Yeast Starter With WLP 644

[Gustatorian]

Planning on brewing a pale ale with WLP644 this week. I've heard some mixed answers about how to build a starter with WLP 644. Per Beersmith, it looks like it performs like regular ale yeast, as far as growth goes in a starter. Anybody have experience with how much to pitch for a pale ale?

 

[TheHairyHop]

what mixed answers have you heard?

 

[snowveil]

I've pitched it at typical ale pitching rates with success. Keep in mind, however, White Labs only includes a tiny dusting of yeast in the WLP644 because they're still treating it like a brett pitch and not a sacc pitch. In order to hit the proper pitching rates you'll have to make a multi-step starter.

I've since been rinsing/repitching WLP644, but IIRC the first batch I used the vial in I stepped up from 500mL to 2000mL stirplate starters prior to pitching.

 

[snowveil]

http://yeastcalculator.com/ can help you set up multi-step starters to figure out where you need to be. With a fresh vial (3 billion cells), 500mL -> 2L according to Kai Troester's stirplate calculations will give you 353 billion cells, more than enough for a 5 gallon 1.050ish beer.

 

[DemonsRun]

If you haven't bought the yeast yet you could get Imperial yeast's version of 644 "citrus" and start off with a much higher cell count.

 

[Conman13]

FWIW, I've used this yeast with and without a starter. I ran a 2L stir plate starter for a 1.075 OG IPA, and just pitched the vial for a 1.050 pale ale. It fermented fine like any other good ale yeast would in both batches. I did notice that it took a little longer on the back end to clear out and clean itself up, I left each of those in primary for 3 weeks before dry hopping. I don't think it would hurt to do a simple starter, but I'm not sure if a multi-step starter is necessary based on my experience.