Howto: Capture Wild Yeast

[sockmerchant]

Hey guys I need some thoughts. I did a brew yesterday (belgian strong), and did that thing where you get tired after cleaning and left the hydro sample out and forget about it. So, just before lunch time today I noticed it had gotten a bit cloudy, poured myself a beer and left it there.

I went back tonight... and a lot of stuff was happening in there. Mini fermentation.

Now there is a chance that I had tiny amounts yeast matter left in the cylinder. I dont wash it too thoroughly between brews but it does get a decent rinse out. Even if this is this case, I would have thought it would take more than 24 hours to reach this level of fermentation from such a small amount of yeast.

I am guessing that its probably some old yeast, mixed with bugs around my garage. I have had some definite brett infection in the past. (tasted bloody good!)

Whats happened here? I am curious so poured it off into a jar and put some foil over it. I intend to see what it results in. This is another two hours later:

PS: I have since added another third clean water. OG was 1.072 afterall

 

[radial67]

900 replies and Im not sure if this has been covered.....

So using straight up Sacc as a fermentation source creates alcohol which theoretically is a fairly inhospitible environment for a lot (not all) pathogens. Translating this I was wondering if making up some unfermented wort as a nutrient source and dilute it with some vodka (mathematics needed here) to about 3-10% would kill a lot of the alcohol intolerant bugs whilst creating a survivable environment for the yeast that can survive in an alcoholic environment and then expose this to air and see what I get.


e.g: e-coli/shigella/salmonella is something i dont want but any wild sacc/brett/pedio/lacto I do and from a quick search on the net, all three pathogens have some form of vulnerability to alcohol.

Is that an idea? Has it been covered in this already or is it just plain dumb?

 

[Oldsock]

e.g: e-coli/shigella/salmonella is something i dont want but any wild sacc/brett/pedio/lacto I do and from a quick search on the net, all three pathogens have some form of vulnerability to alcohol.

Is that an idea? Has it been covered in this already or is it just plain dumb?

It is an idea, but I think lowering the pH to ~4.3 with some food grade acid is a safer idea. There is a lot more research on the pH required for growth of the various pathogenic microbes, and it is something that some Belgian lambic brewers (and American breweries trying spontaneous fermentation) are doing to keep things safer.

 

[radial67]

It is an idea, but I think lowering the pH to ~4.3 with some food grade acid is a safer idea. There is a lot more research on the pH required for growth of the various pathogenic microbes, and it is something that some Belgian lambic brewers (and American breweries trying spontaneous fermentation) are doing to keep things safer.

Good idea.... Do you know of any issues with agar plates with the pH so low?

Am gg to do some DME and citric acid to get it down.

 

[Oldsock]

Good idea.... Do you know of any issues with agar plates with the pH so low?

Am gg to do some DME and citric acid to get it down.

I haven't made an agar plate since high school. I'd assume you have fewer concerns using plates than wort as you'll be able to select which cultures you want to pitch? Maybe look into selective media: http://bkyeast.wordpress.com/experiments/

 

[Randomguy18]

This thread really should be unstickied, locked and buried in a deep hole. While the first post sort of contains some facts, it's also open to misinterpretation. The following 25+ pages (that's as much as I could manage) mostly serve to lead people further astray.


Capturing and isolating yeast *is* actually fairly simple. Here's my recipe:

Prepare a wort sample, inoculate it in open air for a couple of hours or over night (or just throw in some fruit peel), then let it ferment for two weeks. The alcohol created by fermentation eventually kills off a lot of the undesireables.

If the final gravity is OK and whatever you're left with isn't too gross, now you have something to keep working with.

This is when you take samples for your petri dishes. Or you could just wash and pitch it in a starter if the remaining infections don't bother you.

Outside temperature, city pollution and whatever else is given serious weight in the first 25 pages really have very little to do with it, and yet again, I think a sticky that doesn't start off like that is in order.

 

[jaapie]

This thread really should be unstickied, locked and buried in a deep hole. While the first post sort of contains some facts, it's also open to misinterpretation. The following 25+ pages (that's as much as I could manage) mostly serve to lead people further astray.

Capturing and isolating yeast *is* actually fairly simple. Here's my recipe:

Prepare a wort sample, inoculate it in open air for a couple of hours or over night (or just throw in some fruit peel), then let it ferment for two weeks. The alcohol created by fermentation eventually kills off a lot of the undesireables.

If the final gravity is OK and whatever you're left with isn't too gross, now you have something to keep working with.

