# WY3068 Weihenstephan pitching rate



## sp0rk (1/10/13)

I understand that to get a nice ester balance with Wy3068 you should underpitch slightly and keep around 17 deg

After smacking the pack last night I came home to this after work today






I'm guessing it's nice and healthy (despite being 5 months old), so should I just split 25ml off into a test tube (for later use) and pitch the rest?
Or should I still do a starter?


----------



## sp0rk (1/10/13)

NVM, doing a starter...


----------



## Toper (1/10/13)

Make sure to leave a lot of headspace in your fermenter,a good 1/3,or use a blow off tube,the 3068 is a ballistic yeast


----------



## brewtas (1/10/13)

FWIW, I brewed a Leichtes Weizen with 3068 the other day and pitched at a rate of 0.625 million cells/ml/degree plato instead of the standard 0.75. It turned out well but I don't have anything to compare it to. What experiences have others had with different pitching rates for this yeast or others?


----------



## sp0rk (1/10/13)

toper01 said:


> Make sure to leave a lot of headspace in your fermenter,a good 1/3,or use a blow off tube,the 3068 is a ballistic yeast


I went and grabbed a Bunnings 30L fermenter today just to be safe


----------



## aaronpetersen (1/10/13)

I did an experiment where I pitched different amounts of 3068 and fermented at different temps. Pitching rates had a big impact on how long it took to ferment but had little effect on ester formation. Ferment temp had a much larger effect on ester production, higher temp = more banana.
These days I pitch at the rate recommended by Mr Malty (i.e. no underpitching) and ferment at 17deg and get very good results, with a balance of clove and banana. A ferulic acid rest helps bring out the clove.


----------



## manticle (1/10/13)

I'm with Aaron. I don't think deliberately underpitching is the right way to go about it. Treat it like any other yeast but mash schedule and fermentation temperature will influence your clove/banana balance (so esters and phenolics).


----------



## brewtas (1/10/13)

Good to know. Thanks guys!


----------



## Back Yard Brewer (1/10/13)

Sometimes I think we get a little hung up on pitching rates. Unless one has access to a lab to do a cell count just work on the fact that a fully expanded smack pack should easily be enough to inoculate a standard wort. I use 3068 all the time for my house wheat. Now shoot me down in flames here h34r: my standard regime for my 60 - 70ltr batches is as follows...
1 smack pack, build it up to 3ltrs in my conical over 3-4days. Pitch a litre in each fermenter (3) Job done. From my experiences I go on sight and smell from my conical before pitching. Have been brewing with wyeast exclusively for over 5yrs ( I am a creature of habit) with no issues. Even won a number of state and a few national awards along the way. Again, not saying I'm doing it right or wrong but for me it works.

My 2c so now fire away

BYB


----------



## tazman1967 (1/10/13)

I just dumped my smack pack into the fermenter,, August 2013 Man. date


----------



## lael (1/10/13)

brewtas said:


> FWIW, I brewed a Leichtes Weizen with 3068 the other day and pitched at a rate of 0.625 million cells/ml/degree plato instead of the standard 0.75. It turned out well but I don't have anything to compare it to. What experiences have others had with different pitching rates for this yeast or others?


How are you measuring this cell rate?


----------



## RelaxedBrewer (2/10/13)

I used to use the under pitch method, but recently I have been starting at 17c for a few days and the raising the temp slowly. 

On another note, does anyone have much success reusing this yeast? This is the only yeast that I don't like to reuse. Find it looses it ester production


----------



## QldKev (2/10/13)

sp0rk said:


> I understand that to get a nice ester balance with Wy3068 you should underpitch slightly and keep around 17 deg
> 
> After smacking the pack last night I came home to this after work today
> 
> ...



Don't know your OG or Vol, so I can't really recommend you either way.

I always find that stuff takes off like a rocket, so leave some good head space.


