Going Wild

Tactical-Brewer · May 18, 2016

Yep, although my knowledge is rather limited and I'm still very much learning about brewing in general, I'm going wild. Or well, attempting to anyways.

The idea of using a wild, local yeast in a beer is absolutely fascinating to me. As yeast in general are fascinating to me.

After doing a ton of reading, I'm trying my hand at collecting some wild yeast and just going to see what happens. If I get any, and as they grow, I will isolate colonies using agar plates and try to purify them the best I can without a microscope or a microbiology degree lol.

Eventually decided to go on mute dog's method because it seemed pretty easy. Create some lower gravity, low hopped wort, put your flowers, tree bark, fruit in it for 6-12 hours, pull that out and let it set for a while and see if you get anything.

While over at my childhood property this evening for dinner, I got some flowers, put them in my cooled wort I made earlier and am staring at them like a small child stares at a snow globe. I'll keep you all posted or whoever cares about it. Should be fun.

Oh, for the flowers, I did one mason jar with daisies and roses, one with honey suckle, and one with little flowers off some hedge bush my mom said the bees love.

Wish me luck.

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nettekdl · May 18, 2016

I'm on the 10th generation of my local yeast, which I have a thread on if you are interested in my process. I used a different process then you have chosen, I placed containers of my sasion 2nd runnings around my property then stepped all samples up to 1 gallon and selected the best. I got lucky and my wife was in a microbiology class at the time and was able to get my sample plated and isolated but even before isolated it turned out great lambic styles. This reminds me I need to update that thread for subscribers as I just finally tapped that beer last month

Tactical-Brewer · May 18, 2016

Awesome nettekdl! I thought about doing it with that method but read a bunch about people getting mold and what not, or it being too hot and stuff.

However, I want to do that method this fall and place them in different areas, fields, orchards, woods, etc and just play with it.

I love the idea of wild/local yeast and hopefully I get something but we'll see. We had two solid days of rain and I'm hoping the rain didn't wash off any yeast that were on the flowers.

Nettekdl, can you link your post here?

nettekdl · May 18, 2016

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=528270 there is the URL for the thread I had. A fun little thing I did with it was used my neighbors malted barley, my homegrown hops, homegrown sour cherries and the local yeast to make an all local cherry lambic

Tactical-Brewer · May 18, 2016

nettekdl said:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=528270 there is the URL for the thread I had. A fun little thing I did with it was used my neighbors malted barley, my homegrown hops, homegrown sour cherries and the local yeast to make an all local cherry lambic

Now that. Is. Awesome!

brewshki · May 18, 2016

Super cool! Subscribed.

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

I should mention, in addition to mute dog blog, I also read a lot of Sui Genaris blog on the subject as well. They're both awesome reading if you're into this kind of stuff!

I got the flower idea off another blog of a guy who knows mute dog and he used some lavender for his sample. I'm hoping I have the same luck as he did because he got a heck of a yeast strain from that lavender!

mutedog · May 19, 2016

Awesome, I hope you catch something good! Flowers are a good source of yeast, especially those visited by bees. I've caught yeast from a plum blossom that was quite excellent, and I'm planning on harvesting from some blackberry flowers growing near the location of an old brewery from the 1880s that's now a hiking trail.

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

Holy smokes! Mute Dog! Thanks for popping in here man! You're kind of like a celeb to me since I've read a bunch of your stuff, even on the raw Ale!

I'll have to re check cause I cant remember if I want these samples warm or more on the chilled side of things.

I checked them this morning and they were sitting at 63, so I put them in a warm closet where they should reach mid 70's.

Jaybird · May 19, 2016

This is a KILLER! Subd in for sure! Wild is a place I, myself haven't played with much. I have done a porter and a few others but nothing like this! I LOVE IT! Keep us posted you guys! Between the 2 threads and of course @mutedog and his wild ride, there is some killer reading here!

Cheers
Jay

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

Thanks Jaybird!

I was reading an article last night about a Japanese professor using yeast sourced from local Japanese flowers to use in sake since there's been a huge decline in ranges of taste and styles in sake. Thought that was a pretty cool read.

Hoping these flowers get me some good strains going.

mutedog · May 19, 2016

@Tactical-Brewer generally I just ferment them in the typical ale range, or just room temp, whatever is easier.

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

mutedog said:
@Tactical-Brewer generally I just ferment them in the typical ale range, or just room temp, whatever is easier.

Perfect!

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

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Forgot SWMBO had some yeast nutrient and energizer for her wine so I put just a dash in each. Still just keeping my fingers crossed.

Put them on top of the cabinets where they're sitting at a nice 71.9 degrees.

Aristotelian · May 19, 2016

I just picked some red and white clover and put them in mason jars with leftover wort.

@Tactical--it looks like you have capped your mason jars with lids. You don't want to do that. If yours starts fermenting it will explode the jars because they are not designed for carbonation.

I set mine with sanitized foil.

