I have a beer that I brewed a little over 2 weeks ago (I know it is still pretty young) using a starter with 2 vials of White Labs British ale yeast (005) and after taking a gravity reading yesterday I was a little disspointed. OG was 1.065 and the gravity reading yesterday was 1.022 which by my reckoning is attentuation of around 66%ish. This is the first batch where I have tried to control fermentation temps (68F) and was hoping to get down to around 1.014 or so. I am not planning to do anything with the beer for another 3 weeks or so but was wondering if I should try and stir up the yeast a little as I know this particluar yeast is very flocculant or should I leave it be?
Also with these very flocculant yeasts do I need to worry about there being enough yeast left in suspension come bottling time? I have another ale which is ready for bottling (4 weeks in primary & 5 weeks in secondary gravity readings are steady and have been for a while) where I used white labs 002, do I need to add fresh yeast?
Yeah, as babalu said, warming it up will help. Since you’re not planning to do anything with it for a while, I’d get it up to the low 70s and let it go for a week and see if you get a drop in gravity.
If you’re worried about getting viable yeast in each bottle, I would make sure to pick some up with the racking cane when racking to a bottling bucket. It will mix in while you rack and give you some in each bottle, and you really don’t need that much. If you’re worried about viability though, you should add some fresh yeast at bottling.
The trick with this yeast is to throw enough at your beer to allow it to finish in 3-4 days. SO… Warm it up to about 72 and rouse the yeast (without splashing) every couple of days for another week. That’s about all you’ll get out of it. I calculate that you should only expect 1.016-18 with that amount of yeast in a 1.065SG beer. What temp did you mash at and how much crystal malt did you have in your recipe?
There were steeping grains, about 8oz crystal, 4 oz Victory, 4oz special roast, 4 oz smoked and 4 oz torrified wheat. Yes I have had success with similar recipes in getting down to 1.014 ish. I will go ahead and warm it up and rouse it a little and see what happens. My intial question came from the fact that the white labs website list the birtish ale of having an attentuation of 67 - 75% (I think they are the right numbers) so I just wondered if I should just accpet hwre it had gotten to.
So around 2 weeks ago I raised the temp on this fermentation to around 72F and roused the yeast by stirring gently. I let it go for just over a week (there was bubbling in the airlock but no other signs of activity) and then took another hydro reading which was exactly the same as before rousing :-[ and the beer was really cloudy and murky looking whereas before rousing it was clear as bell. strangely the color of the beer has also gotten lighter ??? ! I left it for another 5 days and then took another reading and everything was still the same (cloudiness, color gravity). Have I screwed up this batch somehow? When I took my inital reading the beer was a nice dark amber color and was clear as a bell hwat could have happened?
It probably looks lighter since the yeast is now back in suspension. It sounds like you’re as low as you’re going to get on gravity. Drop the temperature back down a bit and let it sit and the yeast should settle out again. Then you can bottle it up.