repitching with a new yeast

so last night i got a little bored so i was like hell i try to make a mead.

went to the grocery store quick and bought honey and blue berries. threw it all together. with some minor set backs it is now doing its thing in my fermentation closet.

i pitched a nasty bread yeast because it was what i had and planned on doing. however i took my og and well turns out it's around 1.170ish so basically a lot. i've heard bread yeast will poop out early so i was wondering if in a month or so i could repitch with a champagne yeast to get the mead the rest of the way. would that work or is there something else you would recommend?

i would like to get the mead down to about 1.020 i don't want it terribly sweet

1.170 is pretty high for a mead, I think you will want to add some water and bring it closer to 1.100. You can go ahead and use champagne yeast, or wine yeast. Champagne yeast will try to ferment all the sugar, so if you want it at 1.020 you probably will want wine yeast. I've never brewed with bread yeast so not sure how much it will ferment. You will also want to add yeast energizer and nutrients since mead usually needs help to start fermenting.

You're going to need to dilute this to get down to that final gravity level. It isn't going to get there starting at 1.170. Once the bread yeast is done, given the alcohol and high level of sugar that will remain, getting another yeast started will be very difficult. My suggestion would be dilute it down to around 1.120. If it doesn't stick, Fleischmann's can chew up 100+ gravity points, and that will leave you close to where you want to be.

MedsenFey said:

You're going to need to dilute this to get down to that final gravity level. It isn't going to get there starting at 1.170. Once the bread yeast is done, given the alcohol and high level of sugar that will remain, getting another yeast started will be very difficult. My suggestion would be dilute it down to around 1.120. If it doesn't stick, Fleischmann's can chew up 100+ gravity points, and that will leave you close to where you want to be.

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so with that said can i let the bread yeast chew threw till it hits 1.070 or however low it gets and then dilute to get my fg?

If starting at 1.170 the yeast are under such osmotic stress that they will be unlikely to chew up 100 gravity points. They will probably stop short of that - if you make it to 1.100 consider it lucky. When you dilute the alcohol down at that point, the yeast might restart and chew up more but it is hard to predict. The stress of high gravity starts also causes yeast to produce more acetic acid and sometimes off odors/flavors. I would suggest diluting the must now.

Medsen

so can i just pour the mead into a big bowl add water till i get a gravity around 1.1-1.2 and then pout it all into a larger fermentation vessel?

All the while performing a very sterilized process of course.

Tinga said:

so can i just pour the mead into a big bowl add water till i get a gravity around 1.1-1.2 and then pout it all into a larger fermentation vessel?

All the while performing a very sterilized process of course.

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Do a google search for "wort dilution calculator." You should be able to calculate exactly how much water you need to get to where you want to be.