----------



## newguy (2/10/13)

Listened to a presentation from Dave Logsdon once. Someone asked about 3068 and how to get a big banana ester. He said that you can't oxygenate your wort at all (not even splash it when filling the fermenter) if you want a large banana component. I can confirm this because I verified it after hearing his answer, and it also dovetails with my experiences with it to that point (when I was inexperienced I got superb banana but as I got better at brewing I couldn't get any - turns out I was oxygenating my wort more & more as I got more experienced).

As far as building a starter is concerned, I've found no difference with the finished beer profile between pitching large starters and pitching no starters (oxygenation aside).


----------



## Ross (2/10/13)

It's 5 months old, I'd personally be making a starter. You may well get away without one, but if that's the way you go, I certainly wouldn't be reducing the pitched amount by another 20%.


Cheers Ross


----------



## sp0rk (2/10/13)

Ross said:


> It's 5 months old, I'd personally be making a starter. You may well get away without one, but if that's the way you go, I certainly wouldn't be reducing the pitched amount by another 20%.
> 
> 
> Cheers Ross


I ended up making a 1.5L starter, she should be ready to go this afternoon
I got admonished on another forum for leaving the smack pack overnight
Any thoughts on whether this is a good or bad practice?


----------



## Ross (2/10/13)

Leaving your smack pack overnight is fine, with older yeast it can take several days for the pack to swell. Whoever admonished you, needs to brush up on their handling of Wyeast packs, unless I'm missing something.


----------



## manticle (2/10/13)

I was advised as a general rule of thumb - 1/2 day for each month from manufacture.

Nowadays I just usually wait for good swelling as well as being timed with when i want to pitch but definitely no issues with leaving a pack overnight or longer. It's in a nice environment - just don't leave it next to the heater or in the oven.


----------



## verysupple (2/10/13)

I'm sort of with Back Yard Brewer in that I think it's a bit ambitious to try to pitch at well specified rates without a lab. But if you can estimate a ballpark figure for dell density then I guess that's better than not trying to control the pitching rate at all.

<rant>

On a separte note, the constantly regurgitated 0.75 million cells / mL / P is simply an average-ish figure for ales. Some styles or yeast strains give the best results with a lower pitching rate than that, and some are better with a higher pitching rate. So just because you pitch more or less than 0.75 M / mL / P doesn't _necessarily _mean you're under or over pitching. 

After a bit of research I've found sources from the brewing science community and commercial brewers stating pitching rates ranging from 0.375 - 1.75 M / mL / P (this range includes ales and lagers). Let's look at a couple of extreme examples. If an appropriate pitching rate for a given style is ~0.375 M / mL / P and you pitch the homebrewer's mantra, are you over pitching? What about if the appropriate rate is ~1 M / mL / P and you pitch the homebrewer's mantra? In both cases you're close enough that the beer will almost certainly turn out fine. This is because there's no hard boundaries for pitching rates. It's a bit like the pH and temp ranges that enzymes work at, there may be an optimal set of conditions but in the end the useful range is pretty large. It's actually pretty hard to under or over pitch on a homebrew scale. 

Now, I can't remember the exact range of pitching rates I found for Bavarian weissbier, but I think the values quoted were generally lower than 0.75 M / mL / P. If you pitch a smack pack that has low viability directly into 23 L of 1.050 wort, you're probably getting close dropping out of the _optimal_ range. But as many, many people will articulate through anecdotes, the beer will probably still turn out fine.

People seem to use the terms "underpitching" and "low pitching rate" interchangeably (and likewise for over pitching) when they are not synonymous! For a beer to be under or over pitched it would have to exhibit resulting flaws. Just because you ended up with more or less banana than you wanted doesn't make it under or over pitched. The beer probably still fits the guidelines as they too are somewhat broad.

</rant>


----------



## brewtas (2/10/13)

I should have mentioned that I was just going by yeastcalc calculator so it wasn't accurate at all, only relative to the size of my normal starters. I have a hemocytometer and a microscope and I'd like to have a more accurate idea of what's going on but I didn't get around to using it for this one.

Verysupple, thanks for the clarification of terminology about over/under pitching. I guess that's what I was getting at with my question about people's experience with pitching rates. I'd like to understand the differences better.


----------

