Harnessing wild yeast from fresh wet hops

[hoppyscotty]

I'm brewing a beer this weekend utilising fresh hops from a mates garden. His hop plant has become intertwined with an apple tree so I was wondering about the possibility of getting some funky wild yeast and fermenting from that.

How would I go about that?

I was thinking about pitching the wort into the fermenter and dry hopping with the fresh (picked within the hour) wet hops straight away and seeing if any fermentation kicks off over the course of a couple of days...if not I could just pitch the US04 I was planning to use. Does that sound like a viable plan or is there too much of a risk of infection or any other undesirable outcomes?

 

[Sadfield]

Only one way of knowing for sure.

I guess there could be more wild yeast due to the proximity to the apple tree, but I wouldn't have thought home grown hops would be much different to commercial ones in this regard.

Then there's the question of pitch rate. How much yeast is there, will you see activity in a few days?

Romantically, its a nice idea. I haven't tried it so can't really say what will happen.

I have used the method #1 below to good effect. If you want a less risky option.

https://bootlegbiology.com/diy/capturing-yeast/

 

[hoppyscotty]

Thanks. Yep a big unknown but with open fermentation I guess you have the unknown around pitch rate. I was going to use us04 anyway so can still use that and might get some co fermentation with whatever wild yeast is present.

 

[Sadfield]

Cool. It'll be interesting to hear what it turns out like.

 

[hoppyscotty]

We'll see. I'm sure it will be fine. I appreciate the idea of harvesting your own hops and using them in your beer is more romantic than practical, but I have them so would be a shame not to use them.