International Coffee Day 2014

In honour of International Coffee Day, September 29th, I am reposting an entry from three years ago. Shade the coffee, shelter the birds!

Love Coffee? Save a Bird With Every Cup.

Rose-breasted Grosbeak (Photo: Seabrooke Leckie)

It’s the time of year when many of the birds we have enjoyed all summer, ‘our’ birds, make their long, perilous journey south, completing one of the most amazing feats of the natural world. Many of those birds will spend their winter on coffee plantations.

A native of Ethiopia, coffee was introduced to Brazil by the mid-1700s, and coffee plantations today cover an estimated 7 million acres in the northern Neotropics from Columbia and Brazil to Mexico. Traditionally, coffee has thrived in shaded woodlands, but in order to produce crops more quickly, sun-tolerant coffee plants were developed.

Full-sun farming requires the removal of the forest and replaces it with a virtual biological desert. Without the forest birds to eat insects, and decaying materials to feed the plants, sun-grown coffee requires the heavy use of pesticides and fertilizers. At least half of the coffee grown in the Neotropics has been converted to full sun.

Buying shade-grown coffee is probably the most important thing you can do to help save the rainforest and protect migratory birds. These days, shade-grown coffee is widely available in supermarkets and specialty stores. Sometimes you have to read the label carefully to verify that the coffee is shade-grown.

Too expensive? Don’t drink that much coffee? Here’s an easy alternative: Look for Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee. Nabob is a product of Kraft Foods, one of a few corporate giants that control 40 to 60% of the coffee market. According to the label, Nabob is currently more than 60% Rainforest Alliance Certified and working towards 100% certification.

Look for the Rainforest Alliance Frog

Still drinking instant??? Most instant coffee is made from the poorest, sun-grown beans. If you purchase an inexpensive one-cup or small-pot coffeemaker, brewing the real thing is very fast. You can enjoy a better cup of coffee and help the birds with a minimum effort. Wake up and smell the coffee! The birds will thank you.

For more information about shade-grown coffee, see my Shade the Coffee, Shelter the Birds post. For plenty of information on many aspects of coffee and habitat, visit the site linked here: Coffee and Conservation.

Ovenbird (Photo: Seabrooke Leckie)

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Love Coffee? Save a Bird With Every Cup

Rose-breasted Grosbeak (Photo: Seabrooke Leckie)

It’s the time of year when many of the birds we have enjoyed all summer, ‘our’ birds, make their long, perilous journey south, completing one of the most amazing feats of the natural world. Many of those birds will spend their winter on coffee plantations.

A native of Ethiopia, coffee was introduced to Brazil by the mid-1700s, and coffee plantations today cover an estimated 7 million acres in the northern Neotropics from Columbia and Brazil to Mexico. Traditionally, coffee has thrived in shaded woodlands, but in order to produce crops more quickly, sun-tolerant coffee plants were developed.

Full-sun farming requires the removal of the forest and replaces it with a virtual biological desert. Without the forest birds to eat insects, and decaying materials to feed the plants, sun-grown coffee requires the heavy use of pesticides and fertilizers. At least half of the coffee grown in the Neotropics has been converted to full sun.

Buying shade-grown coffee is probably the most important thing you can do to help save the rainforest and protect migratory birds. These days, shade-grown coffee is widely available in supermarkets and specialty stores. Sometimes you have to read the label carefully to verify that the coffee is shade-grown.

Too expensive? Don’t drink that much coffee? Here’s an easy alternative: Look for Rainforest Alliance Certified coffee. Nabob is a product of Kraft Foods, one of a few corporate giants that control 40 to 60% of the coffee market. According to the label, Nabob is currently more than 60% Rainforest Alliance Certified and working towards 100% certification.

Look for the Rainforest Alliance Frog

Still drinking instant??? Most instant coffee is made from the poorest, sun-grown beans. If you purchase an inexpensive one-cup or small-pot coffeemaker, brewing the real thing is very fast. You can enjoy a better cup of coffee and help the birds with a minimum effort. Wake up and smell the coffee! The birds will thank you.

For more information about shade-grown coffee, see my Shade the Coffee, Shelter the Birds post. For plenty of information on many aspects of coffee and habitat, visit the site linked here: Coffee and Conservation.

