HELP! Honey is sitting at the bottom of fermenter!

[dgrabstein]

Hi meaders and meadettes, :fro:

I poured some wildflower honey directly into the primary fermenter a few days ago at peak fermentation, as I have read about staggered nutrient/honey additions. However, the honey went straight to the bottom and is still just sitting there!

What can I do to fix this problem? I've stirred it a little with no success, I don't want to heat the fermenter, should I just leave it?

Thanks in advance, DG

 

[stpug]

I think you're going to have to continue stirring making sure not to introduce too much air. If you leave it then it will not get incorporated. Next time, use a little sterile water to thin out the honey prior to adding.

 

[passedpawn]

In my limited experience, it's fine. The yeast will eventually get all of it. In a way, I think it is even ideal since it limits the OG of the mead, reduces osmotic pressure on the yeast cells, thus improving their health.

Full disclosure: I've only made 2 batches of mead in my life. Each was a 4-gallon batch with 1 gallon of honey in each. I could be wro... wr... wr... not so correct.

 

[poseidon9447]

I had that happen my first batch, th e yeast will find it. Each day you will see the honey disapear more. I used a sharpie to mark the carboy each day.

 

[jeffjm]

One or two of the people in my homebrew club deliberately don't mix their must, and let the honey settle out, for the reasons others have mentioned about limiting the sugars the yeast have available at one time. Their meads turn out fine.

 

[fatbloke]

One or two of the people in my homebrew club deliberately don't mix their must, and let the honey settle out, for the reasons others have mentioned about limiting the sugars the yeast have available at one time. Their meads turn out fine.

Except you can't take a dead on accurate SG, only the calculated version which is in turn a guestimate from an approximation for how much sugar percentage the honey might be........

Of course, it does work, apparently with some yeasts better than others, but with testing and sampling the honey does need to be fully incorporated.

Equally, the correct calculation is done from the total amount of gravity drop and if the readings are accurate then you can work out pretty accurately.

It is also necessary to monitor the ferment. If you don't know accurately the gravity at a given point, then you can't monitor how the ferment is going......

 

[jeffjm]

Good points, Fatbloke. I was thinking of trying a no-mix process on my next batch but you've persuaded me not to. I probably would have realized the problem when my OG measured 1.000

 

[fatbloke]

Good points, Fatbloke. I was thinking of trying a no-mix process on my next batch but you've persuaded me not to. I probably would have realized the problem when my OG measured 1.000

There was a thread about it over at gotmead, they even came up with a daft acronym for it.

If you did some preps, mixing up prolortionally small but equal ratios then you could probably achieve a good ferment.

Whether you would have to do a **** load of calcs so that youd worked out the exact weight of honey to volume of water and had enough to take a gravity then it could be extrapolated.

Personally I couldn't be bothered.......I'll just carry on mixing the honey and water then blitzing the f*** out of it with a stick blender.........

 

[stpug]

I stand corrected - and happily so I might add

Good to know that it's not a deal breaker to see my honey fall to the bottom on my meads.

Cheers everyone