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Spring Banter & General Discussion/Observations

CapturedNature

By CapturedNature,
in New England

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tamarack

tamarack

Posted
Posted
36 minutes ago, MetHerb said:

The hole is a 5/16 diameter hole about 1-1.5" deep.  It would be no different than a similar sized branch breaking off.  The tree heals itself within a few months so you're not leaving this open hole in the side of tree.  It's kind of a misnomer that taking sap hurts the tree.  We are only collecting a small portion of all the sap that is running through the tree.  Even with vacuum systems you're just creating an environment of lower pressure to allow the sap to flow.  You're not sucking it out of the tree.  Trees have been tapped for hundreds of years without harming them and proper management plans help the trees be healthier than they otherwise would be.

Since this is a banter thread, I'll offer a mild correction.  Trees don't heal in the way that we do, they cover wounds with new wood.  If one were to cut down a 24" diameter maple that had been tapped since it was 10" and saw it into boards, every old tap hole would be visible, probably filled in with woody material (likely a different color than surroundings) but with each outline plainly seen.  However, as you've noted, a healthy tree will grow over a 5/16" hole during the first growing season after a tap is removed, and though I'm far from a sugary expert, I'm confident that the above info is factual, with that one tiny exception.

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CapturedNature

CapturedNature

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Posted
23 minutes ago, tamarack said:

Since this is a banter thread, I'll offer a mild correction.  Trees don't heal in the way that we do, they cover wounds with new wood.  If one were to cut down a 24" diameter maple that had been tapped since it was 10" and saw it into boards, every old tap hole would be visible, probably filled in with woody material (likely a different color than surroundings) but with each outline plainly seen.  However, as you've noted, a healthy tree will grow over a 5/16" hole during the first growing season after a tap is removed, and though I'm far from a sugary expert, I'm confident that the above info is factual, with that one tiny exception.

Correct...There are some saw mills that will make boards from maple trees that have been tapped and you can see what it does.  It's one reason when tapping you try to spiral around the tree so it reduces the impact to the tree.  I've attached an image that I think is a veneer but it gives you an idea of what something would look like made out of the wood.  I know one guy that sided the inside of his sugarhouse with the boards.

355_lg.jpg

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Whineminster

Whineminster

Posted
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2 hours ago, MetHerb said:

Correct...There are some saw mills that will make boards from maple trees that have been tapped and you can see what it does.  It's one reason when tapping you try to spiral around the tree so it reduces the impact to the tree.  I've attached an image that I think is a veneer but it gives you an idea of what something would look like made out of the wood.  I know one guy that sided the inside of his sugarhouse with the boards.

 

oww, those look like gashes! Poor tree :(. Haha no I'm J/K, I'd tap my trees but they're not big enough yet, only like 5 or 6" in diameter.  Around here it seems to be the big old scraggly trees that everyone taps. 

 

Going in a spiral? Wouldn't you want to tap in different spots vertically too? I heard if you cut a ring of bark off all the way around a tree, it dies.  Is this true? 

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tamarack

tamarack

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That's an incredible piece of wood - shows the tap holes and the fungal stain above and below.  "Character wood" - reminds me of the wood from decades-old logs fished off the bottom of Moosehead Lake.  There's a mill in Wisconsin that would pay huge prices for such logs - like 5-10 times what fresh logs would bring at a hardwood sawmill.  The catch was that, first, it's costly and dangerous to find and raise the sticks, and second, the mill had to receive the logs no more than two weeks after they had been pulled from the water, probably because a longer uncontrolled drying would result in checks and cracks that would make them useless for lumber. 

Cutting a ring all the way around (called "girdling") will usually kill a tree, though a vigorous one may be able to bridge the gap with new wood before the roots starve.  For large trees, one wishing to girdle - a good way to eliminate unwanted and unmarketable trees without crushing a tenth acre of saplings - two cuts a few inches apart is recommended.  Makes for some great wildlife snags as well.  I think the "spiral" mentioned includes changes in height.  However, for a 20" tree and 5/16" holes, it would take nearly 200 such holes to go all the way around, and before one would drill that many, the initial holes would long since have grown over. 

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Typhoon Tip

Typhoon Tip

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15 minutes ago, tamarack said:

That's an incredible piece of wood - shows the tap holes and the fungal stain above and below.  "Character wood" - reminds me of the wood from decades-old logs fished off the bottom of Moosehead Lake.  There's a mill in Wisconsin that would pay huge prices for such logs - like 5-10 times what fresh logs would bring at a hardwood sawmill.  The catch was that, first, it's costly and dangerous to find and raise the sticks, and second, the mill had to receive the logs no more than two weeks after they had been pulled from the water, probably because a longer uncontrolled drying would result in checks and cracks that would make them useless for lumber. 

