First Mead Batch - Very SLOW Fermentation

Hey folks. I've been home brewing beer for quite some time now, SWMBO is a big fan of sweet mead so I decided to dabble in making a batch. I followed a simple recipe that called for 24lbs of honey to 6 gallons of water (yes she likes the mead REAL sweet). So here are the steps I followed:

1. Boiled 3 gallons of water, removed from heat and dissolved the honey.
2. Added 3 gallons of chilled water.
3. Added Go-Ferm as instructed.
4. Placed into Keezer next to my Weiss.
5. Waited until the temp was at 68F, then pitched my WLP720 Sweet Mead Yeast.
6. Popped on the airlock and closed up the keezer to await yeasty fermentation goodness.

Seems simple enough, but it's been about 36 hours since I pitched. I am not too terribly worried, but there has been very little signs of fermentation. My OG was (1.127 Yes, incredibly sweet) my SG ready today was 1.124, suggesting 0.3%ABV.

Since this is my first batch, I just wanted to get an outside look to see if everything is looking ok thus far.

What do you all think?

I wouldn't be too concerned after only 36 hours. I just made my second sweet mead, and while my OG wasn't quite as high as yours (1.1), the fermentation took around 45 hours to become noticeable. So I'd follow the old adage- RDWHAHB. You can always re-pitch if things don't progress.

BTW- at what temp are you keeping your keezer? That could delay some of the fermentation.
Cheers!
Charlie

cbrodbeck said:

I wouldn't be too concerned after only 36 hours. I just made my second sweet mead, and while my OG wasn't quite as high as yours (1.1), the fermentation took around 45 hours to become noticeable. So I'd follow the old adage- RDWHAHB. You can always re-pitch if things don't progress.

BTW- at what temp are you keeping your keezer? That could delay some of the fermentation.
Cheers!
Charlie

Click to expand...

Well, it's a brand new keezer so I am still working on stabilizing a temperature. So at first it got down to about 61F (I was trying to err on the cold size rather than hot), so it spent about 12 hours at ~61F, i've been slowing calibrating up to 68F (wort/must temp).

Cold temp could be the problem, I had just pitched some Nottingham yeast into my weiss the night before. Since notty has a pretty aggressive fermentation I was going a bit cooler.

So to answer your question, the first 12 hours was spent at about 61 and since then it's been at about 66-68.

The temp could be your issue... again, I'm not a mead expert or anything, but 61 is pretty low for WLP720. See what the next 24 hours bring. I was at 70 in my keezer from the get-go, and I still had a slow start.
Good Luck!
Charlie

cbrodbeck said:

The temp could be your issue... again, I'm not a mead expert or anything, but 61 is pretty low for WLP720. See what the next 24 hours bring. I was at 70 in my keezer from the get-go, and I still had a slow start.
Good Luck!
Charlie

Click to expand...

Thanks! I'll check my SG tomorrow and chime in with what I find. Thanks for the insight!

Ok, so I have raised my temp to 67 (slowly rising) and my gravity readings have fallen very little. There is still no noticible airlock activity, but my gravity samples have been sparkling as if the must is carbonated like a 7up would be.

Ive done some reading about degassing and feel that it may help mead move along better. I will get the temp stabilized at 69-70, then pop the top and stir it up to release as much co2 as I can.

In any event, this is all great learning. Ive got some lavin 1122 on its way if I have to repitch!