Mead Yeast Starter?

I have plenty of beers under my belt (85 gallons this year alone), but I will be trying my first mead this week. Is it necessary to make a starter for a 5 gallon batch of approximately 1.110 OG mead? I have 2 vials of White Labs Sweet Mead yeast. I had planned on pitching directly without a starter. Should I wait a little longer on a starter? If so, how do I go about making a mead starter?

With the liquid yeast, it never hurts to make a starter. With the dry yeast, you don't have to. If you do pitch it without a starter, just remember you'll need to open it up and aerate during the first few days. I know this sounds like heresy to a brewer, but you need oxygen exposure to get the yeast up to maximal biomass, and maximal alcohol tolerance. The oxygen exposure will not hurt mead during fermentation (it is much less oxidation prone than beer), nor will it allow contaminants (you'll have 14-15% ABV). In brewing, you use starters to get the oxygen exposure and the yeast growth going before you pitch. With a mead, you'll need to give the oxygen exposure after pitching.

As for making a starter, I usually use a little apple juice with a pinch of nutrient. You can take a little mead must and dilute it to a gravity of about 1.050 (cut it in half), or you can make a starter using a little malt extract like you would for beer. If your starter is 1-2 liters, you won't have any noticeable impact on flavor regardless of what you use.

Good luck with it!

Medsen

Actually, the method Ken Schramm's book has you aerate by stirring the hell out of the must before you airlock it. I forget whether it's pre-pitch or post-pitch, though.

The problem with that method is that it saturates the must only 1 time, which allows at maximum, about 8 mg/L of O2 to be dissolved into solution. That is typically a bit less than is required for maximal biomass, and especially with a high-gravity batch, could leave you with incomplete fermentation. For typical wine fermentations, you need at least 10 mg/L of O2, so at least one aeration post pitching is required to get to that level. In practice, we routinely see fermentations that are aerated/de-gassed performing better.

Medsen

Medsen's advice is very sound.

I have only used dry yeast for my meads so far (only about ten batches). I like how cheap it is (about $1) & how easy it is (just rehydrate, then pitch).

Keep us posted!