This is when you take samples for your petri dishes. Or you could just wash and pitch it in a starter if the remaining infections don't bother you.

Outside temperature, city pollution and whatever else is given serious weight in the first 25 pages really have very little to do with it, and yet again, I think a sticky that doesn't start off like that is in order.

Wow wow easy captain. I agree there is a lot of misinformation going on but this is a popular thread. Some people are interested in isolating the strains, some people are interested in brewing with whatever falls in (consortia) and there are people who get contaminations. That all together makes a nice mix of interests and sometimes we might get a little side tracked.

Outside temperature is quite important. Gueuze breweries only brew during the colder months, because bacteria will take over if its too warm. If you want to brew spontaneous, you need to keep that in mind. Yeast will grow but you will have a nice enteric taste going on as well perhaps not the nicest.
Fruit peel does not contain a lof of yeasts, it is a big misconception. Only damaged fruit carries serious weight in yeast.

I agree that catching yeasts is quite straightforward. But I have only tried it in a handful of places and I cannot know how it will be somewhere else. And I have had my failures as well.

Perhaps you could do a nice writeup?

 

[Randomguy18]

Wow wow easy captain. I agree there is a lot of misinformation going on but this is a popular thread. Some people are interested in isolating the strains, some people are interested in brewing with whatever falls in (consortia) and there are people who get contaminations. That all together makes a nice mix of interests and sometimes we might get a little side tracked.

By all means. I like the topic, but because of all the misinformation and bad practices in the first 25+ pages, which isn't people getting going off on tangents, I don't think this thread makes a decent intro to wild yeasts and should be stickied with "howto" in the subject line.

Outside temperature is quite important. Gueuze breweries only brew during the colder months, because bacteria will take over if its too warm. If you want to brew spontaneous, you need to keep that in mind.

I think I came across one reference to something along those lines. The recurring theme, though, was that high temps lead to too much mold, which makes yeast capture infeasible.

I certainly don't have all the right answers and think the people who have been keeping this thread alive would do better at starting a new sticky if that's what you're suggesting. Just keep your audience in mind; anyone without a decent lab should certainly ferment something before they bring out the agar. And not dump the jar over a little mold growth before the brewer's yeast kicks in.

 

[Marauder]

perhaps someone can provide some advice or insight.

I Brewed what would have been a cream ale(minus typical American ale yeast) but brought the gravity up to about 1.060 in the last 10 minutes with pure maple syrup. When the boil was finished I covered the kettle with a cheese cloth, "coolshipped", and left it right where it was for about 2 days.
Then (without any visible sign of life) I decide to trust that something must have inoculated the wort. Siphoned to a carboy and air-locked it up. Within about one more day (total on day 3 since brewed) I had a small krausen forming. In 2 more days a decent 1-2" krausen and the airlock rocking. This went for about 9 days from there, bubbling hard until finally slowed down and the krausen fell about 2 days ago. Those numbers are rough estimates but today is day 15 for sure. No more krausen no more airlock activity, and I checked the gravity. 1.050?? It looked to be going so strong. Most of what I have been reading from previous posters in the thread seemed to indicate very fast fermentation. I am wondering have some experienced slow ferments? or maybe I captured a non alcohol tolerant strain? I know it isn't uncommon to let a wild beer sit a long time to fully develop its funk, but at this rate, purely from an attenuation stand point, to get down to a decent FG, it will take about another 2 months. That is if the yeast is still active, (I will check grav again monday) Any thoughts?

 

[jaapie]

perhaps someone can provide some advice or insight.

I Brewed what would have been a cream ale(minus typical American ale yeast) but brought the gravity up to about 1.060 in the last 10 minutes with pure maple syrup. When the boil was finished I covered the kettle with a cheese cloth, "coolshipped", and left it right where it was for about 2 days.
Then (without any visible sign of life) I decide to trust that something must have inoculated the wort. Siphoned to a carboy and air-locked it up. Within about one more day (total on day 3 since brewed) I had a small krausen forming. In 2 more days a decent 1-2" krausen and the airlock rocking. This went for about 9 days from there, bubbling hard until finally slowed down and the krausen fell about 2 days ago. Those numbers are rough estimates but today is day 15 for sure. No more krausen no more airlock activity, and I checked the gravity. 1.050?? It looked to be going so strong. Most of what I have been reading from previous posters in the thread seemed to indicate very fast fermentation. I am wondering have some experienced slow ferments? or maybe I captured a non alcohol tolerant strain? I know it isn't uncommon to let a wild beer sit a long time to fully develop its funk, but at this rate, purely from an attenuation stand point, to get down to a decent FG, it will take about another 2 months. That is if the yeast is still active, (I will check grav again monday) Any thoughts?

