Flowers?

[Eric W]

Hello,

Going through my first time making wine on my own. Made wine since I was a little kid with my family (30 plus years)

I’m currently about 9 weeks in on multiple varieties and noticed yesterday that two of the 6 gallon carboys have a white disc like film at the top. (Picture attached) I used my families simple method with nothing added accept the must and yeast. All of the equipment was new and sanitized and cleaned with one step and star San.

Could this be mold/flowers? Besides the removal of the film and transferring into the a sanitized carboy - do I need to start looking at adding sulfite or another chemical to ensure I don’t loose this batch?

My other carboys are unaffected and the process has been the same for all.

Extremely limited headspace (in secondary) and has been racked once since fermentation.

Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Eric

 

[Rice_Guy]

yes it could be flowers
A Treatment, *take a paper towel and carefully remove the white mass
*spray the neck, surface, cork, all top surfaces ,,, with sanitizer solution
*treat the wine with 50 ppm Kmeta, (0.20 gram per gallon) (when I had it I did 100 ppm which could be tasted)

 

[Arne]

Hi Eric, I am not totally sure what you have there, but if it was mine I would very carefully add a little wine and float whatever it is off the top of the carboy. Next, rack it into another carboy with k-meta added to it. I have done this a couple of times over the years and the wine came out fine. Also, when it was bottled it got drank sooner rather than later. Arne.

 

[Arne]

@Rice_Guy you posted while I was still typing. LOL, Arne.

 

[Eric W]

Hi Arne,

Thank you so much for the detailed info. I went to my local brew store and picked up the potassium metabisulfite. The owner who is extremely knowledgeable confirmed exactly what you said. He instructed me add 1tsp of potassium metabisulfite into a quart of water, mix and add 5mls per gallon of juice.(hope the ppm makes sense?) I tasted the wine first and it was still fine, added the sulphite, mixed and racked into a clean carboy. Hopefully now out of the woods. I have 15 - 6 gallon carboys with 4 different varieties going and only 4 have the “scoby” on top. The owner of the store said it was a bacterial infection which I assume is different than mold? Thankfully I check my juice daily and this must have happens within 24-48 hours so I caught it very early.

I know am keeping a closer eye on the rest and will follow the same procedure if need be. My theory is that I used some of the valpolicella to top off most of the juice after first racking. Maybe it was contaminated? I thought my cleaning was on point so a bit disappointed it happened.

Thank you again!

Eric

 

[Rice_Guy]

,,,, Mycoderma vinifera ,,,
requires oxygen for growth, a wild fermentation is a sequence of organisms finding suitable growth conditions and taking over the show. If I looked for it with an enrichment technique I should be able to find it in all raw crop, it’s only is it one per milliliter or one per liter or one per carboy?
also others as Pichia or Hansenula families.

 

[Eric W]

Thank you very much for the information. It was found in 4 of the carboys. The potassium metabisulfite solution (solution of 1tsp per quart of water) - I used 5 ml per gallon of juice. Each 6 gallon carboy received 30ml or solution. Hoping that seems correct.

Thank you,

Eric