Secondary - Mead

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BourbonDrinker · #1 Post by **BourbonDrinker** » Mon Oct 06, 2008 9:54 am

My mead has been sleeping away in my secondary fermenter for about 3 months. How long should I wait to bottle the mead?

Greenblood · #2 Post by **Greenblood** » Mon Oct 06, 2008 7:35 pm

That is a topic that has been debated by the best mead makers out there. There is no harm in bottling it now, and letting it age in bottle, but if you have no (or very very very little) head space in the carboy, many will tell you that they have found a great benefit to bulk aging. Most of the meads which I have bulk aged have fallen prey to terrible oxidation due to too much head space even with purging the carboy with CO2 on a fairly regular basis. Scientifically, it makes little sense to me why oxygen was allowed to make its way into the mead, but it did it nonetheless.

Joe Yoder · #3 Post by **Joe Yoder** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 9:53 am

Science Alert!!!
John,
Gasses mix. It is as simple as that. Unlike liquids that will stay separate if they are of significantly different densities (black and tan, anyone?), gasses will mix regardless of their density. This is why it is fairly useless to simply try to blow CO2 into a carboy or corny keg to 'purge' the oxygen. You may get less oxygen, but you will never get all of the oxygen out. The only way to purge a keg or carboy is to fill it with liquid and then displace the liquid with CO2. Otherwise you will get a combination of gasses some of which will be oxygen (bad) and some which will be CO2 (good).
At least that is what they were teaching in chem 101 back in the day...
Joe

Greenblood · #4 Post by **Greenblood** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 3:38 pm

Well there ya go. Thanks for the mini lesson Joe!

Jensen · #5 Post by **Jensen** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 10:38 pm

Joe, I am impressed!

BourbonDrinker · #6 Post by **BourbonDrinker** » Wed Oct 15, 2008 11:10 pm

So what I'm reading into this is just bottle it now and sit on the bottles for another 8+ months?

Greenblood · #7 Post by **Greenblood** » Thu Oct 16, 2008 8:01 am

That is your safest bet.