Today however, we've lost about 5 brix and the cap is very strong. I slightly miss-judged how much head-room to leave and I lost a few berries when the cap rose above the top. The smell is wonderful and the taste is nice. I also checked on the ambient ferment and it too has formed a cap. I'll punch down in a few hours for the first time with it.
The other thing I decided to do was add about 3/4 of an oak spiral broken in two to the ferment. Although I've been leaning towards no-oak in my wines the acidic nature and lack of wood tannins in Barbera could benefit from some of this during fermentation. I'll take it out at pressing and since I won't be doing an extended maceration the wood contact will be minimal. Later today when the brix goes down another few points I'll add some Fermaid to the must just to make sure there's enough nutrients to get completely dry.
I won't do anything like that for the ambient bucket. It will be completely natural.
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