Harvesting from bottles REPRISE

PitsPale · 12-10-2008, 04:48 PM

I, like someone else who recently posted, would like to harvest the yeast out of a couple bottles I have but I would like to clean it and save it for use in a later brewing...

I've read the yeast cleaning 101 thing about how to recycle your yeast - but how is this done out of the bottle?

So - starting with the empty bottle with sediment at the bottom you would just use that instead of the carboy and do everything the same?? Obviously you wouldn't get multiple mason jars like the tutorial, but maybe 1 or 2? Would it be better to empty 2 or 3 bottles and collect from multiples at once?

Thanks,
Andy

**BargainFittings** · 12-11-2008, 11:19 AM

You don't need to clean the yeast from bottle sediment. It should be just yeast.

Flame the lips of the bottle before you pour off the beer and then add the yeast from several bottles together and make a starter.

You can store the yeast with some sterile water in one bottle in the fridge for quite awhile. Just cap it and keep it cold.

Just be sure to build a starter up a couple times if you don't have much yeast to begin with.

**Homercidal** · 12-11-2008, 04:44 PM

That yeast thread is VERY nice. Basically I imagine you'd just carefully pour off a bottle or two and then what I did is add cool water to each bottle (just a little) and swirled it up. Then I poured it into a large mason jar with a small batch of wort sitting on my stirplate (optional). I think from there, the yeast harvesting thread takes over. At least that's my plan.

I think it will take a mason jar or two to collect enough yeast to make it worth saving, and you might not save any money over buying yeast, but this way you can be sure of using the same yeast as the breweries (at least the same yeast that they finish with...)