Keeping a yeast starter going for a month or more

[fungusdrool]

What are the consequences?

I assume one: real foul oxidized beer.
But can the yeast stay healthy?

How often would you feed them? Is a doubling of volume OK every 2 weeks?

If I keep the starter on a stirplate, such that the yeast never have a chance to settle, do they go dormant or do they stay active?

What happens if they are active and start to starve?

Basically, I keep pushing off the brew that would use the yeast, and since I don’t seem to be getting close, I never crashed but just kept them spinning.

Will I be able to use this yeast? If not, is there something that I can do to revitalize them?

[mvsawyer]

The will not be active if there is no sugar to eat. You’re just making them dizzy in there. If you keep pushing back brewday, put them in the fridge and let them be. If they sit in there longer than a couple of weeks, wake em up with some fresh wort a day before brewing. Otherwise, they’ll still be ready to direct pitch from the starter.

If you’ve had them going for a month already, crash the starter and a few days before brewday wake em up with fresh wort.

[fungusdrool]

Thanks for the reply.

One question: would there be any point to rousing them before the brew if I just need to crash again anyway (to pour off the start-beer before pitching)?

So they are currently quasi-active/hungry/dizzy…I crash them…I rouse them they are happy…I crash them again…then bring out of fridge/pour off beer/and pitch?

[a10t2]

After a month at room temperature the viability of the culture is probably <50%. So you may need to step the starter up no matter what.

There’s little downside to a month or so of storage in the fridge. If you want to get the culture active on brewday, you can pull off a little wort a few minutes into the boil, chill it, and add it to the starter vessel. Since the wort is the same as the rest of the batch, there’s no reason to chill/decant.

[fungusdrool]

“If you want to get the culture active on brewday, you can pull off a little wort a few minutes into the boil, chill it, and add it to the starter vessel. Since the wort is the same as the rest of the batch, there’s no reason to chill/decant.”

That’s an awesome idea that I’ve never done before!
This one is going on my “brew day info page”.
Thanks.