Coffee news and miscellany

In April, I gave an overview of my home coffee growing project, a.k.a. Finca Dos Gatos, prompted by my discovery of buds on one of my Panama plants, planted from seed collected in 2008. Here is an update.

The plant on which I discovered buds on 12 April, and which I believe to be the only typica variety among 10 other caturra, flowered on 25 May. I think I ended up with four flowers.

The flowers lasted only a couple of days. Meanwhile, some of the coffee beans I had picked up in Nicaragua in March 2011 were starting to germinate. First was a one of two coffee cherries I picked up at Selva Negra. These were not from the production area, but from a plant growing wild in the cloud forest, right next to the spot where I saw my first Resplendent Quetzals. I thought a coffee plant from that location would be a great memento. My germination method is the same as how I sprouted lima beans in elementary school: on a wet paper towel, kept warm in a plastic food container. One bean sprouted which I planted in soil on 7 May.

Bourbon or caturra seedling, from Selva Negra, ready to plant.

At around the same time, on 15 May, I had a number of beans from El Jaguar start to sprout. Although they grow several varieties, I only collected yellow catuai, for the sake of variety. This variety was developed in Brazil and is commonly grown there, and is a cross between caturra and Mondo Novo

Some ripening yellow catuai at Finca El Jaguar.

We had a very rainy spring here in southern Michigan, so I did not put the coffee outside for the summer until June. By mid-summer, it got very hot here, and I do not have enough shady places in our small yard for all the large plants, so I created some. I purchased some 40% shade cloth, and some plastic snap-on grommets. “S” hooks go through the grommets and hook on to the gutters, and the other grommets fit on tree stakes in the lawn. The shade cloth is therefore very easy to take down to mow. A spare piece of shade cloth can be clipped on top to provide some extra protection on really hot days.

I kept the seedlings in a more protected spot. The Selva Negra seedling grew faster than I remember any of the others progressing. By mid-July it already had its first set of true leaves.

Meanwhile, not much was happening on my plant that had flowered. I read it takes some time for beans to begin to develop. Indeed, I did not find any sign of beans until 15 July.

I have a two-bean crop; perhaps they will be ripe by Christmas. One of the other Panama plants also flowered, and had many buds. But the heat and humidity took it’s toll, and I lost most of the buds before they opened. Further, every plant was in dire need of repotting, so on 6 August, I potted up every plant. I used  a good topsoil, plus organic potting soil, all mixed with Espoma Organic Bio-Tone Starter Plus, which contains beneficial bacteria and mycorrhizae. Up to this point, I’d given these plants plenty of root space, using deep, narrow tree pots. The problem at this point was that new containers deep enough for the roots were ridiculously large and heavy. Several Panama plants (3 years old) went into 15″ deep 3.2 gallon tree pots, the last size up that I have.

Not sure how long this one will stay in the larger pot.

The Nicaragua plants (2 years old) are all two growing together. They went into two or three gallon pots. The largest pair posed a dilemma. The little rubber trash can seemed like overkill, so I ended up using a cat litter bucket, after drilling drainage holes in the bottom. What could be more appropriate for Finca Dos Gatos?

I now have a finca too large for the bedroom window, where I overwintered the plants last year. Indoor winter vacation, which began last month, is now in the basement under two four-foot Sun Blaze T5 fluorescent fixtures, each with four 6500K (blue) bulbs (same as before, just an additional fixture). The lights are on a timer, about 12 hours of light a day.

Three Panama plants on the left; six Nicaragua on floor/to the right (I gave away a pair of Nica, and some seedlings). I have a little class: I covered the cat litter bucket with four duct tape sheets. I didn’t even know such a thing existed, but it sure makes for a durable, waterproof covering. I chose black, but they come in all colors and patterns. Those pots are heavy, so they are on rolling stands.

The seedlings are under a smaller set of lights. As of now, late October 2011, here is the  Selva Negra seedling; it’s about six inches tall.

And here is the El Jaguar seedling, about 4.5 inches:

The two unripe cherries survived being transplanted. They are full size, but still green.

I’m happy to report that the two cats for whom the finca is named have stayed out of the pots. Actually, they both like lounging in the bright lights on gloomy days.

Sophie guarding the finca.

This winter, I plan to induce and promote flowering by providing a dry period followed by renewed water, switching out half the bulbs for red spectrum, and changing the fertilizer. I’ll let you know how it goes early next year.

People are always interested in the coffee I have grown from seed at 189 meters in southeast Michigan without a greenhouse. Since I’ve just reached a milestone with my oldest plants — flower buds! — I thought I’d show everybody the family album, and provide some tips, for what they’re worth.

I started out by collecting fallen ripe cherries in Panama in January 2008. Some were from Finca Hartmann near Santa Clara in Chiriqui, some from a Starbucks supplier (Finca La Florentina) in Volcan, Chiriqui. I probably had three dozen beans, which I attempted to germinate the way I sprouted lima beans as a kid — in damp paper towels against the side of a clear plastic cup. I’ve refined this a bit to layering them flat between damp paper towels in a covered seed starting tray. I’ve found that perhaps 20% will sprout, but it takes 3 or 4 months. Other folks have had good luck with soaking the beans in water 24 hours, then doing the paper-towel thing.

After a 4-month wait, some coffee sprouted. It seems to take another month or so before the first leaves can finally shed the bean!

Once there was several millimeters of both root and stem, I transplanted them into sterile potting soil mix in peat pots. For future “crops” I have tried to use more compost (coffee has pretty high nitrogen requirements).

The first leaves are round.

