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New Years day yeast management

Yeast & Fermentation
#1

Followed through on taking care of my harvested yeast inventory on 1/1/17. (I have to practice getting used to writing 2017)

Only had two yeasts needing care. Harvested US-05 (aka WY 1056), and WY 3711. Had two pint jars of WY 3711 and one quart jar. One pint was from April and the other two jars from June. The yeast in the pint jar from April and the pint jar from June looked greyish so I dumped them. The Quart jar from June had very dark oxidized beer above creamy white yeast. I decanted the oxidized beer and replace it with the spent wort from the US-05 starter.

I reread my label as I was preparing to extract 50 ml of yeast form the quart of June 3711 harvest for a 1 liter starter. The date was June 29, 2015. Took a full 24 hours before a good krausen developed in the swirled not stirred starter.

I’ll probably only estimate 3 billion cells per milliliter the next time I use this yeast and hope fermentation characteristics are the same as a fresh pack of yeast.

#2

I need to do this as well…who knows what kind of unintended yeast experiments are taking place in the back of my fridge?!

#3

I was just thinking that I need to start going through yeast in January and discarding if not used within the past 2 months. I’m like @dannyboy58, who knows what’s going on in there!

#4

I’m bad about storing yeast. Usually end up buying fresh. With dry I just toss it in so it is way easier than saving it. Did save some of the Hothead yeast and will try to use it for at least three more batches by saving some each time and making a starter for the next. Saving a bunch is not easy in an RV and the fridges at home are empty and turned off until spring.

You guys are being smart tossing any suspect yeast. A new vial, smack pack or packet is cheap compared to a ruined batch.

#5

I just started collecting and storing my yeast in September…after 8 years of brewing. That first 10 gallon batch of lager was an eye opener after I calculated the starter size required for 1.060 OG. So now I have a nice constant rotation of 2035 and 1335 slurry in pint jars; just need to get better at keeping track of generations.

#6

I had started a spread sheet to track generations but gave up after a year. When you harvest two pints, pint A and Pint B, then use some of Pint A and then harvest two more pints…Aach!

Now I look at the jars once in a while and toss what doesn’t look like good yeast. To complicate it I make an extra large starters to harvest from each starter besides having the harvested yeast from each fermentation.

#7

Geez, my collected yeast are in the door of the fridge!:disappointed: I’m am going to gear up so in 2 weeks to use my lager yeast, which do still look good. I’ll use both types, and toss the bavarian after, and one last one with 34/70 after. I’ll do a starter to see how my ales are in Feb… Sneezles61

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