pumpkin ale turned Black in carboy

i got the Northern Brewer pumpkin ale kit awhile back. after reading reviews about it and on this forum, i decided to add more pumpkin pie spice to the secondary. in the primary it had an amber/orange color. now it turn black while in secondary.
could it be infected? why else would it turn black?

i tried searching on here but couldnt find anything.

It's clearing, relax. (it's not really black)

thughes said:

It's clearing, relax. (it's not really black)

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This. You'll be fine.

when will i start to see a change?

Can you take a picture? What makes you think it is black? what color was it when you started?

ill post a picture of it tomorrow. the color of it is just black after i put it in secondary. its been in there since the 3rd of september

thughes said:

It's clearing, relax. (it's not really black)

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I third this. Yeast dropped out, nothing to reflect the light now. It will be lighter in the glass.

Was it in a bucket before, and then you transferred to a clear secondary. Most beers will look like this. The white bucket and cloudiness early in fermentation make them look bright. Once they are clear, which they are after a couple weeks in the primary they look super dark. Its hard for light to pass through the beer so it looks darker than it is. It's like looking at a glass of beer vs. holding it up to the light.

My pumpkin ale was based off an Amber Ale and is quite dark and has been since I brewed it. I think the grains were quite dark though. I've attached a pic of it in the secondary.

Stab in the dark here. Do you sanitize with iodophor? Maybe some residual sanitizer is interacting with some unconverted starches from the pumpkin. Iodine + starch ='black(ish)

I do not.

jaw005 said:

when will i start to see a change?

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When you pour it in a glass to drink it.

Jaehnig said:

My pumpkin ale was based off an Amber Ale and is quite dark and has been since I brewed it. I think the grains were quite dark though. I've attached a pic of it in the secondary.

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this is how mine looks right now too.
i have plastic carboys. but it was covered up to not much light has gotten to it

That looks like a carboy full of amber-ish beer to me. My pinkish-gold Strawberry Blonde (as seen in a hydrometer test tube) looks deep reddish brown in its secondary carboy.

Remember, your carboy's got about a foot of beer for the light to pass through, while it's only passing through two or three inches of beer in the bottle or glass. All that "extra" beer will absorb a lot of light, and make the beer appear a lot darker than it will in the final serving container.

My last batch was a light (for the style) IPA, came out a beautiful golden-yellow in the glass, but it looked like an amber in the carboy after the yeast settled out. Like you, I got worried when I saw the color in the carboy, but the beer came out looking exactly how I wanted once I got it into bottles and pints.

Jaehnig said:

I do not.

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Damn. I was hoping I had this brilliant stroke of insight

As everyone else has said, I bet it will turn out to be much lighter in the glass.