liquid yeast question

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frankjones

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Is it necessary to make a starter for a vial of liquid yeast for pitching into 2.5 gallon batch?

Thanks for taking the time to read my neeewbie question.
 
Depends on the age of the yeast and the OG of the wort. Most likely not though.
 
Usually it would not be necessary unless the yeast was near the "use by" date or had been mishandled. Each day after production the number of viable cells decreases. Mishandled yeast will also have reduced viability. One extreme method of mishandling is the yeast being shipped during hot weather.

Run your east through this calculator with the production date, OG of your beer, and the volume in the fermentor.
http://www.brewersfriend.com/yeast-pitch-rate-and-starter-calculator/

Production date for White Labs yeast is 4 months previous to the use by date.
 
Necessary? Well, that depends on the age of the yeast and the OG of the brew. Use an online yeast calculator (Yeastcalc, MrMalty, Brewer's Friend) to determine if you'll be pitching enough yeast. Since you are using a "vial" I'm assuming White Labs, in which case the viability date is 4 months prior to the use-by date on the label. The vial contains approximately 100 billion cells.

With all that said, I'd recommend a starter whenever using liquid yeast because you have no other way to know what sort of environmental conditions the yeast have been subjected to prior to landing in your hands. Rather than finding out 3 days after you pitch into your wort that there are no longer any viable cells, a starter will tell you if you have good yeast or not. The yeast is probably fine, but what if they spent several hours in a 120° truck between the yeast lab and the LHBS? If you make a starter and that results in more yeast than you need, save the remainder in a sanitized container for another batch in the future (make another starter at that time).
 
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