The peat pots were prone to falling apart. I placed the peat pots into another tall, deep, clear plastic cup with potting soil cut with a fair amount of coarse sand. I placed marbles in the bottom of the cup, and sliced a bunch of drain holes in the cup. I was worried about drainage, and wanted to keep track of root growth.

Five seedlings went outside against a west-facing wall under shade.

In fall, I brought them in the house, and put them under a grow-light set up. Still, by March they looked really crappy. I think it was both some lack of nutrients, nitrogen, perhaps and not enough light. I had been fertilizing with a weak solution of orchid fertilizer, but apparently that wasn’t doing the job.

This coffee needs some TLC, or maybe N-P-K.

Repotted and back outside, they seemed to recover by mid-summer.

Summer vacation against an east-facing wall, no overhead shade.

Meanwhile, I picked up some more cherries at Finca Esperanza Verde in San Ramon, Nicaragua in March 2009. This time I looked for over-ripe, but not dessicated, fruit. About 30% of the beans sprouted in roughly three months. All the plants came indoors again in the winter. I don’t have a lot of windowsill room, but the Panama plants and some of the Nicaragua seedlings got moved around to various sills, and some of the Nicaragua plants went under lights. They all made it through the winter, not as anemic as the winter before, but without having grown much at all

Smaller Nicaraguan plants had been on a windowsill, the one on the right under the lights.

The Panama plants wintered in front of a west-facing window.

Once again, lots of growth in the summer. In fact, I had a hard time finding pots deep enough for the roots that weren’t equally as wide. I finally ordered these “tree pots” from a nursery supply company. Cheap, lightweight, available in many sizes, they were perfect. When I repotted, I used organic potting soil with NO additives (so many come with time-release fertilizer) and at least 30% sand.

All the coffee, plus an orchid, on summer vacation.

Late last fall, I decided that the plants were doing too well to let them decline over the winter. I purchased a good lighting set up: One four-foot Sun Blaze T5 fluorescent fixture with four 6500K (blue) bulbs. It was ready to hang, and allows for expansion (daisy-chaining additional fixtures). I also purchased two four-foot T5 fluorescent 3000K (red) bulbs, which I figured I’d use next winter to induce blooming. I put the fixture on a timer for 12 hours of daylight a day. At the same time, I started using Earth Juice “Grow” fertilizer/micro-nutrient nearly every time I watered. Prior to this, I usually only fertilized with organic fertilizer or worm/compost “tea” in the summer when the plants were outside, or orchid fertilizer or house plant fertilizer inside.

The results were amazing, and I attribute it to both the light intensity and hitting on the right fertilizer. Lots of lush growth — I had to prune several of them.  We have a whole-house humidifier, but I still worry about humidity under these lights, which do get pretty warm. I try to spray-mist them every day.

We don’t even need to close the bedroom curtains in the winter! The farm now has a name, in honor of Sophie and Juniper, the feline caretakers.

Last week when I was rotating their positions, I noticed several of the Panama plants were starting to bud!

Buds! Present on three of the five Panama plants so far. Conceivably, these could be leaf buds, but I’ve never had leaves emerge from the axils before.

Uno gato (Juniper) for scale. She has munched her share of coffee leaves, and I have to take care to keep her off the finca. Naughty girl.

I’m pretty sure these are all caturra, except one tall, rangy plant that may be typica or even geisha. It was from an area where all three varieties were being grown. However, this plant is growing in a heavier garden soil (I ran out of potting soil when I was transplanting) and also spent one winter on the windowsill versus under lights. Not sure that would account for the different growth style or not. Opinions welcome!

Typica rather than caturra? I had already pruned off about 8 inches from the top and some of the side branches prior to this photo.

Last month, I picked up more cherry in Nicaragua. Since I’m running out of room here at Finca Dos Gatos, I decided to only try starting some yellow cataui from El Jaguar. I also picked up only a couple of cherries I found from coffee growing wild in the forested part of Selva Negra, right next to the spot where I saw my first Resplendent Quetzals. I thought a coffee plant from that location would be a great memento.

Tom Owen at Sweet Maria’s has a nifty guide to coffee growing at home.

UPDATE: I’ve given a photo update in late October 2011.

This has become something of a tradition: how much I spend on coffee each year — good, often great, sustainably-grown coffee. I’m not a typical coffee drinker, in that I get nearly all my coffee online (and so pay shipping charges) and 95% of it is single-origin. I prefer single origins because it enables me to do research on the source and gauge sustainability. Most average coffee consumers will be able to bring this price down substantially without compromising sustainability.

I started in 2008 with an annual coffee expense of $987, including shipping, which worked out to $2.70 a day.

In 2009, I kept more precise figures, calculating $1031 for beans plus $129 for shipping, for a total of $1160 for the year. This was $0.45 per 6-oz cup.

Here are my 2010 stats:

• 78 bags of coffee totaling 61 pounds.
• Total retail price = $1064. I purchased very few bags locally, so I also spent $143 on shipping, for a grand total of $1207 for the year.
• This still works out to only $0.48 per six-ounce cup ($0.42 without shipping).
• I buy a lot of really high-quality coffee, much more than the typical consumer. The average price per pound (not including shipping) this year was $17.57. The big outlier was Counter Culture’s Hacienda Esmeralda Mario San Jose which retailed at the equivalent of over $69/lb. Including that coffee, I purchased 16 bags of coffee that retailed for over $20/lb.

I have a three-year average of around 60 pounds a year, from 20 roasters. Usually, about half the roasters are new ones that I try out.

So, no excuses — great coffee that helps support ecosystems and rural communities worldwide is not too expensive for all of us to enjoy.

I’ve posted this before, but if you’d like to calculate how much a cup of coffee costs, based on the price of a bag of beans, just punch in the price and weight of the bag here: