yeah dave ive done it many times. we demo it every year at a local museum . we rock boil it . takes forever for nothing. i actually prefer to gather the sap boil it about 50% and use it for tea water. just add whatever you want, sweet fern, wintergreen , mint, sassafrass is the best and you have sweetened tea. birch can also be tapped. takes a lot more sap than sugar maple and sugar maple takes a lot. i think its like 55 to 1. so 55 gallons of sap from a maple will give you 1 gallon of syrup. this year i didnt make any but i usually make a quart and then boil some for sugar.