Insect/spider life in my hops

[supermoth]

I just picked my first year Cascades and am planning to wet-hop the beer that is mashing as I type this. Thing is, as I was picking through the hops I found a couple little gray spiders, several ants, and a small ladybug, and I doubt I even found everyone who's hiding in there. I'm planning on throwing the hops and their stowaways in during the last 5 minutes of the boil. Safe?

 

[hoppymonkey]

It'll be fine. Mine was like a little wolf spider farm. I got tired of picking them off me while harvesting. Must be why I had no insect eating my hops problems.

 

[theredben]

If I were you I would try not to put too many ladybugs in. Not sure what they do to beer, but they do terrible things to wine.

"Ladybird taintSome insects present in the grapes at harvest inevitably end up in the press and for the most part are inoffensive. Others, notably types of ladybirds, or the multicoloured asian lady beetle, release unpleasant volatile compounds as a defensive mechanism when disturbed. In sufficient quantities these can affect the wine's bouquet and taste. With an olfactory detection threshold of a few ppb, the principal active compounds are methoxypyrazines, or pyrazines, that are perceived as rancid peanut butter, bitter herbaceous, green bell pepper, or cat urine. This is also a naturally occurring compound in Sauvignon grapes and so ladybug taint has been known to make Rieslings taste like Sauvignon Blanc." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wine_fault#Ladybird_taint

Parts Per Billion (ppb) is a crazy small amount!!

 

[gbx]

...With an olfactory detection threshold of a few ppb, the principal active compounds are methoxypyrazines, or pyrazines, that are perceived as rancid peanut butter, bitter herbaceous, green bell pepper, or cat urine...

Aside from the rancid peanut butter, those all could be good things! Even cat pee seems to be in style now.

 

[ThreeDogsNE]

Even cat pee seems to be in style now.

They do sell a lot of Bud!