West coast bugs season?

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Unferth

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I was thinking of doing a first time easy lambic, but read that in Belgium, they typically only ferment in oct/nov because that when the Brett bugs are going strong.

If I try to catch a yeast in Vancouver in January, will I catch the right bugs for this? I'm doing extract, probably wheat/pale extract.

Anyone have suggestions/comments?
 
I believe in Belgium they only brew (not ferment) in those months because the bacterial count in the air is much lower, so the beer doesn't become overrun with bacteria and other unwanted organisms found in the summertime. I'm assuming January would be just fine as it is still very cold. If you're talking about wanting to do ambient fermentation and not pitching any commercial bugs, the issue you might have is capturing the right wild yeast/bacteria without getting something nasty and undrinkable in the end. If you haven't played around with this before, you might want to do a 5 gallon batch, split into 5-1 gallon jugs and place them all in different locations overnight. Ferment each separately and mark each one with where the jugs were placed for inoculation...at the end of the year sample each one and see if you have anything favorable and toss the rest. Just an idea...good luck!
 
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