Friend used two yeasts

[Mencken]

Hey, my friend just brewed a mead. He first used K1V-1116 as his yeast, but he saw no activity. So he decided to re-pitch, and the second time he pitched he used D-47. Still, there was little activity.

However, one guess we have in talking it over is, after putting the must in the fermenter, he put campden tablets in. Then 24 hours or so later, he pitched the first yeast. Our guess is maybe the campden tablets de-oxygenated the must, which caused the lack of fermentation.

So now he has two yeasts in there, and just stirred it up to get the must oxygenated again. Assuming two yeasts are alive and active, what can he expect to happen?

It's a traditional clover honey mead.

 

[wayneb]

Well, it is more probable that the sulfur dioxide released from the campden tablets actually killed, or at least severely attenuated, the yeast, rather than just scavenging O2. Oxygenating will help, but only if the yeast in there are still alive -- which may or may not be true, depending on how much sulfite he added. Do you know how many tablets were used?

There are more questions to be answered before we can determine the most likely cause of the problem -- it may be totally unrelated to the campden addition, since that was 24 hours before yeast pitch. First, what's the exact recipe for this batch? How much honey, how much water? Also, was the yeast rehydrated, or just pitched dry? If it was rehydrated, did he have good control over the rehydration water temperature? Were any nutrients added, either to the main must or to the rehydration? Finally, is there any way that he can measure the pH of the batch?

That info is pretty important to help to figure out what's going on.

 

[Mr. Nice Guy]

If you get them started without pitching the 1116 will dominate. It is the original "killer yeast" and it will take over almost any fermentation. Other ("normal") yeast cannot survive with the 1116 present, it makes toxins that are harmful only to other yeast.

I think...

 

[wayneb]

If you get them started without pitching the 1116 will dominate. It is the original "killer yeast" and it will take over almost any fermentation. Other ("normal") yeast cannot survive with the 1116 present, it makes toxins that are harmful only to other yeast.

I think...

Well, almost. K1V-1116 is a "killer strain" that produces the protein that does deactivate most wild yeasts, but there are other killer strains that produce the same protein. In fact there is more than one protein so the two characteristics are referred to as K1 and K2. K1V-1116 and D47 are both active killer strains, and they both produce the K2 factor, so they will really have no effect on each other when inoculated into the same must. However, 1116 is a much faster fermenter than D47, so the characteristics of 1116 will likely predominate.

 

[Brandon O]

Hey, my friend just brewed a mead. He first used K1V-1116 as his yeast, but he saw no activity. So he decided to re-pitch, and the second time he pitched he used D-47. Still, there was little activity.

However, one guess we have in talking it over is, after putting the must in the fermenter, he put campden tablets in. Then 24 hours or so later, he pitched the first yeast. Our guess is maybe the campden tablets de-oxygenated the must, which caused the lack of fermentation.

So now he has two yeasts in there, and just stirred it up to get the must oxygenated again. Assuming two yeasts are alive and active, what can he expect to happen?

It's a traditional clover honey mead.

Seriously, just leave it alone. You are fine, this is mead not beer. A lot of times you will see very little airlock activity or none at all for extended periods of time.


Just leave it alone and let it do its thing.

 

[Mr. Nice Guy]

wayneb,
I kept thinking, Isn't D47 a "killer" strain as well... That's why I shoud look this stuff up and why I love this forum too, thanks.

 

[digdan]

When in doubt, shake the carboy like a crying baby (yes I'm going to hell for that one sentence) and add a decent amount of yeast energizer and yeast nutrient.

This has saved me plenty of times. You will only notice a slight amount of off flavor that will disappear in a couple months.

 

[Mencken]

Hey, thanks for hte replies, and sorry for the delay in responding. He pitched and then went out of town, so I don't know the full details. Here is what I know:

1) It's a traditional mead with 14 lbs of Clover honey. He had only made beer before, which experiences a lot of volume boil off, so he misjudged the amount of water. I believe his final volume was 5.5 gallons, once he set it to ferment. He brewed the mead @ 190 degrees, oxygenated, then threw the campden tablets in. He let it sit overnight, so it'd be room temperature (guessing about 72 degrees)

2) The 1116 yeast was improperly rehydrated. He read the package which states "do not stir" after you put the yeast in the water. He took this to mean don't stir at all, so the yeast was just sitting on top the water. This likely meant most of hte yeast didn't rehydrate before pitching. 24 hours after brewing, he pitched the yeast and stirred it in.

3) 24 hours later, no action. He got concerned, and pitched the D-47. He knew about his mistake with rehydrating the yeast by this time, and so this yeast should have been hydrated. I do not know whether he saw evidence of it in his starter jar.

4) 12 hours after pitching the D-47, he went out of town, so I don't know anything further. Was more just curious on the effect of the respective yeasts.

 

[Tusch]

Not soon enough to know that either of those two yeast is not fermenting. Particularly if you don't use proper nutrient schedules, it can take up to 72 hours for a mead to start fermenting. He waited 12 hours without activity, when in actuality that meant nothing.

Oh and tell him to never "brew his mead @ 190 degrees" again. No need to heat it at all, except if you prefer to warm the honey to help with pouring.