Newbie question, Weird floaters in my Mead

[Krail]

So I got the book Wild Fermentation, mainly out of an interest in pickling, though the book also talks about things like making yogurt and brewing beer and wine.

The very first recipe in the book is for a super simple Mead brew. I've never done any sort of brewing before and this sounded fun and easy, so I thought I'd try it. It's presented as something very simple that you can just go out and do without too much preparation or background knowledge, but I'm finding that it left out a lot of potential pitfalls (and notably didn't mention any sanitation procedures)

The recipe says to mix a 4:1 ratio of water and raw, unpasteurized honey, mix it thoroughly in a covered container (I used a plastic gallon pitcher with a dish cloth over it) and let it sit a couple days, stirring occasionally. The yeast present in the honey and in the environment is supposed to be enough to ferment, I guess. Once the mixture is foaming, then the recipe says to transfer it to a jug and cap it with an airlock.

As you're probably imagining at this point, I'm having some issues with the first step. It's been a week. It is not fermenting properly and I'm seeing these weird floaters in it , which I assume are some kind of bacterial colony (they're hard to photograph, but you can kinda see that little cloudy splotch I've caught with my spoon there)

Does anyone know what these are or if the mix is salvageable?

 

[damdaman]

Can't tell anything from your pictures but wine yeast is like $1 a packet, you can go to your local homebrew store and get a packet and pitch it and you'll probably be fine.

 

[fatbloke]

Well if it's raw honey, then there's likely gonna be some pollen and other fine debris in it.

From the pictures it looks fine.

I'd just get the yeast and pitch.......

 

[Krail]

It's definitely not just pollen or some other stuff that was already in the honey. The cloudy splotches only started appearing a couple days ago, and they're growing. There's more of them and they're larger than they were.

I guess I'll try picking the stuff out, then get some wine yeast on Monday when the store opens.

Any idea how much yeast I should use for a gallon? 12 cups of water and 3 cups of honey.

 

[fatbloke]

It's definitely not just pollen or some other stuff that was already in the honey. The cloudy splotches only started appearing a couple days ago, and they're growing. There's more of them and they're larger than they were.

I guess I'll try picking the stuff out, then get some wine yeast on Monday when the store opens.

Any idea how much yeast I should use for a gallon? 12 cups of water and 3 cups of honey.

If your still concerned, then 2 routes......

first is sulphite the must, any weak wild yeast strains will circum to that, leave it for at least 24 hours, 48 being better and aerate the hell out of it at least twice a day. The added O2 will aid yeast development when you finally pitch and also help to drive off the sulphites.

Then pitch yeast.......

Or just aerate lime hell and pitch K1-V1116. The K designation indicates its killer characteristic where it will kill off wild and other weaker strains and become the dominant yeast........oh and it makez pretty fine meads.......

Or you could even do both.........

I suspect its unlikely that it will be an issue. Its easy to convince yourself that you have one of the possible horror story scenario's, especially when early on in mead making.......

its generally fine if you just do the most basic of hygiene practices. Ive got some starsan, ive got oxi-chem pro ive even sourced the rare as rocking horse turds potassium metabisulphite (rare here anyway), but am still happy to use 5 crushed sodium metabisulphite campden tablets and a teaspoon of citric acid all dissolved into a pint of water and used from a hand spray to sanitise with. I just soap and water clean/rinse kit first, then spray and leave for 2 or 3 minutes before using kit (shake off excess sanitiser). Has worked fine for about 9 years for me with no issues......

 

[Krail]

Is sulphite a sanitizing chemical? Are you suggesting I put it IN my mixture, or use it to clean the jug before I transfer?

 

[Krail]

Well, I just checked my pitcher again and found that it's finally foaming! I guess the wild yeast eventually took hold.

I dug around for my weird floaters intending to remove them. Maybe it's just wishful thinking (or the foam getting in the way) but I think I saw less of them.