Ovenbird (Photo: Seabrooke Leckie)

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At least the war on the environment is going well…

Happy 40th Earth Day!

In recognition of the day, here are 10 ways to be green. Ten was an arbitrary number. There are many more ways to practise low-impact living. Join in! The planet needs your help.

1. Drink Shade-grown Coffee! There’s no easier way to help save rainforest. See Shade the Coffee, Shelter the Birds for more information.

2. Garden Organically. Whether you grow your own food or prefer flowers, or just plain grass, avoid using pesticides in your yard. Sprays that kill insects and weeds become part of your backyard environment and are bad for other wildlife as well (not to mention you!). If possible, plant a variety of native species to provide food and shelter for birds and bugs.

3. Make Every Cat an Indoor Cat. When it comes to birds, cats are killers. Birds face enough challenges without having domestic pets to contend with. Read more at Natural Born Killers.

4. Choose Seafood Wisely. The days when the bounty of the ocean was limitless are gone. Many fish species are threatened by overfishing. See The End of the Line for more information.

5. Buy Locally-grown Produce. Buying local produce supports local farmers, helps to maintain greenspace, and provides local jobs. Imported foods are transported thousands of miles, contributing to carbon emissions and pollution. Fruits and vegetables from other countries may have been sprayed with pesticides banned in North America or harvested by an exploited workforce. Choose organic food when possible. For more information, see Organic Food is For the Birds.

6. Avoid Bottled Water. All those bottles waste resources and add to landfills. Although recyclable, most water bottles are thrown in the garbage. Bottled water is no safer than tap water in the Toronto area. Sometimes it is tap water. Visit The Polaris Institute for more information about water issues.

7. Eat Less Meat. It takes about 2500 gallons of water and 16 pounds of grain to produce one pound of beef. Over 60% of U.S. grain is fed to livestock. Meat is an inefficient source of protein. “Factory farming” practices that crowd many animals into a small space promote the use of hormones and antibiotics that make their way into the food chain. A vegetarian or near-vegetarian diet is associated with a reduced risk of chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes and hypertension.

8. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Take your own reusable shopping bags or bins with you when you go grocery shopping. The first defense against garbage and waste is not to accept unnecessary articles in the first place. Reduce your use of single-use items such as lighters, razors and other disposable items. Choose reusable items and look for recyclable materials. Recycle your newspapers and other items accepted by community recycling programs.

9. Buy Certified Forest Products. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is an international non-profit organization that supports the environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable management of the world’s forests. Forests are certified against a strict set of environmental and social standards. Producers and manufacturers along the supply chain are certified to ensure that the final product bearing the FSC logo actually originated from a certified forest. For more information, see www.fsccanada.org.

10. Get involved. Become informed about environmental issues. There are many great organizations, from large ones like the World Wildlife Fund to grassroots local causes in your own community. Donate funds to your favorites. Volunteer. Change won’t happen without you.

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Shade the Coffee, Shelter the Birds

Coffee growing under rainforest canopy

The coffee shrub is native to the rainforests of Ethiopia. Introduced to Brazil by the mid-1700s, coffee plantations today cover an estimated 7 million acres in the northern Neotropics from Columbia and Brazil to Mexico. Traditionally, coffee has been grown on the side of mountains, where it thrives in the shade of trees and provides habitat for both native species and wintering migratory birds.

In the 1930s, ornithologist Ludlow Griscom noted that the birds found in shaded coffee plantations varied little from those found in undisturbed forest. Since then, studies have confirmed that not only birds, but also mammals, reptiles, and insects thrive on shade coffee plantations. As rainforest in the Neotropics continues to disappear, shade coffee plantations have become a vital resource for birds and other wildlife.

Sun-grown coffee plantation (Photo credit: wikipedia)

But coffee grows slowly. Coffee bushes take 3 to 4 years to mature. Over the last 20 years, coffee growers have been replacing traditional varieties with new, high yielding, sun-tolerant varieties. Full-sun farming requires the removal of the forest and replaces it with a virtual biological desert. Without the forest birds to eat insects, and decaying materials to feed the plants, sun-grown coffee requires the heavy use of pesticides and fertilizers. At least half of the coffee grown in the Neotropics has been converted to full sun. You can read more about coffee plantations at Coffee and Conversation.

