Hi, I'm a newbie to the world of sourdough bread and starter and I seem to have a bit of trouble with my sourdough starter. It appears to be flat on the 5th day. I got my starter going 5 days ago today with a 50/50 mixture of whole-wheat flour and all purpose flour.
According to the recipe I'm following, I used 1/2 flour mixture and 1/3 cup water on the first day, let it sit for 24 hours, gave it a good stir and let it sit again for 24 hours. The feeding starts from the 3rd day onwards, with 3tbsp starter+1/2 cup flour+1/3 cup water in the morning and it's fed again at night with 2tbsp flour and 1.5 tbsp water. The 3rd and 4th days it had almost doubled in size after each feeding and looked bubbly and nice, quite like the images in the recipe.
The morning of the 5th day however, the starter looked like it hadn't grown much, it was still bubbly. I fed it as usual, but cut down on the water by a bit to keep the mix slightly thicker as suggested in several threads and posts. When I got it down for the night feed, it looked like it had grown only 1cm or so, but the mixture has large bubbles.
What's happening with my starter? Could someone please walk me through this process? I've thrown a previous batch made using the same proportions of all purpose flour and water, which behaved the same way and wouldn't rise even after 3 or 4 feedings, I assumed it had died though it didn't smell funny or bad. I don't want to waste anymore, especially in times such as these. Please help me. By the way, I live in South India. The avg room temperature here is around 25-30 degrees Celsius here. There's been a slight drop in temperature because it's cloudy, for the past three days.
Here's the link for the recipe I'm using: https://amyinthekitchen.com/how-to-make-sourdough-starter-recipe/