My bottles are infected, but with what?

[aartdouglass]

I recently brewed a Bell's Two Hearted clone and everything seemed to go well all the way through bottling, which was over two weeks ago. The beer doesn't seem to be carbonating very quickly; I opened one at two weeks and it was very under-carbonated (though it was slightly carbonated, at least) and I can still taste the priming sugar. I was checking the clarity this afternoon by shining a light through a bottle and noticed colonies of something growing in the bottom. After checking several other bottles, they all have them. I've attached a figure since I can't figure out how to include one directly into the post without hosting it on another site.

My question is, can anyone tell me what the infection is likely to be? Here's the info I think is relevant:

-I used yeast that I harvested from 3 bottles of Bell's Two Hearted. The yeast was used to make a starter. 2/3 of the starter was pitched into the beer, and the other 1/3 was built back up to 1 L to pitch into a brown ale that I made two days later. The brown ale does not have any infection (and is delicious, I might add...) and has only been bottled two days less, so I do not think the problem is in the yeast.
-I dry hopped, which involved pouring pellet hops straight into the primary fermenter. Dry hopping took 7 days.
-I wouldn't say that I have a refined palate, but the beer doesn't taste sour to me, just overly sweet, which I believe is from the priming sugar since the bottles are definitely under-carbonated for the amount of sugar I added (2.3 volumes was my target).

So, I'm thinking that maybe it's not a bad infection, since I would have expected some gushers and/or sourness if it were bacterial. Maybe it's mold introduced from the hops that were added to the primary? In any case, if the beer doesn't taste bad, it should probably be fine to drink once it's carbonated, right?

 

[joehoppy]

Honestly it just looks like yeast and maybe a little trub on the bottom. Pretty normal. Wait another week or two for carbonation. I have an Oktoberfest bottle conditioning right now and is just starting to carb at week 5. What temperature are the bottles being stored at?

 

[Shred]

Not sure that's an infection. Hard to tell from the pic, but gunk in the bottom of a bottle it pretty typical. Even if it does turn out to be an infection there's really no need to be concerned with drinking them if they taste okay. There are no known pathogens that can live in beer.

It's also unlikely your hops introduced anything. They tend to have the opposite effect and help ward off nasties.

I'd say give it another week or so and see if the priming sugar has been eaten up yet.

 

[aartdouglass]

We keep our condo between 62 and 66 F in the winter (I live in Michigan, where it was -10 F last night). I condition in the basement, so it's probably around 62 F most of the time. I'm actually not that worried about the slow carbonation, I just thought it was proof, perhaps, that the infection isn't bacterial. It's good to know that I shouldn't worry until maybe at least 5 weeks, though, because I probably would have been concerned at 3 weeks.

 

[hokieguy95]

Same thing here: My Belgian has been bottle conditioning for two and a half weeks and it was in a vey cold basement that stays about 50 - 60. Opened one last night and no carbonation at all. So I brought them upstairs last night where the house is heated better and I'm going to leave them for at least a month around 72 and see if that won't do the trick. If it was a Big Beer like mine, then they say it will take longer to carbonate.

 

[aartdouglass]

I have a lab thermometer I store in the same place that I keep my conditioning bottles. I just checked it and it read 60 F. It will still completely carbonate at that temp, just slowly, right?

 

[Riot]

Some yeast strains may not, but this batch should carbonate eventually.