Left my Wyeast in car for a week 50-80 degrees.

[Scooterkdavis]

so did some quick searching and found no definate answer, as the title says i bought a slap pack on Sunday and was getting ready to brew tonight and found that its been in my car all this time. In northern california its been up to about 80-85 degrees. Anyway the pack is a little swollen and i just activated it, anyone know if this is good to use or should I go grab another pack???

Thanks

 

[steinsato]

Man, I don't know. If you smack it and it begins to work, you may be in business. But I'm guessing if it was 85 degrees your car was much much hotter.

 

[IrregularPulse]

Is it worth it to waste 20-30 bucks worth of ingredients in case.

 

[PinkyOFloyd]

Too late for a starter if you're brewing tonight. That would give you the answer. If it was 80-85F & your car was outside in the sun who knows what the temp was in your car. I'd grab another smack pack if it were me.

 

[Scooterkdavis]

no that was the temp on the car today, the hottest by far this week the outdoor temp has been in the low 70's but im still dont know enough about yeast biology to know if that will just kill some or piss them them off so they get all pissed and decide to ruin my beer, i hate it when good yeast gets tempted by the darkside

 

[steinsato]

well if it were me, I'd either make a starter tonight and put brewing off til tomorrow (if the starter actually works). Or buy another pack of yeast and brew tonight.

 

[Scooterkdavis]

Thanks guys, I think i'll go get some dry yeast as a back up and if this hits full swell by the time a pitch i'll give it a try otherwise just use the dry...

 

[giligson]

Always keep some good dry ale yeast in the cupboard/fridge as a backup when things like this happen.

 

[Jethro]

With those temps you should be fine. When you activate dry yeast you use 90-100 deg water so I don't see 80 deg being a problem. Probably not a good temp for long term storage though.

I agree with what others here have said, always have some dry yeast on-hand in case things go wrong.

 

[Scooterkdavis]

just an update for all, yeast pack hasnt swelled after 9 hours after breaking inner seal, i guess that temp might have killed yeast... glad i got dry yeast; also got a few extra packs of differnet varieties, good call.

 

[onemanlan]

Yeah if the yeast weren't dry then likely they're dead. They can handle extremely dry and hot situations when they're in their desiccant form with no water, however add water and heat to the same temp then you have yourselef some dead yeast. It's the yeasts not being prep'd for 'OMG HOT!' mode.