This is not unusual. I have isolated many strains that only will ferment very briefly, and not too far down. Probably not a saccharomyces you have there being active but that is just guessing from my side. Check http://www.bjcp.org/docs/LagerYeast.pdf page 9 Diego Libkind presentation has a copy from a table showing what I mean. Good things happen to those who wait perhaps Sacch/Brett is there but just in small numbers. 2 months is not very long for a coolship inoculated beer.

 

[Pith]

Sounds like Kloeckera apiculata ate all the glucose from the maple syrup and then bummed out when they got to the maltose. Wait until it starts again; if there's other strains, they'll eat the dead K. apiculata and the other sugars and hopefully you'll get a nice krausen happening again. If it grows mould, start again and don't put maple syrup in until you're sure some of the maltose is being eaten. My 0.02 anyway. G'luck.

 

[Marauder]

First, thanks a lot guys.

Ok so now it seems after a little more research on the info you two gave me it probably is Kloeckera? I'm in the 2 week window and down the points that would have likely been added by the maple. I checked the grav again today, it hasn't budged. This has an extremely citric/tropic odor. Orange and Mango or papaya or something I can't place exactly, and a ton of funk. So my questions now are, is there anything wrong with pitching a yeast strain (perhaps saison) to finish this thing up now rather than wait hoping sachro takes over and no mold pops up? Also if I do this do you think I will still have some definite character from the Kloeckera or would the pitched strain dominate (I realize this is probably hard to say definitively but a guess or past experience?) also if it is k- will this be able to coexist with the pitched yeast? Say I like how this turns out and harvest the yeast cake. Will some of this character make it to the next batch?

 

[Tiroux]

Hey!

I tried to find my answer in the thread but you know... after a few pages I lost the ambition...

2 weeks to get saccharomyces... really? I've seen people do only overnight and get some sort of yeast (sacch or brett..)

 

[BrasseurGeorges]

Hey!

I tried to find my answer in the thread but you know... after a few pages I lost the ambition...

2 weeks to get saccharomyces... really? I've seen people do only overnight and get some sort of yeast (sacch or brett..)

Ignore this thread and listen to the Jean Van Roy podcast on basic brewing radio.

 

[Pith]

First, thanks a lot guys.

Ok so now it seems after a little more research on the info you two gave me it probably is Kloeckera? I'm in the 2 week window and down the points that would have likely been added by the maple. I checked the grav again today, it hasn't budged. This has an extremely citric/tropic odor. Orange and Mango or papaya or something I can't place exactly, and a ton of funk. So my questions now are, is there anything wrong with pitching a yeast strain (perhaps saison) to finish this thing up now rather than wait hoping sachro takes over and no mold pops up? Also if I do this do you think I will still have some definite character from the Kloeckera or would the pitched strain dominate (I realize this is probably hard to say definitively but a guess or past experience?) also if it is k- will this be able to coexist with the pitched yeast? Say I like how this turns out and harvest the yeast cake. Will some of this character make it to the next batch?

That sounds like a damn interesting contribution from whatever yeast have gotten to work! Is it a yeast character you enjoy?

What I would do personally is rack the brew off the yeast onto a Saison strain (save some of it so you still have some pure Saison yeast left over), especially if you are happy with how it's turning out so far, but don't pitch too much Saison as you might scrub off the wild character with the excess carbon dioxide. Also, ferment reasonably cool (ie cooler than summer outside) so the saison character doesn't dominate too much. Save the wild cake just in case you're really happy with how the beer turns out.

That way you get some wild character, plus a good dose of yeast character you know you'll like, and if you leave it in a carboy you might end up with some brett character a year or so down the track as they eat the complex carbs.

I think pitching is definitely worthwhile as you can never be sure if you'll get Sacch activity before mould kicks in. Either way, Brett won't show up until much later and is going to do so if it's there whether or not the wort is eaten by wild or cultivated Sacch.

Another idea is to rack off the wild cake, ferment slowly with a reasonably neutral strain (or lager it!), then dryhop with a tropical/citrussy hop.

As for "coexisting", the K. has done it's job and you won't hear from it again. It's either sleeping or dying; in my experience, from the autolysis taste I get from wild brews sometimes, it's likely the latter, so the other yeast will use their corpses for nutrients. K only eat glucose/dextrose and maybe fructose and I think they conk out at around 2-3 percent abv.

