Growing your own coffee at home can have a number of benefits. First is the free coffee angle. A mature plant can produce as much as two to four pounds of coffee per year. Second, are their fragrant flowers. Some say the aroma resembles jasmine. However, not to be dismissed are the health benefits of sharing your home with Coffea Arabica. Each plant converts your exhaled CO2 into about one ounce of oxygen per day. This, in effect, will help to offset your personal carbon footprint! So you can counteract rain forest destruction, improve the air quality in your home, reap the social creds of being green and get a free cup of coffee to boot!
How, then, do you grow that cup of joe? It is as simple as making your home, or at least a part of it, mimic the coffee plant’s normal environment. Which is jungly. Very jungly. Most of the world’s coffee is grown within 25 degrees of the equatorial belt, at altitudes between 1800 to 6300 feet, with temperatures averaging 60-80 degrees Fahrenheit, and receiving six inches or more of rain per year. They enjoy high humidity, mist and clouds.
Actually, if you just want a nice green plant in your home, and don’t care to become the next Juan Valdez, coffee doesn’t require much in the way of special attention. If you buy a plant online (from $5 to $65 depending on size), or seeds for home germination (see below), keep it watered and keep it warm, you and your big green coffee plant should enjoy many years of photosynthesis together.
However, if it’s beans you want, read further.
- Not just any bean. As many coffee aficionados know, there are basically two main species of coffee cultivated today -- Arabica and Robusta. The Arabica is more flavorful and is used in high-end coffee. Robusta is not as complex in its flavoring and is higher in caffeine. Arabica is only cultivated in higher elevations and is temperamental to grow, while Robusta, like its name, is a more hardy plant and grows at a more diverse range of elevations and temperatures. This being said, choose Arabica. Why go to all the trouble of growing this plant (see below!) for an inferior brew? Also Arabica is self-pollinating while Robusta needs assistance, not something we want to delve into…...
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Author: Bob Derry