Infection, looking for advice

I brewed up 20 gallons of a porter that I was planning on putting 15 gallons into a whiskey barrel. 2 of my fermenters have become infected. Should I just put the uninfected 10 gallons into the barrel or should I add one of the infected fermenters in with them? If I add one of the infected ones will the infection carry over if I rack from the bottom and taint the whole batch? Also any idea what this infection may be?

 

Cool looking infection, I'm not an expert on infections but, if it were my beer I'd keep it separate, bottle it by itself carefully (sometimes infections produce extra co2?) and see what it turns into. It looks like pediococcus, type that into google images and see what you think. People actually use it in sours, or at least some form of it. Again, not an expert, but I'd think there is a very good chance of transferring the infection if you put a racking cane through it.

 

yup - looking kind of like a brett/pedio infection (could be a very good thing!). keep it completely separate from the other fermenters if you want to keep the others clean!

if you add one of the infected fermenters, the entire batch will become a sour porter...but again...might be a very good thing! they'll need a long time to ride out before they finish munching away at all the residual sugars. If you're not familiar with sour beers, now is the time to start reading up!

also - you should post those pics in this thread

 

Interesting that those two bugs don't seem to be progressing the same.
Maybe two different strains...of something?

How long ago were these 20 gallons brewed?
How sure the other two aren't packin' critters, too?

 

There is no way to identify an infection from looking at the pellicle. You can't 'rack from under' as the infection is through the entire beer, and if you put it in your barrel it'll infect that as well, with no way to kill it off and keep the barrel usable.

 

I'd taste the beer and see what's going on. If it tastes ok, I'd keg it up and consume it ASAP.
You could try adding a shot pr two of Bourbon per gallon to the keg to raise the ABV and delay any more growth of whatever it is.
If you'd like to experiment, you could save a gallon in a jug and see what happens.
It all depends how much you like sour/brett beers.
I've done lots of experiments over the years with wild yeast and these days I tend to stick with yeast I can buy that has been isolated by people that know what they are doing and has known attenuation and flavor characteristics.
You could live dangerously, mix all the infected beer up in your barrel and even add bottle dregs and let the bugs fight it out.

 

Thanks for the advice everyone. What I'm going to do is just stick the clean 10 gallons into the barrel. I'm going to let the infected ones ride it out and see what happens. Who knows, maybe it'll be great!

 

They were brewed approx 2 months ago. I don't have any way for sure to know that the other ones are not infected, but I cannot see anything at all growing on the top like the other 2 fermenters.

 

A couple of pointers in regards to your fermenters:

That's far too much headspace for long term aging. For long term aging, the vessel should be as full as possible.

Those valve assemblies are terrible in regards to sanitation. They have too many hidden nooks and crannies to ever be 'clean enough'. That being said: I wouldn't trust those fermenters any longer. It's a fairly sure bet that anything you put in them from here on will be infected.

 

have you checked all their FGs ? that might help point to an indication of infection or not.

Agreed with the bishop - especially if those are plastic fermenters? (it kind of looks like they are)