Hop absorption & possible reuse?

After brewing a 10 gallon batch this afternoon I realized that whole leaf hops absorb a lot of wort...3 quarts in my case. I used 6 oz of plugs to brew this beer, which is not my normal method, but my LHBS only had plugs of the variety I needed.

I have 2 questions:

1. Do pellets absorb less than whole leaf hops?

2. I squeezed the wort out of the hops in my kettle and now I have 3 quarts of what I assume is bitter cloudy wort. Could I reuse this to make a starter for next week? Would there be any negative side effects?

Thanks,
Matt

Pound for pound, I'd say pellets absorb less. As for your second Q: As long as your sanitation is up to snuff, I don't see any reason why not. Your only hurdle is accounting for the increased IBU's and hop flavor/aroma from the starter. 3 quarts is substantial...so you'd want to calculate the IBU's of that wort and adjust your next recipe accordingly.

I plan on doing the same thing with the wort squeezed out from the hops to make starters. I have not done so yet but I've been saving it to use with a similar style. I'll also be decanting the starter so the IBUs should not make much of a difference, plus I don't think the IBUs will be that much higher since that wort boiled the same time with the hops as all the rest. (Currently hops have free reign of the whole boil pot)