Buying shade-grown coffee is probably the most important thing you can do to help save the rainforest and protect migratory birds. A number of brands of certified shade-grown coffee are readily available. Many of the grocery stores in southern Ontario carry Kicking Horse coffee in their organic section. When you drink a cup of shade-grown, organic, fair-trade coffee, you are getting your day off to a good start! You can practically feel the glow of a halo as you contribute to these important causes! All by enjoying a great cup of coffee! What could be better?

Fair trade and organic coffees are not necessarily shade-grown. Look for the shade-grown certification to be certain. If you can’t find shade grown coffee in your local supermarket, try specialty stores and organic foodstuff sellers. You can also purchase shade-grown coffee easily online.
Some other brands I found locally include the following:

Foodsmiths coffee is packaged for a local organics store by Creemore Coffee Company. You can buy shade-grown coffee directly from Creemore Coffee at creemorecoffee.com.

You can buy shade-grown coffee from Salt Spring Coffee at saltspringcoffee.com.

Another online source is Birds and Beans Coffee.

Still drinking instant??? Most instant coffee is made from the poorest, sun-grown beans. If you purchase an inexpensive one-cup or small-pot coffeemaker, brewing the real thing is very fast. You can enjoy a better cup of coffee and help the birds with a minimum effort. Wake up and smell the coffee!

The Baltimore Oriole (Icterus galbula) is a bird seen around Willow House in the summer that is often found on shade-grown coffee plantations in the winter.

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Bibliophilia Monday: Silence of the Songbirds

Silence of the Songbirds: How We Are Losing the World’s Songbirds and What We Can Do to Save Them, by Bridget Stutchbury. HarperCollins, 2007.

Every fall, we northern dwellers are accustomed to “our” birds leaving our cold, snowy winter behind and flying south. This seems like a very sensible thing to do, and if we think of them at all, it is probably to imagine the birds on vacation, soaking up the rays in the Neotropics. Far from being on holiday, birds that migrate south face a difficult season. They must compete with other birds for habitat that will keep them fed and allow them to build up the reserves they will need for the flight north and a new breeding season. Increasingly, their lives are imperiled by the destruction of the rainforest as more and more trees are replaced with agricultural fields. Other threats include the heavy use of pesticides that can result in mass poisonings. When they return north with the spring, life is no easier, with widespread habitat loss, cats, windows, lights, towers, and other disasters-in-waiting ready to take their toll.

Birds are amazing creatures, little more, it would seem, than sparks of life wrapped in feathers. What incredible lives they live! However, the ever-increasing challenges that songbirds must face, both in the north and the south, are causing a slow but steady decline in songbird populations across the continent. In the last 3 to 4 decades, the songbird population has fallen by a horrifying 20 to 30%. Songbirds are a vital part of the ecosystem. They perform irreplaceable services that we humans count on, from insect control to spreading plant seeds. The fading away of the songbird population is a symptom of the deep wound we have inflicted on the natural world. If they go, will we be next?

Bridget Stutchbury is a professor of biology at York University in Toronto, and a fellow and research associate at the Smithsonian Institute. She and her husband have devoted their careers to the study of songbirds. In Silence of the Songbirds, Stutchbury takes the reader with her as she looks at songbirds in their winter homes. She explains the science behind songbird studies and tools such as the Breeding Bird Survey. She examines the many threats that songbirds face. Finally, she offers the reader a list of solutions, how everyone can contribute to halting the decline of songbird populations. Anyone who has ever looked for the first robin of spring or enjoyed the sound of a bird singing in the yard will want to read this book. Understanding the problem is the first step in finding solutions.

How To Save A Songbird

Buy shade-grown coffee that is both organic and fairly-traded.

Buy organic produce

Avoid non-organic North American crops such as alfalfa, Brussel sprouts,blueberries, celery, corn, cotton, cranberries, potatoes and wheat.

Buy unbleached, recycled paper products

Turn off the lights at night in city buildings and homes during peak migration periods

Keep your cat indoors

For more on these issues, see these posts:

Every Cat an Indoor Cat

Natural Born Killers

Organic Food is For the Birds

Climate Change and the Boreal Forest

Shade the Coffee, Shelter the Birds

For more on the use of pesticides on potatoes in North America, see Michael Pollan’s book, The Botany of Desire, reviewed on November 23.

Eastern Kingbird (Tyrannus tyrannus) catching insects on the wing.

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