 

[Marauder]

Yup so I pitched. I'm not worried about the saison yeast I have plenty. I'm fermenting very cool for a saison strain 68. Good to know if Brett is there it will do its thing later down the line anyway. I don't know if the wild yeast that ate the first 10-12 grav points imparted a character I am going to like or not, but it definitely imparted something! the saison yeast probably won't be able to scrub it all off, it is quite pungent haha. Hopefully it just mellows it a bit. When the saison finishes up I will rack to another carboy and play the waiting game for the Brett.

 

[jack_a_roe]

After reading nearly all of this thread, I decided to take a stab as well. I threw some generously hopped pale ale into a couple of mason jars outside for an hour. Two days later I had what looked like to be moldy almost, little white circles. Next day, everything was all foamy, almost krausen-like. No real off smell to it. If I can find the chord I'll up some pictures.

 

[Pith]

After reading nearly all of this thread, I decided to take a stab as well. I threw some generously hopped pale ale into a couple of mason jars outside for an hour. Two days later I had what looked like to be moldy almost, little white circles. Next day, everything was all foamy, almost krausen-like. No real off smell to it. If I can find the chord I'll up some pictures.

Mould is not good. I hope you skimmed it off.

 

[JoesInBoston]

Oh, COLO,
I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier -- there is a way to get to a pure culture without solid media if you have a lot of sterile containers. It is called limiting dilutions. The idea is to dilute a culture enough times that only single cells remain.

You will need a bunch of tubes or containers about the size of the tubes you would use to make slants. And you will need something to move your culture/fresh wort around. A pipette with sterile tips is perfect. A bunch of sanitized metal spoons will work too.

The procedure is to take a drop of the most recent mixed wild culture and dilute it into 9 drops of fresh wort. If you're using a pipette, dilute 100 micro Liters into 1 mL. Either way, you have diluted the culture 1 to 10.

Now repeat this 10-fold dilution several times, each time taking a drop of the diluted wort from the previous step and diluting it further into 9 drops of fresh wort. Use a fresh pipette tip / sanitized spoon for each dilution.

Let's say, for example, you started with 1000 cells in your tube. After one dilution, you have 100 cells per tube. After two dilutions, you have 10 per tube. After three dilutions you have just one cell per tube. After four dilutions, you'd have -- either one cell or none at all. This is the level of dilution you want to get to, where most of the tubes don't contain any cells. At this level of dilution, you know that any tube that DOES grow, started from just one cell. This will get you to a pure culture!

But how many dilutions are requried? You're starting with more than 1000 cells, so it will take more than four dilutions, but not too many more. A White Labs tube is extremely dense with yeast, and it is about a billion cells per mL. A billion is 10^9. So, if you do 9, or let's be safe and say 10 of these 10-fold dilutions in a series on your culture, you should already be in the zone.

Let's say you find that all the dilutions starting with the sixth don't grow anything. Now, go back to the undiluted culture and do the 10-fold dilution six times, but make a bunch of tubes of that sixth dilution. Make 20 or so. You already know that most of them will not grow. But a few will grow, and you will know they started with just one cell.

Cells have a tough time growing by themselves, so make sure you keep the volume small, 1 mL at the most, aerate every day, and give the cultures plenty of time to grow. It might take a few weeks of aerating every day before the most extreme dilutions show signs of growth.

This is a lot of work, and I have only read about it, not tried it. But limiting dilution it is a standard microbiology technique and it will work! You may prefer to just buy some sterile plastic plates and agar, though.

drummstikk,

I think this is the most solid way to get a pure culture that I've read in this thread. Question though - When you sample the wild culture, would you do that immediately after you saw the most yeast activity? Around 2 weeks or so? Maybe even take some of the yeast from the bottom and create a new starter with that. Then sample from that starter? Would that help to ensure that the cell count of yeast is the highest compared to cell count of other microbes? Unless I am interpreting the way other microbes replicate, I'd rather not go through all this trouble only to end up with a pure culture of a microbe I didn't want to begin with.

 

[BrasseurGeorges]

Since this thread keeps getting bumped, I'm just wondering... After 4 years and 919 posts, has anyone pointed out that the basis of this thread is a misinterpretation of Guinard as referring to inoculation, when he is actually referring to fermentation?

