cover or no cover

[jdmyers]

Hey just lookin for some opinions and im sure ill find them here. Some recipes say cover the primary others say use a towel while others say leave open. whats a newbee like me to do? Also can anybody tell me how to set up a link on my posts that will list what ive made and what wine is cookin

 

[Sammyk]

I and I believe others just cover with a towel. I use a heavy bath towel. Good if you have pets and shedding hair to protect the must from.
Towel is easy to remove for stirring.

If you look above and to the right, you will see MY Topics, if you click on that it is easy to find the posts.

 

[Turock]

Open fermentation is what I advise because the culture needs O2 exposure at this time. It also needs N2 so that you don't get lots of H2S.

But it's wise to put a cloth over it to keep out dog hair, like Sammy said--and lord knows there's a lot of THAT around no matter HOW clean you might be. But also to keep out fruit flies. You can put a bungy cord around the cloth because those little buggers will get right under the edges of it if you're fermenting fruit. A number of fruit flies can ruin the must--giving it off-flavors.

 

[robie]

Protect it from fruit flies and other floating things. Once the wine's SG gets to 1.040 to 1.000 (whenever your instructions indicate to start secondary fermentation), the wine will need to be sealed up under an air lock.

 

[AlFulchino]

always always always a cover...i use a cheesecloth type fabric and then string w a bungee cord to keep taught over the primary...this allows airflow, atop of this i loosely place a lid to keep anything from splashing in...air can still get in

 

[winemaker_3352]

always always always a cover...i use a cheesecloth type fabric and then string w a bungee cord to keep taught over the primary...this allows airflow, atop of this i loosely place a lid to keep anything from splashing in...air can still get in

Ditto to that!!!

 

[cpfan]

This is one of those aspects of winemaking, that the statement "Ask 10 winemakers get 11 answers" applies. Possible approaches....

1. no cover at all - not good idea as discussed above
2. towel or cheescloth over top, probably bungee corded
3. loose lid all the way (my choice)
4. sealed lid with air lock from the beginning
5. cover from start, but seal down part way through (as Robie suggested)

Steve

 

[Minnesotamaker]

It might depend on your household. If you have pets or children, and the wine is an an accessible area, you might want to use the plastic lid. If your cat decides to have a seat on top of that nice warm looking towel covered perch, they might get a wet surprise. If you have a toddler in the house, a liquid filled bucket can be dangerous if they were to end up head first in the bucket.

 

[Redtrk]

always always always a cover...i use a cheesecloth type fabric and then string w a bungee cord to keep taught over the primary...this allows airflow, atop of this i loosely place a lid to keep anything from splashing in...air can still get in

This is exactly what I use also.