Captured Yeast: Attempt one

I had some extra DME lying around, so I decided to find out if my local yeast was any good for brewing.
I made a half gallon of 1.020 wort with a pinch of yeast nutrient and a dash of hops. This wort was split into five small mason jars. Two jars were covered with cheese cloth and placed outside overnight. Two of the remaining three had raspberries from different places around the yard dropped into them. The final jar had a couple sprigs if thyme from the garden dropped in.



After two days the berries and thyme smelled delicous (a bit spicy, very yeasty). Reminded me of a belgian yeast strain. One of the two jars from outside smelled rancid and developed a thick white "crust". The other jar had no activity.
I ditched the two outdoor jars. The three remaining were strained and pitched into 1500mL of 1.030 wort with 1/4 tsp. Of yeast nutrient. This will sit on the stir plate for the next day or so.



We will see where this leads.......

Cool!!! Keep the updates coming

This is very interesting I have not thought about doing this. What would you use this yeast to ferment? Anything or more focused on lambics? Would this be good for adding to a beer post fermentation with some wood chips to do a barrel aged sour style?

wicked! cant wait for winter to give this a go. I am going to try ot in my in-law's mango orchard

Got up this morning to a high krausen mark just at the bottom of the foil. I will post a picture shortly.
I have not decided what I will do with this yeast yet. Depends on what flavors I am getting from it, attenuation, and it's ability to flocc.
The experiment continues....

Did you leave the thyme and raspberries in the jar for a while?

Very cool! I will try this.

Rugrad, there was activity in the jar after 24 hours. I strained the berries and thyme out after 2 days and combined the "beer" into a flask with 1500 ml of 1.030 wort
I have read about some people attempting this and having to wait for 3+ days until there was activity.
Give it a shot, it's cheap enough. Just see what you get, use your eyes and nose as a guide as to whether it will be a good yeast to brew with.

You can see the high krausen mark on the flask. I will take a gravity reading tonight to see how this yeast is attenuating.
Great bready, yeasty smell right now.

Just pitched the wild yeast into a very simple saison/wit type beer. Starting at 11.2 Brix (1.045 sg).
Want to test attenuation and flavor profile.

I love it.
I almost sh#t a brick at the tide line left by the high-krausen.

That is cool.

I did it a while ago and was amazed just how good it was. I had a couple of fails, but the one that worked is great. Did a one gallon test batch to grow some more and see what it really tasted like. Got a 1.050 wort down to 1.004. Tasted great so I did a 5g saision that is about done.

Awesome. I've been reading about different approaches to this kind of experiment. I definitely want to try it out at some point. Let us know how that said on turns out.

Okay, so I tried this. I have a blackberry and blueberry bush growing in my backyard. I made a 1.030 starter with a bit of lemon juice and some aged hops to inhibit mold growth. I split the starter in half and dropped a few blackberries, in one mason jar and a few unripened blueberries in the other. Both showed signs of fermentation after the first day.

The blackberry starter after 2 days had an unpleasant odor, so I dumped it. The blueberry on the other hand had a very fruity/yeasty smell and showed no signs of mold. I tossed the blueberries from the starter and stepped it up a few hours ago and it is going insane!!! It smells like cherry juice. I plan on fermenting the starter out and throwing together a small batch, possibly 3-gallon saison.

Great! Can't wait to here how this turns out.
I have 4 gallons of a simple beer bubbling away with my wild yeast. Thinking about racking it onto some wild raspberries.

I will keep this post updated as I go through the process.

Cool experiment! But how can you know that you have only yeast in there, and no lactobacillus, or something?

Bionut, I can't know for sure whether I have multiple strains or any bugs. At this point I don't realky care. The fermentation smells great, it developed a nice thick krausen...so we will see. It's essentially been a free experiment since I used leftover DME and hops.

Loving the updates, keep 'em coming.

After a week in primary I decided to pull a sample. Seems like I have a sloth of a yeast. Gravity has only dropped to 1.030. However, a lot of yeast is still in suspension, so I will let it ride a bit longer.

The aroma reminds me of a belgian (bready, spicy). The tastevis a bit of the same, although it has a great tart finish.

Here is to hoping this yeast manages to chew through the rest of the sugar!

Is it possible it needs to be warmed up? What temp is it sitting at?

It's at 70F right now. I had thought about bumping it up a bit. Maybe I'll bring it up to 80-85

bump it up mate, you have nothing to loose

Bumped the temp to 75 and gave the bucket a swirl. The airlock is roaring again!

Keep the updates coming

I have been experimenting with wild yeast for the past year. Early Spring 2012 I captured yeast from under a friends pear tree with some 10.35 wort. At the same time I captured yeast on my deck under some herb plants. Over 6 months I built up both samples until I had about an inch of slurry in gallon jugs. I then brewed 10 gallons of Lambic using a turbid mash. Half was pitched with each yeast. They have been fermenting since December and now both taste pretty fantastic. The Lambic pitched with the yeast from my deck is much more tart than the other, but both are much further along than other Lambics in such a short time. Since this is more of a yeast experiment I will probably use about half of each one bottled alone and then blend half and half and bottle the blended Lambic. I may wait longer and see how they go.

Funblock,
That sounds awesome! What kind of flavors are you getting?
What was the base recipe that you used for your beer?

After stirring and raising the temp on my yeast. I had to clean the airlock out 5 times (should have used a blow off tube). Action has settled down, I will check gravity again today or tommorrow.

Gravity dropped to 1.010 , aroma is very nice, notes of lemon/citrus and some pepper. The flavor is crisp and tart, not acetic, but tart like citrus zest or rind.
I think I will see this beer through to bottle.
Not sure if the yeast is a keeper though. Flocculation is low, it's slow to attenuate, and seems to be super temperamental.

This Lambic took 3rd place in the Sour ale category at the Southern New England Regional Homebrew competition last weekend. Came out nice and tart.

well then, there you go, nothing to loose and a prize to gain.
well done

I have done this several times with great success. Last Summer I fermented a wheat beer totally by tossing in fresh picked blueberries. I am now using this yeast for the 4 the generation.