Why can't I harvest yeast from a bottle?

[Plan9]

I've tried a few times with no success. I've tried with beers that other people have ben able to reculture from.

1. I make a wort in my flask, like for a regular starter.

2. I carefully pour the beer into my glass, leaving the yeast behind.

3. Swirle yeast

4. Sanitise mouth of bottle.

5. Pour into starter.

6. Plug with airlock

7. Wait

8. Say "Why the hell is'nt this working?"

Am I missing something here?

 

[malkore]

Most people are getting several bottles worth of yeast, and pitching that into a starter.

no guarantee the yeast are still alive by the time you get the bottles though. A warm warehouse could kill em all.

 

[Awfers]

The yeast could indeed be dead, depending on how the beer was treated (temps exposed to, time in the bottle, strength of the yeast)

What brand of beer are you trying to culture from?

 

[Bokonon]

The best luck I've had when culturing from a bottle has been to step up the yeast twice right in the bottle. The first time with 50-100ml of wort, then with 150-250ml. Then if its grown, I'll pitch all of that into a 1000ml starter.

I never use an airlock on my starters, instead using foil and loosely covering the opening of the container

 

[McKBrew]

+1 on what Bokonon said. You have to start out with an extremely small amount of wort for your initial starter and build up from there. Although there are some resources out there that say you can use a regular size starter, and that it will just take a while. Here is a good article on how to do it. (I have never tried it myself, so I can't say how well this works, but judging from the source I'd say it's good to go.)

 

[AnonyBrew]

Is this a commercial beer or a homebrew?

I've heard some commercial beers use more than one type of yeast in their process, so the yeast in a commercial bottle may not be the same yeast that they used to ferment with initially. Which means if you were hoping to get the same flavor profile from a commercial beer's yeast sediment, it may not be the one they fermented with.

 

[Hoosierbrewer]

I had success with Rogue this week. It took two bottles to get it to take off. The first one did not start, I drank another bomber and added more. It is fermenting now. Patience and swirling are the keys I think. I would also try to put as mush as possible from bottles with the same yeast. 2-3 Rogues would work well.

 

[WBC]

I have made starters from yeast in a bottle. I use several bottles. A whole 12 pak gives up a lot of yeast. It has to be young or the yeast may be dead. Keep trying to find your yeast from places that have a lot of turnover so you are sure that you are getting fresh beer.

 

[ajf]

I used to use yeast from bottles all the time, doing it the way Bokonon said. I never had any problems, but it took a while (1 - 2 weeks) to step up the yeast to get enough for pitching. If you have a stir plate, you could do it much faster.

-a.

 

[Plan9]

hmmm... I see.

I read that BYO article, and I see some things I could do differently. The funny thing is two of the beers I tried to collect from where mention right in the article. Bells and Chimay.
Maybe I'll give it another shot.

 

[Bokonon]

hmmm... I see.

I read that BYO article, and I see some things I could do differently. The funny thing is two of the beers I tried to collect from where mention right in the article. Bells and Chimay.
Maybe I'll give it another shot.

I haven't tried a chimay yet, but I've definitely harvested from a bell's Two-Hearted. It wasn't especially a fresh bottle and it came from beer that was either shipped to me or I carried it on a plane. Then it sat around for a while before I got around to culturing from it.

Chill the bottle and make sure all the yeast has dropped out. Make sure not to agitate the bottle much. Clean your area good with sanitizer and flame the lip of the bottle. Decant the beer carefully trying not to disturb the sediment. Pour a small amount (50-100ml) of wort into the bottle and cover it with foil. Swirl it around whenever you walk by. Give it at least a day or two, maybe on the third day dont swirl it around at all and see if the yeast floculates. If it looks like you've got some viable yeast, add some more wort (150-250ml) to the bottle and swirl often.

If it all works out you should probably have enough yeast to pitch into a starter. I normally dump the whole bottle that I've stepped up into a starter since I don't want to loose any yeast. Then I'll step my real starter up a few times, but I will decant it between stepping it up.

 

[Revvy]

Take a look at this thread about bottle harvesting Pacman.. Prof Frink offers some great tips that worked for me.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=63855

 

[Hoosierbrewer]

I haven't tried a chimay yet, but I've definitely harvested from a bell's Two-Hearted. It wasn't especially a fresh bottle and it came from beer that was either shipped to me or I carried it on a plane. Then it sat around for a while before I got around to culturing from it.

Chill the bottle and make sure all the yeast has dropped out. Make sure not to agitate the bottle much. Clean your area good with sanitizer and flame the lip of the bottle. Decant the beer carefully trying not to disturb the sediment. Pour a small amount (50-100ml) of wort into the bottle and cover it with foil. Swirl it around whenever you walk by. Give it at least a day or two, maybe on the third day dont swirl it around at all and see if the yeast floculates. If it looks like you've got some viable yeast, add some more wort (150-250ml) to the bottle and swirl often.

If it all works out you should probably have enough yeast to pitch into a starter. I normally dump the whole bottle that I've stepped up into a starter since I don't want to loose any yeast. Then I'll step my real starter up a few times, but I will decant it between stepping it up.

I did not know that Two HEarted was bottle conditioned. I will pick up a six pack every few months. I will have to try and harvest it sometime.