Worms or protein?

[crawforde]

I am super new to wine making. I was hoping for some advice. Everything was going very smooth, almost too good to be true. Then this morning I saw these little things floating in my thimble berry carboy. Did my wine go bad? Is this proteins or worms? Nothing is moving. The bubbler has not been removed. And everything was sanitized. In fact I think it's done bubbling. It may be time to bottle. But I don't want to bottle until I can be confident the wine is good.

 

[user 36973]

Hard to exactly identify with the picture, but it does NOT look normal. Berries can often be infected with insect larva. I've had spiders and other bugs make it through the crusher.

I'd rack it and hit it hard with sulfites (say 1.5 campden tabs per gallon). If it is larva, you don't want them decomposing in your wine. They probably died from lack of oxygen.

Let the wine settle, keep the headspace minimized, rack later as needed and consider pectic enzyme, bentonite or super kleer to clarify the wine. Don't bottle it cloudy.

Cheers

 

[Fingaluna]

Based on the "segmented" and tapered look to the floating things, I'd say they definitely look like larvae.
You could rack into another carboy, leaving these behind, then pour them through a strainer to get a close look, but I'd say that unfortunately it does not look great.
If you made your wine from grapes, these guys may have been mixed in with the grapes.
If you made your wine from a kit, then I have no idea how these would have been in there.

 

[kmk]

Looks like seeds. Could a flower head or grass stalk inadverdently snuck into the primary vessel? It may add a level of flavor, who knows. I wouldn't worry considering other 'things' I've seen in primary batches.

 

[hounddawg]

well worms are protein, but not good in wine, when i ferment all fruit or berry wines, i filter when i rack at every stage, even when i bottle, beings larva at egg size is so tiny you can't differentiate between solids and contamination, them are larva an/or larva husks,
Dawg

 

[hounddawg]

Looks like seeds. Could a flower head or grass stalk inadverdently snuck into the primary vessel? It may add a level of flavor, who knows. I wouldn't worry considering other 'things' I've seen in primary batches.

aint that the truth
Dawg

 

[KCCam]

It may be time to bottle.

No, it's nowhere near time to bottle. It should be perfectly clear before you bottle. But you haven't given any information about how you prepared the must, starting specific gravity (SG), current SG, etc. If those are larvae, that's a lot of larvae. For sense of scale, what is the capacity of the carboy? Did you pick the berries by hand? Did you start the wine immediately after picking? Did you freeze the berries first? Did you use a recipe? Did you add potassium metabisulfite (k-meta) a day before pitching yeast? How does it smell? How does it taste?

Complete fermentation is determined by no change in SG for 3 days AND SG less than 1.000 (generally speaking), and not by activity in the air lock. Then you either degas manually and add a fining agent to clear it quickly, or you leave it in the carboy to degas, clear, and age for a few months or more, racking and adding (k-meta) every 3 months or so.

If fermentation is, in fact, complete, then you also have too much headspace.

 

[mikewatkins727]

Is a fruit wine or grape wine? If fruit, what kind of fruit?

 

[KCCam]

OP says thimble berry.

 

[mikewatkins727]

If you have some thimble berry berries available, mash them to extract the seeds. Compare them with the 'whatsits' in your carboy.

 

[hounddawg]

Is a fruit wine or grape wine? If fruit, what kind of fruit?

100% agreed,
but some grape winemakers look down on country wines, best i can reckon out is they are jealous that they can only make grape wine, LOL,,, where as we don't limit ourselves, i mean grape wine is very good with enough sugar
Ole Sweet Tooth Dawg,,, lol

 

[crawforde]

No, it's nowhere near time to bottle. It should be perfectly clear before you bottle. But you haven't given any information about how you prepared the must, starting specific gravity (SG), current SG, etc. If those are larvae, that's a lot of larvae. For sense of scale, what is the capacity of the carboy? Did you pick the berries by hand? Did you start the wine immediately after picking? Did you freeze the berries first? Did you use a recipe? Did you add potassium metabisulfite (k-meta) a day before pitching yeast? How does it smell? How does it taste?

