I had a sour brown that had an awesome big white, furry pellicle for a few months. I added dried cherries in a hop bag and the pellicle was still there for about a few weeks but I just checked it and there is no pellicle. I just wanted to make sure this is normal or someone has experienced it. Cheers!
Brettanomyces pellicles will come and go at their own whim. Don't worry about it, I'm sure all is fine.
I agree with od_sf, just because its gone, doesn't mean that your brett. isn't working... There is some evidence that says that the pellicle forms with the introduction of oxygen, some research says that stability is key for the retention of the pellicle (stable temp. humidity, light [rather, lack of], even noise...), with the few sours that I have brewed, I have only noticed two pellicles form for a long(er) period of time, after a while they just kinda fall away.
Which reminds me, as I've been meaning to ask: I do a lot of brett beers and have seen a lot of brett pellicles, and usually they seem to come and go semi-randomly (i.e. with no apparent change in temp, introdution of o2, or any movement). They usually drop before I ever need to bottle. But I have one beer that's been in primary for 3 months with a lovely fuzzy white brett pellicle on it for the last 2 months. It's time to bottle, but it has not dropped. How should I go about this? Gently agitate the carboy to see if I can get it to drop out? Bottle from underneath the pellicle (i.e. "puncture" the pellicle with the auto-siphon)? I'd hate to end up with pellicle particles in the bottles...
You may just want to wait, or puncture the pellicle, transfer to another carboy and let it settle out, then bottle. Personally, I would just wait; I feel that the brett will tell you when it is done. Brett is kinda a bitch right?
