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Sealing Maple's after the Syrup Harvest

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Mitch, Mitchell, Alone, History, Channel, Survival, Nativesurvival.

Tags: native,survival,nativesurvival,wilderness,bushcraft,plugging,sugar,maples,harvest,sap,syrup,edibles,foraging,wild,primitive,quiver,meat,archery,plant,tree,bowl,burn,spring,fletching,blanket,birch,bark,medicinal,camp,trapping,scouting,tracking,knapping,abo,antler,hammerstone,bone,stone,point,rabbit,hog,deer,white,tail,willow,cordage,dogbane,basket,woodland,water,fishing,kit,go,bag,bugout,bov,bob,bowdrill,handdrill,stick,stalking,tom,brown,ray,mears,trap,conserving,resources

Video Transcription

a smidgen ada survival I'm out here on the night again with my sugar maple trees it's not going to be doing a few things it's me my last night with my trees here I'm going to be collecting my last my last bounty of SAP pulling my taps and plug in the trees so we've got a pretty good harvest this year and I really appreciate it from the trees so it's still freezing out at night and above freezing during the day so the trees are still producing SAP so what I want to do is stop early I've gotten I've gotten what I want out of it so I'm going to stop early before it ends I'm not going to take everything so I want the tree to be able to have sap for its own its own portion I think it's important to not take all the resources from a certain resource and what I mean by that is if there's a fruit tree and it has you know ten fruit let's say I'm not going to take ten I'm going to take between three and five at the most 7mo is going to leave at least a third for nature and maybe even fifty percent unless I was starving of course one tree is going to kill the ecosystem I like to think that way that way that mindset is going to allow the resources i live off of to be sustainable and live as well thus ensuring my myself alliance in my survival ok so again I'm not that far off the road I'm just maybe 300 yards so you might have some cars going by like there was you know just a minute ago so I hope you guys enjoy this this last little night excursion and I'll be right back with you okay so this is a this is a good sign here looks like the liquid is nearly at the top so I have a lot of SAP there the nice full gallon so my not held up over here and I'm going to show you something that happens when you get zapped this late in the season I mentioned in my reducing video making syrup at home that I didn't have to filter it because it was the first batch and it was still very clean so I didn't filter through a bandana like I normally would now this is what I was referring to i'm going to show you guys what's inside here and why I filter my SAP after so the first batch is you don't have to but the second batch I do so hang tight all right so is my drug off the tree and i'm going to show you guys the close-up if I can that's why I filter my second batch because of all the insects in the ants and everything they get into the syrup for the sugar content now again the first batch is usually so clean it's not necessary but obviously the second batch is loaded with insects so I always filled it up before I make syrup now okay so out comes the tap let's get in there alright so now I need to plug that hole right there so well did was try and get this in the white a little bit for you let's try it again there you go it's okay twig a branch off of a maple sapling right behind this tree on the other side of the camera so behind me and it's still alive still green that's important they want to put dead wood inside the living would and i always put species to species so obviously sugar maple sugar maple alright so from here all I'm going to do is get and frame here let's see if it fits first okay does it's a little loose so I'm going to go find a thicker branch all right so this one's a little thicker someone at the end sit on the frame sort of that

okay now i'm going to do is take the bark off

so what's in the tree is going to be wood on wood I've actually more important is mortal to a tree implants and just would this is actually the inner bark which is the living part of a tree in of a branch so I'm going to be putting same species to species in here I'm not cutting so deep that I'm getting rid of the living tissue so that way it's living tissue into living tissue okay so this is a little crooked here not too bad because it's green I can bend it a little bit not worried about it the whole it's gonna straighten right out so and it goes alright so now I'm going to just cut it off try to make it as clean as possible I'm just doing what's called a stop cut where it's where you truncate the material that you're cutting and basically all that means that you cut exactly perpendicular to its growth pattern so I'm cutting directly in a 90 degree angle and then I cut in with the growth pattern into that cut and it creates a nice nice and notch next 90 degree cut going all the way down what's going to happen is I'll be left with a nice flat piece of wood that's let's flush and again it's living nothing I like to do I've used all sorts of things rocks large sticks I just have a hemp I hammer it with me tonight just tap it a little make sure it's nice and tight and that way it's flush so there's no infection insects anything getting inside here let me zoom in for you guys start with that so I'm get focus again there we go all right so you can see it's nice and clean and it's again it's the same species to species and it's a living tissue to living tissue all right so that's how I go about plugging my trees so I'm going to move on along down my line and I'll get back with you guys okay so i just got finished plug it up mine I trees so I've about maybe five gallons of sap here some are all the way to the brim and some are halfway or less that gives me a total of about 12 of the year so I'm pretty happy with that I tap 29 this year and a good friend of mine Sarge feria hung out with me and tapped eight out here as well so I'm going to be swinging by a house pretty soon bro with your half of the harvest and for sure you have quite a few gallons of play around with all right let's Bend mission data survival I appreciate your views your comments and support I'll see you in the next one take care

About the Author

NativeSurvival

NativeSurvival

Mitch is a Wilderness Living Skills Instructor, he has been featured on The History Channel's program "ALONE" and written articles for Outdoor Magazines; he owns and operates The Native Survival School which provides woodland living and survival classes, as well as offering quality outdoor gear he's designed. Defintely, he is a master at bushcraft's techniques.

You can find all his videos on his YouTube channel.

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