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Many of you followed the saga of our hard work to plant 175 coffee trees, and then finding our field devoid of trees. We are still haggling amongst ourselves as to what happened to those trees, but today the most amazing thing happened. While mowing that field (planning to replant it) I was riding the mower near the edge of the forest. Lo and behold, in amongst the Wiwi and Ohia and Hapu'u I see leaves that look like coffee trees. On closer inspection, I can tell you there are several trees, over 10 feet tall, with long LONG weeping ranches and the first buds of what look like coffee cherry. There are also some Keiki beneath them. I am astounded.
Where did they come from? If they are somehow transplanted from our field (feral pigs, wind storms???) how did they get that big that fast? Whoa, what a dayof discovery.
There may be hope for our coffee tree dreams yet!
Woo Hoooo.
Just another day in P A R A D I S E !!
I want to be the kind of woman that, when my feet
hit the floor each morning, the devil says
"Oh Crap, She's up!"
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Aloha, Pam,
Back in the South we called desirable plants that just came up wherever they wanted "volunteers." I always noticed that they tended to do well and let them grow where they came up whenever possible. Since moving to Hawaii, the only successful tomatoes I have grown have been volunteers. They just seem to find the best places and survive there. (We don't know how the seeds got there.) Hopefully your coffee will produce for you in its surprise location.
Cheers,
Jerry
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Not only will we be leaving the volunteers where they are, we are studying them to figure out why they like it there so much! Gotta love mother nature!
Just another day in P A R A D I S E !!
I want to be the kind of woman that, when my feet
hit the floor each morning, the devil says
"Oh Crap, She's up!"
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Pam, maybe it's like shade-tree coffee farming. I don't recall off the top of my head what the environmental benefits are of shade-tree growing. Something to do with needing less insect control?
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Pam,
I recently read this article in Hawai`i Island Journal (
http://www.hawaiiislandjournal.com/2006/1118b.html) that may explain your "wild" trees. I suspect your coffee trees were there before you were!
In a [mac]nutshell, there once were 6000 acres of coffee between Kea`au and Volcano. By way of comparison, that's nearly double the number of acres currently under coffee cultivation Kona!
Art
Edited by - ArtM on 12/10/2006 13:06:50
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It was disheartening to hear that the coffee trees that had been planted were lost. A lot of work and many days and hours of labor were put in to accomplish the planting. We hope this new "find" pans out and you are able to distinguish how and why they are growing in this location. Armed with that knowledge, you can reaccess where, how, and posibly when to plant the next batch. In the mean time, count it as a Christmas gift from Mother Nature and Madame Pele.
We get out of life......What we put into it
We get out of life......What we put into it
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Folks:
See the info at this link on "Shade Grown Coffee":
http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Conservationan...efault.cfm
The concept is instead of clearcutting a forest and planting just one crop, attempt to replicate an environment or work with the existing one that will support multiple types of plants and animal species. That way the land is more productive and not depleted because of no rotational crops and it can also provide habitat for birds and other species.
Years ago we used to call this companion planting which focused on primarily planting nitrogen-fixing trees/plants, as an example planting chrysanthemums which have a natural insecticide (Pyrethrum) around vegetables.
Will Peratino
Will Peratino
