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I'm confused here... why would you use an airlock (way of keeping oxygen out) and use a stone to inject oxygen?

If you aren't boiling it in the mason jar, but just putting it in the pressure canner to sterilize, then it isn't an issue is it?

Mason jars also can be pressure/steam treated, so I would assume they would fit the bill as well? If you pressure can wort, that would eliminate the advantage of an erlenmeyer, at least as long as you don't have a stirplate (I don't)?

I don't have any flasks, so have just been using mason jars to do starters. Is there any particular advantage to the erlenmeyer flask for starters, if you alternately have canned sterile wort? We have loads of mason jars, and a pressure canner, so it seems like this would be an easier way to...

Ah, not planning on doing slants, just glycerine stabilized frozen yeast cultures. Per this link to the wiki. Someone mentioned that the sediment in the starter, once crashed, is basically all viable yeast, as opposed to the trub at the bottom of the fermenter after a month.

The instructions in the wiki for making frozen yeast cultures is great stuff... this is referring of course to the glycering mixture process with test tubes. However, instead of washing the yeast cake, is there any reason you couldn't just use the thick slurry in the bottom of a starter jar...

I don't have the patience to deal with keeping the temperatures super low via ice etc, myself. I brew banana-ey wheat beer in the summer, and I guess I'll just brew clove-ey wheat beer in the winter :)

What do you retain when you decant? Is the sediment all yeast, or is it also starter trub to dispose of?

to clarify: it's two SEPARATE starters, each now taking up most of two mason jars apiece.

I've been building up starter for a dubbel and a tripel, to start this weekend, but now with about two quart jars each of starter working away, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to brew this weekend. Given I might not have a chance for a few weeks, can I put these in the fridge like washed...

So the tripel yeast has shown life as of this afternoon... do I figure that's it's some wild critter that has caught fire, or is it the yeast I pitched into the starter??

two days and counting, the Dubbel yeast is roaring along in the starter, will add some additional malt and water this evening to keep it cranking until I'm ready to brew. The High Gravity smells kind of like chickpeas... not death, exactly, but not good and not yeast-ey in any way. NB wrote...

Will that off flavor temper in the bottle, or will it just taste forever of bananas? If the range is listed as going up to 78, I expected that at 78 it would actually work...

The chief issue is no activity in the smack pack followed by no activity in the starter, and no trub of any kind in the starter as well, and it kind of stinks... like it's not a yeast smell, it's got a bit of a funk to it.

Ordered some things from NB, got two smack packs of yeast, one Trappist High Gravity, and one Belgian Abbey pack. After smacking both, neither really showed any meaningful activity after almost 24 hours, so I pitched both into a starter. The Trappist HG smelled a little odd, not like any...

First batch in years, first solo batch (just a month or two back), couldn't get wort cool, pitched at over 100* F, hot spell, fermented at near 80* even in the basement. When I went to prepare for bottling, I managed to drop the empty foil packets for the hops into the fermented beer...

Can't figure out what the heck it's made out of, though it seems basically like a miracle-worker: a sink coated with paint in a bathroom under renovation in our place has been salvaged, a piece of All-Clad Stainless lost stains that have been there for years... Yet, it says it's...

Ok, so to sum up what my takeaway is here: 6-8 weeks in primary is ok. Give it at least three to carbonate. Give it a lot longer to really hit its stride and be worth the effort :)

Also, if i'm understanding correctly: if you add two more weeks in the primary, it's two weeks less you need to bottle age, potentially? I can have some of the finishing happen in bottle or in primary, depending on where I have more space, it sounds like?

I know that the Bavarian Wheat DME has a higher proportion of Wheat to Barley in the mix. I'm planning on just getting a few 50 pound bags of DME, both regular pale as well as Wheat, and the only wheat I'm seeing at Northern Brewer is Bavarian (as far as what's available in 50 pound bags.)...