1st mead done fermenting now what?

I was all excited to bottle and age it but then I remembered something about "clearing" I'm at 1.00 gravity totally stable for about a week. It happened quick though. 1.5 months using a champagne yeast. Can I bottle tonight or do I leave it in the fermenter?

oh yea. i am moving 150 miles or so on Saturday. Wondering if I would normally wait and leave it in the bucket at this point if it might be better to get it bottled and secured for the move?

Bottle it.

lol. works for me. just for my sanity though....why bottle it now...because that is the right thing to do or b/c of the move?

If it is clear, and the SG hasn't moved in a week or more, it should be safe to bottle. However, if you have don't have any immediate plans for that carboy, I say leave it sit to bulk age after racking.

I would say if it is clear you could bottle. I am in the same situation with a batch of Apple Wine. I am looking at moving in about a month and a half and I really don't want to bottle that quick if I can keep from it. What I would do is rack it right before you make the move. Bulk aging is good and then just cover your airlock with plastic wrap and put a rubber band around it. Watch your temp and good luck!

If you've got some good way of safely moving the carboy and securing it in a vehicle, I'd go that route and wait to bottle later. Maybe put a stopper in the carboy and tape it down while it's in transit.

If not, then bottle it. If you mean it to be a still mead, I'd use beer bottles and crown caps (or champagne corks with cages), since it might still slowly ferment another point or two out and if it does it would likely push out standard wine corks.

Something like that! The solid cork taped down would work if not going too far. Something like a 5 or 6 gallon plastic bucket where you could put the carboy down in and pack some stuff around it and cover the top so the sun isn't beating down on it. That's what I'm going to do with mine!

Haven't had a cork pop yet but I usually have still meads and stabilize a few days to a week before bottling.

another option would be a short secondary using a fining agent, maybe isinglass.
you could get all the yeast out of suspension quickly, then bottle it for a safer (less oxidizing) move.