Why so much lag time?

[Spartan1979]

I brewed a 1.081 Belgian Quad on Thursday. I pitched about a cup of yeast (Wyeast 3787) that I got from a Belgian Dubbel that I had kegged 6 days before and had stored in a mason jar. I took the mason jar out of the fridge about two hours before I pitched it. I aerated pure O2 for 90 seconds before pitching.

I expected this to take off like crazy, but there were no signs of fermentation at all on Friday. It was going fine by Saturday morning. Any ideas why there was so much lag time?

Thanks.

 

[day_trippr]

I can only imagine the yeast figured out that the actual amount of viable cells in your pitch was insufficient to take off and they held a rally to build up their army

Cheers!

 

[CascadesBrewer]

I would say it would depend on your "about a cup of yeast". If that was a cup of very clean yeast it sounds like a solid pitch. If that was harvested yeast with trub then it was probably an underpitch for a 1.081 beer. On the plus side, underpitching 3787 can help to boost the yeast character.

 

[Bobby_M]

The viability of a gross harvested slurry is probably lower than you think it is especially after fermenting a dub. Chucking it into a 2 liter starter would help.