Oops

[RustyHorn]

In short, my wort has been yeastless for roughly 48 hours as I was going to pitch tonight. The problem is that my airlock has started to bubble :-/ I knew that I couldn't pitch straight away so I added some hops in the hope that they'd utilise their antibacterial properties to avoid infection.
Should I be worried or should I pitch my yeast anyway?

 

[QuadConPana]

I'm a relative newbie, but maybe the airlock activity is from temp changes. I would risk $7-9 worth of yeast before I discarded $30+ of grains, hops, and sweat.

 

[RustyHorn]

That is possible because the night was unseasonably warm.

 

[Bowtiebrewery]

RDWHAHB.

Pitch and see what happens.

 

[Todd820]

I say pitch away as well. Pretty sure adding hops would not stop anything that has started and your best bet would be to get a healthy fermentation going with your yeast.

 

[RustyHorn]

I say pitch away as well. Pretty sure adding hops would not stop anything that has started and your best bet would be to get a healthy fermentation going with your yeast.

I had already added the hops.

 

[ba-brewer]

Open up the fermentor, if you see a krausen or signs of active fermentation I would not add new yeast. If you are into sour beer let the wild stuff run its course or dump it. Then do a major cleaning/sanitizing of all of your stuff that came into contact with the wort.

 

[RustyHorn]

I'm a relative newbie, but maybe the airlock activity is from temp changes. I would risk $7-9 worth of yeast before I discarded $30+ of grains, hops, and sweat.

Open up the fermentor, if you see a krausen or signs of active fermentation I would not add new yeast. If you are into sour beer let the wild stuff run its course or dump it. Then do a major cleaning/sanitizing of all of your stuff that came into contact with the wort.

I got home and all is good! I think it was the temperature change. I almost got excited about the prospect of brewing a sour. It would have been a major faff though!

Thank you, both of you, for helping out

 

[Calder]

Glad to hear all is well.

I would be worried that I the hops contained bacteria or yeast that could have infected the wort. While hops have some preservative qualities that hinder the growth off some spoiling bacteria such as lacto and pedio, and probably a multitude of other bacteria, they don't stop yeasts from working ....... as demonstrated by us hopping the heck out of wort and then pitching yeast and expecting it to ferment. I wouldn't be surprised to find hops can have wild yeast on them. Yeast is everywhere. Most wild yeast will do nothing if pitched into a beer already containing alcohol with only complex sugars left (dry hopping).