The best coffee is made in the shade

By Scott Shalaway

Pittsburg Post Gazette

November 20, 2011

Next time you're grocery shopping, try finding a bag of "environmentally friendly" coffee. But don't be fooled by deceptive packaging. Just because a bag has an image of a bird on it doesn't mean it's "green."

Coffee drinking birders and conservationists can make a difference by purchasing coffee that is certified organic and "bird-friendly." Unfortunately these certifications can be confusing.

The Smithsonian Institution's Migratory Bird Center's certification process is the gold standard. Begun in 1995 and based on years of scientific research, SMBC developed strict criteria for evaluating shade coffee farms. Independent third-party inspectors evaluate coffee farms. Only those that meet SMBC standards and are certified "organic" by the U.S. Department of Agriculture are eligible for bird friendly certification. Roasters that have earned the Bird-friendly(R) moniker pay a per-pound royalty to SMBC to support research and conservation.

During a visit to the Smithsonian last summer, Robert Rice, a SMBC scientist, told me that Bird-friendly(R) certified roasters do not necessarily use 100 percent shade-grown beans in every product. In fact, only two, West Chester, Pa.-based Golden Valley Farms (www.goldenvalleyfarms.com) and Canada-based Birds and Beans (www.birdsandbeans.ca) make every blend using 100 percent shade grown beans. Shop wisely.

The vast majority of coffee on grocery shelves is not bird friendly. It's grown under full sun with chemical fertilizers and pesticides. It's bad for farmers and birds, and sun coffee's flavor is often bitter.

In nature, however, coffee is an understory tree. It loves the shade, where it grows slowly, and its beans are rich and mellow. Shade coffee farms also produce fruits, firewood, flowers, lumber and medicine ingredients from the canopy trees. And the canopy supports a rich diversity of birds (more than 150 species), insects, amphibians and other wildlife.

If you plan to buy coffee this holiday season, make it SMBC certified Bird-friendly(R) coffee. Look for the logo.

For more information and a list of Bird-friendly(R) coffee roasters, visit www.si.edu/smbc.

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Scott Shalaway is a biologist and author. His other weekly Post-Gazette column, "Wildlife," runs Sundays on the outdoors page in Sports. He can be reached at sshalaway@aol.com or RD 5, Cameron, WV 26033.