 

[Microphobik]

Just decided to give this a shot by taking some left over wort from a brew day (gravity was higher than recommended - about 1.045) and taking it outside to our little orchard. I put a screen over it and left it for a few hours and then actually dipped an apple and a plumb in it, both of which had that noticeable slight dust over it, presumable containing some yeast. I have it in a mason jar with the lid just loosely placed on top. I then let it sit at room temp. Within about 35 hours I started seeing noticeable bubbles. Sort of like the foam you might see around the edges of a under-carbonated beer that had been out for a while. I'm at 48 hours now and the bubbles are increasing. It doesn't look like a traditional Krausen, but rather the same as before, with more bubbles. I don't see bubbles within the body of the wort like you do when normal fermentation is in full swing.

The smell is interesting. Nothing like a normal beer, but not rotten smelling either. It's got a bit of a sour-like smell but I can't tell if I'm getting a really phenolic Belgiany thing, or if it's actually starting to sour a bit.

What does this sound like? What would you do next?

The original post says it takes about two weeks for Saccharomyces to take hold. But this has definitely happened a lot faster.

Am I making beer or vinegar? No signs of anything like that moldy film I've seen on juice that sits out. It actually looks clean. But the smell is definitely different.

Any advice for my next step?

 

[statseeker]

I would try propagating it again with more wort. Just keep doing that until you get a good amount. Any off flavors or smells will start to make themselves more apparent on the second and third propagations. All I ended up doing was adding it to a running saison fermentation and letting the flavors come that way. It was definitely different than normal 3724 beer. But better, more citrus notes. Time to experiment.

 

[Microphobik]

I would try propagating it again with more wort. Just keep doing that until you get a good amount. Any off flavors or smells will start to make themselves more apparent on the second and third propagations. All I ended up doing was adding it to a running saison fermentation and letting the flavors come that way. It was definitely different than normal 3724 beer. But better, more citrus notes. Time to experiment.

I will definitely do that. But what does it sound like I have with such a fast, but not necessarily vigorous, start. The smell is definitely odd. Not foul, just odd. Definitely phenolic, and it has an almost hot smell, if that makes any sense. There are pickle-like notes without being quite vinegary, and I don't know if I ma in fact getting vinager, or if it's just the spices (such as clove) that one finds in vinager. I've made fermented hot sauce before, and it's definitely not that moldy white surface that I would normally associate with a lactic fermentation. This is more of a bubbly look, like a carbonated beer. But at the same time, its not foamy like a normal Krausen. Just wondering what it sounds like to anyone who has done this before.

 

[statseeker]

That's the problem. It's hard to tell even in all the detail you're describing. That's why I would continue to build it until you can sample it and get a taste and smell profile in a single malt single hop beer. Yeast will be the only variable.

 

[Microphobik]

That's the problem. It's hard to tell even in all the detail you're describing. That's why I would continue to build it until you can sample it and get a taste and smell profile in a single malt single hop beer. Yeast will be the only variable.

Fair enough. I'll stay on it and see what I get. Thanks.

 

[KappinSpaulding]

After I get a few batches under my belt (I haven't brewed a single one yet myself) I want to create a post apocalyptic brew. I will forage all of the ingredients I can and wild yeast will just be icing on the cake.

 

[statseeker]

There's a post floating around about using grape nuts as the malt. Start stock piling them and you might get your post apocalyptic brew. Look up 5 dollar batch or something.

 

[Schlenkerla]

I made this beer back in 2009.

My 1st Wild Yeast Cultured Beer

I wasn't drinking it due to the leather glove taste. I saved the bottles. I opened one a month back. Its like it fixed itself. Somewhere from 2009 to now!!

Might drink one today with football. It'll be 5 years in April....

 

[Beerswimmer]

Today was a brew day, so I grabbed 4 jars of second runnings. Got them to boil, covered them in cheesecloth and put them outside. One on each side of my house next to plants. The temps are between 60F down to 52F. Hoping for something Belgian-esque!

 

[Beerswimmer]

I set my 4 jars of second runnings out at around 9pm with gauze over them and left to sit overnight. At 5:30am there was a big windstorm, so I ran out and put them in my dirty garage until about 3pm that day. I took them in and changed the gauze out for a coffee filter and put them into my warm(73f) room to see what happens. This morning I checked and 2 had blue green .old and were dumped, 2 are possibly fermenting with yeast. I dumped the 2 with mold and will leave the other 2 for a bit longer to see what happens. No bad smells from either, but they look different. One is much clearer than the other. Never mind the trub in the jars, I collected before verlauf to give the yeast something to eat if they want.

Jar #1

Jar #2

Both