Flavour enhancer or infection risk?

[Killer Brew]

Well it's that time of year when plenty of stuff is airborne and (nearly) nothing attracts like sweet, sticky wort. Left the good stuff running through the Grainfather's CFC into FV for a few minutes and came back to see a blowfly soaking it up in the GF. So on the hot side but the temp by that stage had dropped to only 70C as most had drained out.

So my question is what would you do? Also any other stories to share? I'm sure others have experienced this or worse!

 

[SBOB]

So my question is what would you do?

spray the fly with starsan

 

[Rocker1986]

Just a bit of extra protein. :lol:

The only issue I've had occasionally is bloody fruit flies somehow getting into a closed up fermentation fridge. I guess they get attracted by the tiny amounts of fermenting beer that drip out of the FV tap occasionally over the course of a fermentation. Thankfully the things haven't caused any problems.

They were in there on the last batch which I kegged this morning, but I think the week long cold crash killed them. :lol:

 

[LAGERFRENZY]

I am pretty sure that I read somewhere on this forum about someone's grandad whose job it was to fish out the dead rats and birds that used to end up in the brewing vats last century.

 

[Grott]

Speaking of rats, our cat has a bad habit of bringing their relatives, the mouse into the house. Unfortunately in most case she lets them go in a distressed state and they pass away under some fairly in removable object. After several days the stink starts (which alerts us to a dead mouse) and generally last about three days.

Well it started yesterday in the brew room and is near on impossible to find. With a temp yesterday at 38c and today over 40 the room is out of bounds. Just hope stink doesn't transfer to anything.

Sorry, bit off topic but adds to this problem.
Cheers and merry Xmas new year to all.

 

[S.E]

Just a bit of extra protein. :lol:

The only issue I've had occasionally is bloody fruit flies somehow getting into a closed up fermentation fridge. I guess they get attracted by the tiny amounts of fermenting beer that drip out of the FV tap occasionally over the course of a fermentation. Thankfully the things haven't caused any problems.

They were in there on the last batch which I kegged this morning, but I think the week long cold crash killed them. :lol:

Do you use FV taps like the ones from Bunnings and do you pull them apart to clean them? If so smear a little keg lube or Vaseline in them before reassembling. You’ll never have a dripping FV tap again.

I use the same taps on cubes to serve real ale and they don’t drip under carbing and conditioning presser, even at around 15-20 psi.

 

[Rocker1986]

Yeah I do, I've been meaning to try that trick actually. Will do after this current batch is kegged.

 

[Matplat]

Do you use FV taps like the ones from Bunnings and do you pull them apart to clean them? If so smear a little keg lube or Vaseline in them before reassembling. You’ll never have a dripping FV tap again.

I use the same taps on cubes to serve real ale and they don’t drip under carbing and conditioning presser, even at around 15-20 psi.

How do you sanitise vaseline? Pretty sure my last batch has been infected through a leaking tap....

 

[Rocker1986]

Quick follow up on this; on Tuesday before I tipped the new batch into the FV I took the tap apart and smeared some keg lube over all surfaces that come in contact with each other inside the tap. It's worked a treat, no leaking in the bottom of the fridge on this batch, so far anyway! Makes it easier to turn the tap on and off too.