Bad smelling liquid yeast

I smacked inoculator pack of Wyeast 1084. Put 800 ml of wort in the flask, boiled it and let it cool thinking the smack pack would swell up while the flask cooled. When it was time to pitch, the pack had not swelled, so I opened it and poured it in. I smelled it and it was terrible. I don't know about rubbery, but stench fits the description. I put it on the stir plate and went to bed. When I got up, no signs of fermentation. I bought a new propagator pack today. The Local home brew shop offered to replace the yeast for free if I had the empty package. I didn't have it with me. When I got home from work, the starter had started. I tossed it any how and an now waiting for the new package to swell up and the flask to cool again.

This will be stepped up to 2 litres for an 11 gallon batch of Oatmeal Stout.

Whaddyathink?

David

How old was the smack pack? Did it encounter high temperatures for a period of time? Age plus high temperatures may have killed the yeast and caused them to decompose... that's my guess.

-Steve

Stench is a good description of autolyse. I think you made a good move tossing it. I've got some yeast banked in the fridge and I think I'll have to take them outside to dump. They'd been in the back for four year.

Smack pack was Apr 20-09. I don't think it got warm, I bought it at lunch time, took it with me to where I eat lunch and had it put in the fridge. Picked it up after work, brought it home and put it back in the fridge.

I have been washing and saving yeast from the dump valve. Once this one takes off, I will have plenty of 1084 for the rest of the year.

Its not worth risking 11 gallons of oatmeal stout!

David

Yeast can smell rank as hell at times. I made a 1 gal starter for splitting 6 ways. (For a yeast-swap). Bottled a sixer and it smelled awful. I chalk it up to over pitching and maybe some oxidation.

I made a 3 gal DME Pale Ale test batch. It was perfect. Sometimes they just smell bad.

Afterwards I went ahead with the yeast swap.

FYI - April 09. 4 months old. - Wyeast says it needs 1 day on a stir plate for every month old. Yours would have needed 4 days.

One live yeast cell and patience will get you a jar full, or a starter full. Schlenkerla's Myeast started just that way. The lysed cells become nutrients for the next generation. Your starter would likely have been okay if your sterile technique was good. If it got contaminated in handling, and you started with one live yeast cell and one stray bacterial cell in the bottle, then you could get to place bets on the race between them. If your started ended up smelling like decent green beer you could go ahead and pitch it--in the wort, not the trash. If it smelled like vinegar, well....goodbye to it, unless you like wild vinegar on your salads.

Thanks, It probably would have made it, but.... For the price of a new package peace of mind was worth it. The new starter is going now. Gotta step it up to 2 litres by Saturday.

The new package smelled WAY better.

David

threedogs, thanks for the informative post. now think i can revive this vial of white labs english ale with a dec 08 date on it. the smell wasn't quite appealing when i pitched it into the starter earlier today, but i'll wait to see activity and give it a sniff before chucking it.