✦ Starter Troubleshooting ✦
This one fools nearly everybody, and it's the single most common reason people give up in the first week.
That early rise usually isn't yeast. A new starter goes through a bloom of other bacteria in the first few days that produce a lot of gas quickly, and it looks like spectacular success. Then those bacteria die off as the mixture gets more acidic, and everything goes quiet.
That quiet stretch is the starter actually forming. The yeast and lactic acid bacteria you want are slower and they're only now taking over.
What to do. Keep feeding on schedule and wait it out. Real activity usually returns somewhere between day seven and day fourteen, and it looks different: steadier, more predictable, with a smell that's pleasantly sour rather than funky.
Don't start over. People throw out perfectly good starters at exactly this point, start again, and hit the same wall a week later.