertaining for the guest but helps the sugar maker because no sane person would watch and think they should do that too, so competition stays low. Here is a picture of the operation in full flow for those who can't be here to watch.

To elaborate on the turkey fryer process a bit more and how our evaporator works. The big silver tank in the background is the feed tank. We pump from outside tanks into here with a filtering process to remove most things from the sap. This tank feeds a float box which controls the amount of sap in the syrup pan.

The flue pan, which sits in front of the tank in this picture, is where most of your evaporation takes place. It has small alleys or flues in the pan that make more of the sap in contact with the heat below.

After it has boiled in the flue pan, the smaller box to the left will control it's release into the syrup pan. The syrup pan is the shorter pan to the left where you get to making the finished syrup product, or in my case, close enough to finished but not in danger of burning and ruining a $1,000 dollar stainless syrup pan. I prefer to use, you guessed it, the good old turkey fryer to finish my syrup on, after filtering, because I can do large batches and easily control the heat since it is propane. Plus the pot is $45 which would sting but wouldn't cause a heart attack.

We are still refining the process but we are getting there. Construction wasn't fully complete when we started as you can tell from the scaffolding in the background. That will have to wait for the snow melt too.

Farmer Phils Big Winter Vacation.

For those who don’t know, we raise Icelandic sheep on our farm. The sheep were actually the first animals we got on the farm along with Mama the goat. Most sheep need to be sheared (get a hair cut) at least once a year. We shear twice, in the spring and in the fall, as the fleece quality is much better the more you cut it. It also makes lambing easier and the summer a little more bearable for the sheep.

 

Previously we have hired a professional shearer to come and do this for us. Not many people would look at the process and determine that it is easy. It takes a lot of strength, flexability and patience as you finagle a 175 lb. animal around with really sharp clippers that can cut both of you. All the while, they are attempting to get away not realizing the impending danger they are in. Despite this, I have been watching it for a number of years now and really wanted to learn how to do it myself. Enter my big vacation to the Cornell University shearing school this past weekend.

The shearing school was a two day course at the Cornell sheep farm in Dryden, NY. It teaches the basics of shearing while giving you a hands on experience handling all types of sheep. (No major injuries to report to student or sheep).  Shearing has been fine tuned over the centuries to a standardized pattern of cuts that are used across all breeds of sheep. The process we were being taught was perfected in New Zealand in the 50’s . It breaks down the shearing in simple, easy to follow steps, which as with most things, look great on paper.

 

 

He doesn't appear to be in pain or yelling expletives and that sheep is holding still - based on recent experiences, I am calling Shenanigans...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 After getting a few demonstrations, we began shearing. We would then get some more demonstration and shear some more sheep. It really was a hands on learning process because no sheep will react the same way and each step takes a few times to feel comfortable with. By the end of the day on Sunday I can claim that I sheared 11 sheep. I will probably be practicing on our lambs as a refresher for when we do the full flock. I'll try and go a little further into the process then.  As one instructor put it best “ sometimes whatever gets it done is the best method”and I think that sums it up. All in all a great class, where I got to meet some great people and learn something new-all the elements of a good trip in my book.

I did attempt to have a guest blogger tell the story of how our horse earned the name of Houdini while I was gone but she was still traumatized from the event, but I am sure we can get her to tell the tale soon.