Question on dry hop and am I too late

[Lance Rose]

i made my first ever batch of beer 24 days ago, it’s still in the original fermentation bucket, I haven’t checked it, also forgot to use my citra hops to dry hop it, am I too late, should I just check and bottle it now?

 

[Keith81]

Not too late, dry hop then bottle. I always leave beer in the fermenter 3-4 weeks to let it start to clear on it's own before bottling.

 

[IslandLizard]

3-5 days on dry hops is enough. You can add the pellets through the airlock hole so you don't have to lift the lid, which is beneficial. A few hours later, give the bucket a little swirl to suspend them. You may want to give it a little swirl again the next day.

Tie a piece of voile or a hop bag around the end of the racking hose when transferring to your bottling bucket, to filter out any hop bits that get sucked up. Make sure to keep that end of the hose and bag on the bottom, under the beer, so you don't aerate it.

 

[Lance Rose]

Thanks, and is normal for the beer to look like this, thin white floating bits?

 

[Qhrumphf]

That white stuff looks like the start of a pellicle.

In most cases that's a telltale sign of infection.

Now it's possible that normal yeast can do it, although it's rare. My understanding is that when it does happen, it's usually related to oxygen and most common in buckets (being left too long, too much head space, leaky lid, etc).

In either case it's not a good thing.

 

[IslandLizard]

That white stuff looks like the start of a pellicle.

In most cases that's a telltale sign of infection.

Aside from giving it a good taste first, what do all you guys think the OP should do?

• Bottle now with our customary advice and precautions of bottling an infected beer, or
• Add dry hops for a few days then bottle with the same list of precautions

It's not going to get better, either way.

 

[Qhrumphf]

I'd probably taste it, dry hop, and then proceed with extreme caution bottling, OR skip the dry hop, rack to a *glass* carboy and see what happens in a month or two.

Ideal solution would be plating it out and seeing what grows and trying to ID. Even without IDing easy to tell if there's bacterial contamination. But I assume that's not an option.

 

[Rob2010SS]

My thinking is if it's already infected, dry hop it and then bottle. It won't make it any worse

 

[seatazzz]

My two cents...give it a taste. After this long it's done, and whatever it tastes like now is what you're going to get when it's bottled. If it tastes nasty, don't waste your time bottling, dump it. If it is truly infected (and it looks like it to me) bottling it now gives him the risk of bottle bombs, which nobody wants to see or experience. Chalk it up to a learning experience and try again. Not what you want to hear, I know. There's WAY too much head space there, and something seems to have gotten in.

 

[KarmaCitra]

What was your sanitation process? Maybe there was a step missed that allowed this potential infection?

Also, it definitely appears there is a ton of headspace in that bucket, how many gallons is that?