Shade Grown & High Elevation Grown Coffee BeansUpdated 6 months ago
Being Grown at a High Elevation:
When coffee is grown at higher altitudes (at least 5,700ft above sea level), it has a number of beneficial effects on the beans. When you grow coffee at a higher altitude it slows the development and ripening of the beans. This is because the temperature of the environment is cooler which causes the beans to develop more slowly. The slow growth of the beans allows them to absorb more nutrients and become much more dense and harder than coffee grow at lower elevations. This means that there are more antioxidants in the beans, which means you will get more out of the coffee you are drinking. Not only is the coffee much more nutrient dense, it is also superior in taste. Most expensive high quality coffees are grown at higher elevations to maximize their flavor.
Being Shade Grown:
By growing coffee plants under a sun filtering canopy improves the quality of the coffee bean for a number of reasons. The trees provide shelter for the coffee plants from the sun. This allows the beans to mature at a slower. This allows them to become more nutrient rich, denser, and harder than coffee beans that are not shade grown. This means that the final coffee product will be much more nutrient rich and have a much better flavor.
The trees that shade the coffee offer other benefits than just protection from the sun. The leaves that fall from the branches of the trees provide a naturally occurring source of nutrients for the coffee plants. When the leaves decompose they become part of the soil which the coffee plants use to grow. This helps to improve the nutrient density of the coffee plants. The fallen leaves also provide protection for the coffee plants from weed growth. The fallen leaves act as a “mulch” making it hard for new seeds from other plants to grow. This means that there is more nutrients in the soil that are readily available for the coffee plants to use which will improve the nutrient richness of the coffee beans when they are fully developed.