Bugs in beer and excessive bubbling

so, i've brewed a pilsner that has been bottling at 55 degrees for about 4 weeks. it should finish up on the 29th of august. i've got two problems.

one; i opened up a bottle early (about a week ago) just to see what was going on. i get a constant flow of bubbles, so much so that the flow of bubbles out of the bottle never subsides. by the time i pour the beer, half of it is gone due to the escaping bubbles. is this excessive carbonation? did i put too much priming sugar in the batch? will it fix itself in time?

second, after i opened up that first bottle, i closed it back up with about half the beer in the bottle and placed it back in the fridge at 55 degrees. when i checked it today, i noticed little solid things clinging to the walls on the dry portions of the bottle. they look like bugs. is the entire batch ruined? is this some sort of fungus, or is it a larvae of some kind? i'll try to take pics, but when i get the things out of the bottle, they're too small to tell what they are.

here are some pics, you may need to copy/paste the link into your browser...

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0BcuGLVo2aMWEz&notag=1

I'm not sure but that looks as though you have a fruit fly infection. Check your other bottles and see if you've gotten anymore of those critters in them. If they are fruit fly larvae then they may have gotten in there before you closed it back up. Those buggers work fast and can live in your fridge before the cold gets to them. Or, maybe your bottle(s) weren't cleaned right and those were already in there at bottling time. Lot's of variables to think about. Check the rest of your bottles first.

August West said:

one; i opened up a bottle early (about a week ago) just to see what was going on. i get a constant flow of bubbles, so much so that the flow of bubbles out of the bottle never subsides. by the time i pour the beer, half of it is gone due to the escaping bubbles. is this excessive carbonation? did i put too much priming sugar in the batch? will it fix itself in time?

Click to expand...

What this sounds like to me is a dirty bottle. Don't get all antsy. Try another one. I had one do this to me and the beer smelled rancid and tasted horrible (don't you love how you have to taste something you know is nasty?), the problem was that someone snuck an unsanitized bottle in the mix while we were bottling.

as for the bug, probably got in there when you re-sealed it.

thanks guys. all of the bottles were cleaned in the same manner; in the dishwasher with high-heat. i've looked at a few of the other unopened bottles, and i don't see the same thing. however, these things weren't present in the bottle until after i opened the one up. and then, they only appeared where their was no liquid touching the side of the bottle (they are bottling on their sides).

well, i guess i'll hope for the best, and i probably won't use so much priming sugar next time.

I would say that you just had a bad bottle. Crack open another and see if it is a gusher too. If so then you may have an over carbing problem or and infection. you can take a bottle and chill it down as low as you can get it with out it freezing and open it, if it opens and pours ok then it is probably over carbination.

Cheers