Tactical-Brewer · May 19, 2016

Aristotelian said:
I just picked some red and white clover and put them in mason jars with leftover wort.

@Tactical--it looks like you have capped your mason jars with lids. You don't want to do that. If yours starts fermenting it will explode the jars because they are not designed for carbonation.

I set mine with sanitized foil.

It is the mason jar lids but they're only halfway on. That way the CO2 can escape. I didn't have any air locks that will fit on the mason jars.

Tactical-Brewer · May 20, 2016

Ok, so this morning, day 3, I can see what appears to be little white bubbles floating on top of the wort. The bubbles aren't on the sides, they're floating in the middle so who knows. They definitely have a funky funky smell to them now.

We'll see. Also I'll take a picture when I get back home.

mesooohoppy · May 20, 2016

Sub'd for sure, I'd love to do this one day.

cannman · May 20, 2016

Just a heads up, there are thousands of yeast strains, and the one you want is saccharomyces cerevisiae. If you don't catch a good one here, KEEP TRYING! Worst case is one of those 3 will be mildly sour and you can add that yeast as a sour agent in your next beer with a repitch. "Locally Soured"

:mug:

mutedog · May 20, 2016

Aristotelian said:
it looks like you have capped your mason jars with lids. You don't want to do that. If yours starts fermenting it will explode the jars because they are not designed for carbonation.

In my experience the lids will give way before the glass shatters, not that I'm saying anyone should test this.

zgja2 · May 20, 2016

subbed. Always interested in the weird and wild

Tactical-Brewer · May 20, 2016

You know, thinking about this, I didn't really give them a good stir to oxygenate them. I poured them into jars through a strainer to get the hop leaves out, and then just added the flowers.

You guys think that's sufficient? I'm a little worried to stir them now and introduce anymore oxygen since bad bugs thrive on oxygen too.

What do you guys suggest? Let them be for the time being?

Also, anyone who's interested in doing this, I highly suggest it. It literally cost me 5 dollars worth of dme (I didn't have dme and I literally only used a small portion of that 5 dollars worth so I'll have plenty to keep doing it and make starters) and like 8 bucks for the mason jars which came with like a dozen or whatever. Easy peasy, especially if I can try to do it, so can you.

Aristotelian · May 20, 2016

Give it a shake. No harm in oxygen at this point as long as you aren't leaving it open to let fruit flies and such in there.

Tactical-Brewer · May 20, 2016

Honey Suckle
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Hedge flower believe it's Escallonia Iveyi. Missed a flower in this jar. Believe it or not, this one smells the funkiest!
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Rose/daisies
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Sorry for the crappy pictures, but hopefully you can get an idea. Not quite sure yet. Just going to let them ride. If I see mold start to pop up, I guess I'll try to get it out with a sterilized fork before it gets out of hand.

Jaybird · May 20, 2016

I would be willing to bet there was enough O2 on the flowers. I would LET IT RIDE myself...

Killer start man! Those are all good signs...

Cheers
Jay

IslandLizard · May 20, 2016

mutedog said:
In my experience the lids will give way before the glass shatters, not that I'm saying anyone should test this.

Oh, I've tested it, unintentionally, with mason jars containing harvested or ranched yeast, topped off with the saved beer. Even in the fridge they can pick up a bit of fermentation again. With the band screwed tight, first the lid starts to bulge, then 3 fold lines develop in a triangular shape, and where the lines meet at the edge, the crease gets sharper. Eventually gas will or should be able to escape, but it takes a bit effort. It looks like the glass is strong enough, and the lid will give out eventually.

I'd keep the bands loose enough so gas gets released well before the lids start to bulge. I've used 48oz plastic/PET mayonnaise jars for small test fermentations. Just kept the plastic screw lids on loosely.

OswaldvW · May 20, 2016

Subscribed

mutedog · May 20, 2016

Looking good @tactical-brewer I wouldn't bother with stirring/oxygenating at this point. Wait until you are stepping them up for that.

Tactical-Brewer · May 20, 2016

mutedog said:
Looking good @tactical-brewer I wouldn't bother with stirring/oxygenating at this point. Wait until you are stepping them up for that.

Sweet! I'm gonna let them ride. Can't wait to see if I caught anything good! :rockin:

GrogNerd · May 21, 2016

we have a local yeast guy, PhD in microbiology, consults at several breweries and started his own yeast company. only sells at 2 HBSs here in NoVA. I've used his yeast for 2 brews (his Pale Ale strain for a Bigfoot clone and a strain he harvested from a bottle of Basque cider for a apple wine) and have his German strain for a Grodziskie I plan to brew (if I ever get around to it). I may never go back to White Labs or Wyeast.

Jasper has been in the news several times, most notably for harvesting yeast for an All-Virginia beer and brewing a beer with yeast collected from a 35-million year old fossil (yeast itself was not 35-million years old, just the fossil it was collected from)

the best resource is his presentation on yeast, where he talks about how to go about collecting wild strains

hope this helps!

Going Wild

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