Pitch now or wait?

[blackbear219]

I just brewed my 1st homebrew Saturday. I had made a starter since the yeast vile I ordered was about 94 degrees when I got it. 24 hours in the fermenter there was nothing. At 48 hours I had seen a couple of bubbles through the airlock but no kruezen. I was worried so I called my mailorder HBS and they said wait until Wednesday. Sure enough when I came home from work Tuesday it was bubbling and there was a good layer of kruezen on it. It was still going this AM.

The lesson I learned is that yeast that gets hot, if not completely dead, takes longer to show signs of life. I assume that is because it is going through more generations of reproduction and the numbers are going up with each generation. If you start with very few yeast cells it will take more generations and more time for them to show signs. This is my assumption.

I'm going to pass along the advice that my HBS gave me. Give it 3 to 4 days then take a gravity reading. base your yeast re-pitching decisions on that reading.

Hope it takes off soon!

See, I didn't do a starter. I certainly will from now on, but the point is that I didn't this time. The way I see it, if the original yeast is just experiencing a lag time (which I figure is probably the case) and if I pitch another vial in now, the total cells in those two pitches would be a similar cell count as it would have been if I had just pitched a starter to begin with.

This has already been a batch of experiments. I changed the hops around on the recipe because of availability problems, I added half the LME as a late addition. This will be another fun experiment in a batch that I am sure will turn out just fine.

 

[Bennypapa]

I pitch another vial in now, the total cells in those two pitches would be a similar cell count as it would have been if I had just pitched a starter to begin with.

I'd have to agree with that thinking. It makes sense.