Cutting a ring all the way around (called "girdling") will usually kill a tree, though a vigorous one may be able to bridge the gap with new wood before the roots starve.  For large trees, one wishing to girdle - a good way to eliminate unwanted and unmarketable trees without crushing a tenth acre of saplings - two cuts a few inches apart is recommended.  Makes for some great wildlife snags as well.  I think the "spiral" mentioned includes changes in height.  However, for a 20" tree and 5/16" holes, it would take nearly 200 such holes to go all the way around, and before one would drill that many, the initial holes would long since have grown over. 

I've read that Lakes Superior and Huron are also big for recovering timbre that's sat at the bottom post shipping flounders. The water being so cold and oxygen depleted at depth preserves the wood and it's a kind of snooty/artsy thing - fascinating nonetheless..   

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CapturedNature

CapturedNature

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36 minutes ago, tamarack said:

I think the "spiral" mentioned includes changes in height.  However, for a 20" tree and 5/16" holes, it would take nearly 200 such holes to go all the way around, and before one would drill that many, the initial holes would long since have grown over. 

That's exactly why that is the suggested tapping procedure.  By the time you get back to the spot you tapped years prior, the tree has grown enough allowing an area for the sap to transported vertically through the tree.

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OceanStWx

OceanStWx

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On 3/6/2017 at 5:27 PM, CoastalWx said:

  But you and several others aren't listening. I am happy to correct some of the myths, but the blatant disregard for facts brought up in here is mindblowing.  The whole "they always look good far away and then trend to crao" is nonsense. First of all, if you define far away from day 7-16...guess what...you'll always come up with a hit with a model run between 2-4 times per day. You are just asking for disappointment if that's how you view the science. There is a reason why we say please ignore the op runs beyond day 7. Some are not doing that. Also, we've had several events that were nothing inside day 7 and then trended better. Last year had a few of them...hell so did this year. So that is another misnomer. People believe what they want to believe.

How soon we forget about progged whiffs that turn into blizzards for SNE. I'll actually give @Damage In Tolland some credit here, at least he recognizes when a storm trends into 1-2" of slop for him on the hill as a win. We've had a lot of systems this year trend colder close in, but if you were progged for rain to begin with you don't care about a colder rain. But it matters for some, like Kevin, Hubb, and out by the Pit. 

1 hour ago, Ginx snewx said:

Happy mid level magic anniversary, some knew some didn't

Nah, all storms trend worse.

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ORH_wxman

ORH_wxman

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5 minutes ago, OceanStWx said:

Exciting news for 20' snow bank enthusiasts: We're working to get 8B0 added to the METAR plots at GYX. I believe it's currently reporting via MADIS, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue to get it into our systems.

It's been showing up on the UCAR plot for a few weeks now...its fun since it's a real weenie location at like 1800 feet I think.

 

 

2017030815_metars_alb.gif

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OceanStWx

OceanStWx

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7 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

It's been showing up on the UCAR plot for a few weeks now...its fun since it's a real weenie location at like 1800 feet I think.

That's where Ekster and I noticed it recently.

On ADDS it is an available METAR, and they were told that if they started transmitting it we would start to broadcast the info for them. So we're working to get it up and running. Everything is done on their end, so now it's up to us. 

I don't see why we couldn't get it to display on the webpage as an observation location, etc.

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OceanStWx

OceanStWx

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2 minutes ago, dendrite said:

Mesowest has an 1825ft listing. Not sure if that's official or estimated from the lat/long of that point on the runway shown.

http://mesowest.utah.edu/cgi-bin/droman/station_total.cgi?stn=K8B0&unit=0

Yeah, that's the point on the runway. You can see the white-ish AWOS just about the space between the "e" in service and "A" in agency. 

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wxeyeNH

wxeyeNH

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Those winds in NY are crazy.   I have not been paying attention but that line of heavy showers racing east.  Winds are already getting very gusty at my high SW exposure.  No wind advisory or special weather statements but is going to be a surprise high wind event?   We will know soon enough...

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dendrite

dendrite

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19 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

Those winds in NY are crazy.   I have not been paying attention but that line of heavy showers racing east.  Winds are already getting very gusty at my high SW exposure.  No wind advisory or special weather statements but is going to be a surprise high wind event?   We will know soon enough...

not happening james

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