Complete fermentation is determined by no change in SG for 3 days AND SG less than 1.000 (generally speaking), and not by activity in the air lock. Then you either degas manually and add a fining agent to clear it quickly, or you leave it in the carboy to degas, clear, and age for a few months or more, racking and adding (k-meta) every 3 months or so.

If fermentation is, in fact, complete, then you also have too much headspace.

So I cant lie, I am still learning to figure out the gravity, I picked all the berries, I did NOT freeze them, they are in 2 (1) gallon carboys. These only appeared in one bottle. The other was fine. I waited a day before I started making the wine. I did not use a recipie or a kit. It smells sweet. And very mouth it tatses likwatering. Like a jolly rancher, or fruit candy. And it tastes like a blu. Its very sweet.

No, it's nowhere near time to bottle. It should be perfectly clear before you bottle. But you haven't given any information about how you prepared the must, starting specific gravity (SG), current SG, etc. If those are larvae, that's a lot of larvae. For sense of scale, what is the capacity of the carboy? Did you pick the berries by hand? Did you start the wine immediately after picking? Did you freeze the berries first? Did you use a recipe? Did you add potassium metabisulfite (k-meta) a day before pitching yeast? How does it smell? How does it taste?

Complete fermentation is determined by no change in SG for 3 days AND SG less than 1.000 (generally speaking), and not by activity in the air lock. Then you either degas manually and add a fining agent to clear it quickly, or you leave it in the carboy to degas, clear, and age for a few months or more, racking and adding (k-meta) every 3 months or so.

If fermentation is, in fact, complete, then you also have too much headspace.

 

[crawforde]

iliki am not sure why I am having such a difficult time responding to this thread. I am sorry everyone. I picked all the berries, I did NOT freeze them. I did not use a kit. I am also still learning how to establish SG. So I do not know that number. I used Camden tabs. And each carboy says 3 liters. These little guys only showed in the 1 bottle though. I just strained the "larva" out and set it to settle again. The wine smells delicious, and tastes sweet. The color is amazing also. It looks like it could be pulp from the berries, but I'm not sure, since it was only in the one bottle. I did wait a day to put yeast in the juice initially.
I guess my question now is, did I rack it too early?
Thank you so much everyone for the help.

 

[KCCam]

iliki am not sure why I am having such a difficult time responding to this thread. I am sorry everyone. I picked all the berries, I did NOT freeze them. I did not use a kit. I am also still learning how to establish SG. So I do not know that number. I used Camden tabs. And each carboy says 3 liters. These little guys only showed in the 1 bottle though. I just strained the "larva" out and set it to settle again. The wine smells delicious, and tastes sweet. The color is amazing also. It looks like it could be pulp from the berries, but I'm not sure, since it was only in the one bottle. I did wait a day to put yeast in the juice initially.
I guess my question now is, did I rack it too early?
Thank you so much everyone for the help.

Freezing helps to extract the juice, and to kill some living things (pretty sure it doesn't kill bacteria or wild yeast though). Do you have a hydrometer? You need one, and you need to learn how to read it. There is a tutorial in the beginners forum. The only way to know for sure that fermentation is complete, or approximately when to transfer to secondary, is by using a hydrometer. The fact that the must tastes sweet definitely indicates fermentation is not complete. The fact that it is "very" sweet probably means most of us would still have it in primary as well, but hard to know without an SG reading, and likely not too important at this point anyway. When it is complete there will not be even a hint of sweetness.

Do you still have the little guys? Maybe post an in-focus picture with a ruler for scale. Seems weird that both carboys are from the same berries and only one has this. Good news is that the acidity and alcohol content of properly prepared wine provides an environment that human pathogens cannot survive in, at least that's what I've read.

What date did you pitch the yeast? Give us an SG reading as soon as you have one.