late stage mold on wild mead

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late stage mold on wild mead

Postby khoomeizhi on Sat Dec 27, 2014 5:39 pm

i have a fair amount of experience with wild-yeasted meads, having started 30-some batches in the past 4 years. i haven't really had any issues with anything going bad or off-flavors, or the other things that 'conventional' homebrewers warn about. this may be my first such issue.

so i've got a 5-gallon batch of mead that i started january 2014 that was pretty much normal until after a late-stage racking (racked two of the gallons of the should-have-been-done-by-then mead onto oak cubes, and the other 3 gallons into a 3-gallon carboy to continue clearing). after that last racking, all three of the containers it was split into started growing that classic fine thin mold layer over the surface of the mead, with occasional big bubbles of escaping air/CO2 that get trapped by the mold layer.

we tasted it at the rack and it was basically dry, and should be at least 12% alcohol - i've never heard of a mold that could stand that, let alone just start to get established in those conditions.

being all into wild brewing, i've never gotten into all the sterilization/sulfiting/whathaveyou that may be the only appropriate next step. any ideas about any of this? i do have some campden tablets that i've only ever used on corks pre-corking...i figure that i should probably kill the mold before moving on towards bottling, assuming the taste hasn't been irrevocably damaged.
khoomeizhi
 
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Re: late stage mold on wild mead

Postby boschmas on Tue Jan 13, 2015 10:10 pm

I know you posted this a while back, but I wanted to suggest that you may have ended up with some Brettanomyces or Pediococcus, particularly since you racked onto oak, which is commonly used to feed souring bugs in brewing.

There's a ridiculous collection of soured beer pellicle photos at Home Brew Talk. Maybe scroll through and see if your growth looks anything like those? http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f127/pellic ... on-174033/

Is your mead still around? If so, how's it doing now?
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Re: late stage mold on wild mead

Postby khoomeizhi on Wed Jan 14, 2015 6:27 pm

oh yeah, it looks like some of those for sure. thing is, it's happening on the three gallons that aren't on oak, too. i generally am alright with sour or funky flavors, so i haven't been too worried about it.

i've actually been busy with a lot of things so they're all still sitting there (almost a month and a half now since racking), but i was planning on racking onto campden tablets soon, to arrest the process. i'd like to clean it up so i can bottle it finally (been planning on doing it in the next few days, actually)...
khoomeizhi
 
Posts: 86
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Location: wnc

Re: late stage mold on wild mead

Postby boschmas on Wed Jan 14, 2015 10:42 pm

You've probably got contamination on your racking equipment. People usually replace when that happens, because Brett in particular is apparently very difficult to eradicate.

You might leave one batch for a year or so and see how it develops. Might be awesome! (Might be awful!)
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Re: late stage mold on wild mead

Postby khoomeizhi on Thu Jan 15, 2015 5:17 am

i guess i probably should replace the tubing i use for racking. haven't seen this same infection in things that have been racked since, though...

will update as things progress.
khoomeizhi
 
Posts: 86
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Location: wnc

Re: late stage mold on wild mead

Postby khoomeizhi on Sat Feb 07, 2015 4:44 pm

i eventually racked the three different carboys of this onto campden to kill the infection. they're all waiting to clear now. just cruised past a year since starting this batch. the two oaked gallons look like they might be ready sooner.
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Posts: 86
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Location: wnc


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