Christmas Gifts

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who added to my mead supply collection!  This year, I received four new 1 gallon carboys (edit: and one bottle capper!) courtesy of my sister, brother-in-law, and nieces.  My parents got me new carboy bungs (stoppers) and airlocks, as I realized I did not have enough to brew with my complete collection of equipment.  I also received two fun books, Making Wild Wines and Meads and The Drunken Botanist from my mom.  Looking through the first, I have some fun ideas for the fruits we have growing in our backyard, especially the mulberry tree.  Hopefully the crows don't eat all the fruit this year!

I also purchased some chemistry equipment for myself to improve my yeast capture experiments. (I swear at some point I will post about the process and what results I am getting!) The cache includes test tubes for storing yeast, plastic pipettes to extract the yeast cakes from completed fermentations, 60x15mm petri dishes for isolating yeast, and the requisite agar-agar powder to use the dishes.  Lastly, I bought Wild Brews: Culture and Craftsmanship in the Belgian Tradition to learn about the procedures the professionals use for yeast capture.  I haven't made it through the book yet, but at first glance it is a good reference for my experiments. 

Again, thank you everyone for the new equipment!  It will come in great use for making this next year's batches.