Shake my fermenting beer

It's been slightly lest than 72 hours since my 5 gallon batch started producing bubbles in the airlock. Bubbles are still coming, but much more slowly than during the first 48 hours or so. A post that I read somewhere last week said that the poster shook their fermenter up every couple of days to promote fermentation. Does this sound like a good or bad idea to you more experienced brewers out there?

Thanks guys!

What was your og? Airlock activity or the lack thereof is not a great indicator of fermentation. Shaking can lead to the introduction of oxygen which may or may not be a good thing. If your past the aerobic phase of fermentation (which my guess is you are by now) then it would be in your best interest to let it be.

Not sure why you would shake it once fermentation has started. Let it do it's thing, and try to ignore it for at least 3 weeks.

I would not say shake, but a swirl or two in days one two and three I do believe is worth doing , after that leave it alone. My swirl is really to try to not let to much yeast get compacted underneath a load of trub. However, I also believe that those yeasties are very tenacious and would escape from any amount of trub, remember that there are or should be more than 250billion of them !
Conclude - shake swirl? Only if you want to. But only in the first few days of fermentation , after that leave it alone.

Someone said it on the internet, but that does not make it true.

Fermentation slows down because the majority of the sugars have been consumed in the initial feeding frenzy of the yeast. Eventually fermentation activity will cease when there are no more sugars for the yeast to work on.

The yeast work on their own schedule. Trying to change their schedule may only cause damage. Patience is the best tool in brewing.

The best thing we can do is pitch the right amount of yeast and have the temperature of the wort controlled so the yeast can do their thing to produce a flavorful product.

Doctor_M said:

What was your og? Airlock activity or the lack thereof is not a great indicator of fermentation. Shaking can lead to the introduction of oxygen which may or may not be a good thing. If your past the aerobic phase of fermentation (which my guess is you are by now) then it would be in your best interest to let it be.

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OG was 1.072

Thanks everyone. Very helpful responses.

Leave.........it.........alone.

In two weeks, get a hydro reading. Get another 4 days later. If they are the same and reasonably close to the expected FG, you're ready to bottle.

Rdwhahb

Thedutchtouch said:

Rdwhahb

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The OP may have no clue what that stands for.

BigFloyd said:

The OP may have no clue what that stands for.

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Yeah, I definitely didn't until I googled it. hahaha I wish I could Rdwhahb, alas, this is my first batch.

That's alright though, I have a case of Bells and Troges

My first batch I ever brewed showed airlock activity for about 18 hours, and then everything stopped. Trust me, it's not worth it to worry. I just tried my best to wait 2 weeks to get an FG reading, and everything turned out fine.