why a pellicle?

checked on my beer today and my blonde ale that is fermented with WLP001 and is being dry hopped in a bag has a pellicle across the top. very stable and growing and i'm not sure why. it shouldn't have one short of contamination (it is an extended dry hop - its been 10 days and was supposed to come out today but now i'm thinking the batch is toast)

the hops are definitely the source as i split this batch and one has the bag of hops and one doesn't. everything sterilization wise is the same.

so it got me thinking; why has a pellicle formed? clearly something isn't right and i'm not ready to dump the batch yet, but any insight into why a pellicle forms? to keep O2 out i assume...

and can pellicles form in non-funked beer with normal sacc strains or is this clear contamination?

its stored next to sours with all sorts of brett and bugs, but i can't imagine there's been cross contamination considering everything is air locked tightly.

I think you answered your own question, with both possible answers. First, the hops could have had some wild bugs on them, just like any other plant matter. Second, you could have accidentally cross-contaminated it from your other batches. Some bugs are notoriously resilient, so maybe on the thief or something?

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just pisses me off... on some batches i'd be basking in the glory of how this looks. not this one... ugh.

i don't think its cross contamination mostly because it formed really fast. i haven't looked at it in a while, but i noticed wax like particles just a few days after dropping in the hop bag and now its covered... looks kind of cool actually.

jtakacs said:

looks kind of cool actually.

Click to expand...

Pics, please! (since don't we all love a little pellicle pr0n?)

How does it taste?

i'll snap a photo this weekend... and i haven't tasted it yet.

I suspect cross contamination. Suggest keeping your sour beers in a separate room, at least this is what I do and haven't had an issue yet.