Phase Change

Ice turns to water as winter turns to spring.

We tapped our maple trees today! They look pretty much as the ones in the previous shot - big blue bags hanging hooked over a metal tap that has been drilled into the sap wood at a slight angle. Sap runs when the nights fall below freezing but the days are warm, so we should be collecting any day. Nothing yet though.

As I mentioned earlier, the big problem for novice tappers like us is identifying the maple trees in the first place. It really would have been a good idea to do this in the fall! Nephew W., who's done this before, came out to help us - we marked six trees as likely maples and tapped 5 of them. Key identifier, according to the books, is the twigs - they should branch off in pairs. Mr. L. has been photographing the twigs and the bark of other people's tapped maple trees over the last week, but I have to say it's anything but convincing. Wish us luck!