Is my beer fermenting?

I may have messed up my first try at oatmeal stout. Forgot to aerate the wort after toping up and pitched the yeast dry. Started on Saturday with SG of 1.035 and have seen very little activity from the airlock. Can I overcome my blunders?

Stout63 said:

I may have messed up my first try at oatmeal stout. Forgot to aerate the wort after toping up and pitched the yeast dry. Started on Saturday with SG of 1.035 and have seen very little activity from the airlock. Can I overcome my blunders?

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What is the SG currently?

I have done 100000 more things wrong to some batches. If you followed recipe and pitched and the right temperature things are fine. Take hydrometer reading, realise everythin is fine. have about 15 beers, laugh about your worries. drink 3 v8 go to bed.

Haven't tested?

I followed the recipe to the tee and the temp is 60 to 65.

Stout63 said:

I followed the recipe to the tee and the temp is 60 to 65.

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That sounds good. But the only way to tell if fermentation has begun is to check the SG.

Is it ok to open the lid w/o contamination?

yeah what She said haha

yeah its fine just sterilized you extraction device. And dont put your sample back in. do it fast

Stout63 said:

Is it ok to open the lid w/o contamination?

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Of course it is. I mean, you do plan to open it sometime, right?

It's good to be careful, and keep it airlocked and sanitize whatever touches your beer. You don't want your cat to sneeze it in, but it's ok to open and take samples and transfer when needed.

It's probably just fine. It's probably fermenting just fine. You may notice a ring of crud around the top when you open it, showing where the krausen was when it was at it's peak. But the only way to know for sure is to take the SG.

A handy dandy trick I learned...

Take a flash light, and turn it on and put it directly on the lid of the fermenter. This will illuminate what's inside. If your light dies out before where you filled the wort to (presumably 5 gallons) then you have some krausen. (A good thing.)

Oh yeah, and RDWHA(M)B

If this is bucket, you should be be drinking a beer and not worrying about it.
If its glass carboy, then admit it your a yeast voyeur and your not getting your normal activity fix. (I'm sure there is support group out there, I just have not joined it yet).

A heavy beer, with little oxidation will be slow to start, but if you pitched the recommended yeast level, it is starting off, just a little slow. Give it two more days, then take a hydrometer measurement. Odds are everything is fine.