# Did I just kill my yeast?



## Boglehead (Feb 16, 2009)

I don't think you have anything to worry. I haven't made mead in a few years, but it is slow going after the first few weeks. Longer, slower fermentations (on the order of months) is the general rule. Adding yeast nutrients can help at this stage as there is very little diverse nutrition available for the yeast with honey and water alone. 

I had focused on melomels and cysers in the past to avoid this problem.

With enough time to rest, off flavors from oxidation have never been an issue for me. No matter what you do, it will taste great.

A thorough resource is ken schramm's book on mead making. well worth the cover price. As an aside - his meadery outside detroit makes great meads and melomels, but blind tasting, I can't say they are better than anything I made in my garage.

Enjoy!


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## Mjød Brygger (Dec 2, 2020)

Good to hear, thanks for your info


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## StefanS (Jul 6, 2019)

IMHO your fermentation has stopped but not by meaning that is done but is something wrong and it just seized. 
With your description your mead at that point has only (1.110-1.058)x 131.25 = 6.8%ABV. It is very low because your potential is around 15%ABV. By some mistakes you made from beginning ( too big fermenter compared to amount of mead - too big head space), adding of nutrients at starting point (what kind of nutrients? if you used Go-Ferm only that is ok, but if you used Fermaid K with DAP that means yeast wasn't able to multiply). Which one yeast did you use? 


Mjød Brygger said:


> that adding oxygen by gently stirring the must would help kickback the fermentation process.


you can stir must up to 8 day from beginning of fermentation, otherwise you are right - stirring that late is like playing with vinegar....


Mjød Brygger said:


> What is your thought on that, did I blew it? Should I just go ahead and start a new mead? How much oxygen do you need reck your mead? What can I do if I messed it up?


let say simple - with presence of oxygen yeast will multiply, without oxygen they will ferment. That the reason stirring is helpful during first few days (when is not much of alcohol present yet - Acetobacter need alcohol and oxygen to make vinegar fermentation), IMO - close your fermenter with airlock and check your readings of gravity after a week (try not to stir). If your specific gravity not change you can try restart your fermentation with new yeast - use S. carevisiae (bayanus) -example - Lalvin EC-1118. 


Boglehead said:


> A thorough resource is ken schramm's book on mead making. well worth the cover price.


Agree - but IMHO - better source for beginners is - Steve Piatz - The complete guide to making mead.


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