I just returned home from a 10-day trip to find that one of my cats apparently knocked over some things that fell onto one of my carboys (ARGH!). The cascade of stuff knocked off the bung/airlock that was in a 1-gallon batch of elderberry wine (gasp!). The person watching our house never noticed what had happened, so I have no way of knowing how long the wine was exposed to air. The batch was begun on 8/30/09 and I racked to the secondary just before I left on my trip, so the fermentation was still active.
There are still visible CO2 bubbles in the fermentation and, when I put a bung/airlock back on, it started popping slowly almost right away. The carboy was always topped off so only the top bit in the neck was exposed to air.
I know there's nothing to be done, but I was wondering if anyone might know if the wine is likely to be all right or not? It seems to smell fine right now but (sigh) I am bummed about this. I had no idea the cats could even get up on the storage shelf where this stuff fell from (never, never underestimate cats).
Any thoughts on this?
There are still visible CO2 bubbles in the fermentation and, when I put a bung/airlock back on, it started popping slowly almost right away. The carboy was always topped off so only the top bit in the neck was exposed to air.
I know there's nothing to be done, but I was wondering if anyone might know if the wine is likely to be all right or not? It seems to smell fine right now but (sigh) I am bummed about this. I had no idea the cats could even get up on the storage shelf where this stuff fell from (never, never underestimate cats).
Any thoughts on this?