Reusing Harvested Yeast

Harvested off some 1056 from a batch of Pale 2 weeks ago, split the slurry into 2 quart mason jars and it's been sitting in the fridge since. Should I pitch this into a starter and then add the starter to primary when I brew this weekend or can I just bring the harvested yeast up to room temp, decant and pitch directly without making a starter? Thinking because I split this into just 2 quart jars that I should have plenty of yeast to just do a direct pitch into primary but figured I'd ask the group while I still have time to get a starter going.

Check Mr Malty for the amount of slurry needed; I usually pitch harvested yeast directly if it's been less than 3 weeks.

I think two weeks is recent enough to not do a starter. Also, you should decant while the yeast cake is still cold and firm.

What is your expected batch size and og of your next brew? You're likely to massively over pitch, but you probably won't notice much of an effect...

Next batch is 5.5 gallons and OG of 1.051. I could always just pitch 1/2 the amount in the jar if you think the entire thing may be too much.

quaboagbrewing said:

Next batch is 5.5 gallons and OG of 1.051. I could always just pitch 1/2 the amount in the jar if you think the entire thing may be too much.

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Does your harvested yeast contain a lot of hop debris? If not estimate 1 billion cells per milliliter for a rough estimate of yeast cells. Check Mr Malty for guidance also.

There was definitely some hop debris left behind in the slurry. I pitched the slurry yesterday around 3pm @ 70 degrees (1056 Yeast). 14 hours in and no activity. Wondering if rather then over pitching I could have under pitched and maybe didn't get enough viable yeast into the batch. I have plenty of US-05 on hand...how long should I give this before I need to switch into rescue mode and pitch the US-05.

Don't start worrying yet. How many milliliters of slurry did you pitch? Bring your wort temperature down to 62° to 64°. When the yeast takes off it will raise the temperature of the wort by about 5° to 6°. After the first three to four days of active fermentation temperature control will no longer be needed.

pitched approx 100ml of slurry...wort was 70 when I pitched but moved to cellar that's sitting at a pretty constant 64 degrees. normally wouldn't be all that concerned but this was the 1st time I pitched slurry...usually I wash the yeast first but was pressed for time 2 weeks ago and decided to just dump and save off the slurry knowing I was going to be using it couple weeks later. I'll check in on it later this afternoon when it's reached the 24 hour mark and see where things stand.

Post back this afternoon. I have had fermentations not take off for over 24 hours and the beer turned out as expected.
According to Mr Malty your pitch was probably good.

When reusing slurry, I like to make a small starter and pitch at high krausen. Last time, the lag was about 4 hours before fermentation started.

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and we have liftoff...27 hours in and finally starting to see some activity