Tapping Day - Finally

Got some good snow on Friday (five inches) and it was colder but the forecast look promising for some good temps. It's really been cool the last week or so.

Date	Low	High
Fri, Mar 11, 2005	12°	34°
Sat, Mar 12, 2005	9°	23°
Sun, Mar 13, 2005	11°	28°
Mon, Mar 14, 2005	12°	24°
Tue, Mar 15, 2005	18°	37°
Wed, Mar 16, 2005	18°	32°
Thu, Mar 17, 2005	19°	36°
Fri, Mar 18, 2005	24°	30°

So Trip and I went out this morning and tapped the trees. Of course I didn't have the correct size drill bit. I needed a 7/16" and only had a 3/8" And, of course, trying to compensate for the smaller bit I bored the hole a little. And, of course, I made it TOO BIG. So when I tapped in the spiles the sap started running, but it began leaking between the tree and the spile (not good). So there's my first bonehead move of the project. Wrong tools makes for bad work, in just about everything.

So now we have four taps going, three of the four are slightly running and each of them are leaking (dang it!) and the fourths is dry so far.