Sediment in Bottleneck

[Wingy]

I've had my beer in bottles for 8 days now and went down to go check on them. There appear to be small, round, white dots right where the beer line is on some of the bottles. They look for the life of me like tiny little bacterial cultures (about 1-2mm in diameter). They aren't present in all the bottles, so I'm thinking that if it is an infection it's a sporadic and not widespread one. Anyone have any thoughts/advice to help me keep peace of mind?

I went back through and read older posts about this, and I don't think it's a bottle kraeusen... FG was stable for 12 days prior to bottling and I can't imagine that the yeasties would get happy enough to kraeusen with just the priming sugar. The ring is not all the way around the bottle neck and the small white dots seem to be localized. I think my sanitation was good... soaked bottles in the LD cleaner until they were filled. Bottles were all recycled, soaked overnight, and stored dry. Thanks for the help.

Edit: Should add that these dots are stuck on there pretty well... shaking up the bottle a bit did nothing to dislodge them.

Update: 90% sure it's a lacto infection - lots of nice white colonies clinging to the bottleneck at the waterline, and I chilled down a bottle and tested it. Much worse than the last one with a strong astringent/puckering aftertaste. Toss it or hope it turns into a nice lambic? I've another in the primary so I'll be nuking anything else plastic with bleach, then soaking in starsan for 2-3 days before any more beer touches the plastic...

 

[ACbrewer]

There are 2 options - one as you said is an infection. If it is that, the beer will generally be sour and almost always nasty... maybe 1 in 100 will be ok...

the other option which I've had is little white round balls that I think were yeast that had balled up rather than dropped out. With the yeast it doesn't look nice, but the beer was drinkable.

 

[Wingy]

There are 2 options - one as you said is an infection. If it is that, the beer will generally be sour and almost always nasty... maybe 1 in 100 will be ok...

the other option which I've had is little white round balls that I think were yeast that had balled up rather than dropped out. With the yeast it doesn't look nice, but the beer was drinkable.

Thanks - tiny yeast balls are definitely possible. They are the same creamy white color you see when you plate out yeast and some bacteria, so I was just checking to see if anyone else had experienced before entering panic mode.

 

[Wingy]

Bump... anyone else have input?

 

[mlarnold]

Id go with yeast pellicles, probably only real way to know is to try it, if it tastes bad dump the ones with the clusters and be better at sanitation next time. RDWHAHB

 

[adhomebrew10]

I had the exact same thing happen on both my APA and brown ale. White dots floating in the beer. I am almost positive it was just part of the yeast cake that got disturbed when I bottled the beer from the carboy. In about a month all had settled to the bottom of the bottle and compacted. No off flavor or infection.

 

[ayoungrad]

I made my first wheat about 5 weeks ago. I had it in primary for 3 weeks before bottling. At bottling I was aiming for about 2.6 vol CO2 - higher than I typically go as an attempt to emulate the American Wheat style. After about 5 days in the bottles, they all had white "dots" in the neck at the water line. At the time, I was more worried that they were from the lack of Whirlfloc (this was the first time I didn't use it - again, to emulate the style). But, after 3 or 4 more days, all the white "dots" were gone.

So, in my case the "dots" were most likely yeast related to the "mini-fermentation" that can take place during bottling carbonation. For me, it was probably more noticeable because I used more sugar for this batch. Apparently "mini-fermentation" can be more intense if you use DME but I was using corn sugar.

I suppose the "dots" could have been from yeast that had not yet flocculated and subsequently did, but either way, it resolved on its own.

Hope this helps.

 

[Wingy]

Thanks all - I'll let it sit for a few more weeks, but I'm leaning towards infection. I tried one and there was some astringency and a slight sour taste at the end which was not there in a bottle without the white dots. Worst case I'll try and forget about it for 6 months and see if I can make an accidental lambic .

 

[bovineblitz]

Thanks all - I'll let it sit for a few more weeks, but I'm leaning towards infection. I tried one and there was some astringency and a slight sour taste at the end which was not there in a bottle without the white dots. Worst case I'll try and forget about it for 6 months and see if I can make an accidental lambic .

At 9 days in the bottle I'd expect a little astringency, possibly a little bit of a sour vinegar flavor, and various other off flavors... no need to worry yet.

 

[ChrisMoss]

There are 2 options - one as you said is an infection. If it is that, the beer will generally be sour and almost always nasty... maybe 1 in 100 will be ok...

the other option which I've had is little white round balls that I think were yeast that had balled up rather than dropped out. With the yeast it doesn't look nice, but the beer was drinkable.

I've had a similar problem with a recent batch of mine and just don't know what's wrong. I brewed a chocolate vanilla porter which has now had 2 months in bottles. Carbed to 1.7 as really careful not to overcarb. Looked at bottles today and noticed small balls of white substance floating on top of beer. Also slight white line around neck of bottle where liquid ends. Assumed this might be yeast just floating rather than dropping.

Opened a bottle (after chilling slightly) and heard that dreaded fizzing noise of air escaping, bubbles began to rise in the bottle and eventually pushed out the top of the bottle.

So I know this pretty much sounds like a classic infection, only I was super careful with sanitising bottles - in fact I soaked them in VWP (a combination of something like PBW and Starsan), then rinsed them a few times, THEN soaked them in star san solution and let that drain from the bottom. Can't work out what's going wrong.

The only thing that might be relevant is that the porter OG was 1.072, and I (underpitched) only pitched one vial of white labs british ale yeast. So it went down to 1.024 in the end, making it 6.4%. Is there a chance that all that's happened is gradually the yeast in the secondary fermentation has started to ferment the remaining sugars? Once the initial rush of the co2 has escaped the bottle and I've poured it, it doesn't absolutely erupt constantly in the glass like pale ales I've done before which have looked like they are attached to a fish tank bubbler! In the glass, the beer tastes as it did at 1 month, isn't overly fizzy and looks fine.

Really hoping this was a case of under-pitching rather than another infection as these infections are almost driving me to the point of not even brewing!

Would appreciate any advice you guys have to offer.

Cheers - Chris

 

[ACbrewer]

If you under pitched, one thing that could have happened is a stall... 1.072 down to 1.024, unless you had a lot of unfermentables, means that about a .006 for most yeast types remained unfermented...*** When you move from fermenter to fermenter, you push out some CO2, and thus allow the yeast another go. This is very common is mead making where if you don't have it get stuck for a month, it is because you are doing something to it. Anyhow I'd bet that most of your bottles are good, although they may be headed upwards in pressure. How long was it in a primary/secondary?


*** with most yeast types they have a 75% attenuation. Some go as low as 60 or 65 and a few up to 80 or 85% but 75 is a good rule of thumb, 100-75 is 25, so you should have 25% left at the end, in this case 72*25%=18, or 6 points lower.

Also - long live a zombie thread!

 

[ChrisMoss]

Great reply thanks for the advice - I found this thread by a search so thought I'd chance it!

It was in primary (no secondary) for about 15 days, and now it's been in the bottle for a couple months it's 1.022 - dropped .02. Re-capped it and it's sitting a little more settled now, but will see how it ages!

Thanks again for the advice bud!