Our Earthworms are Turning Coffee Pulp into Organic Fertilizer!

Written by Mario Serracin, Ph.D. (pictured left) who is Rogers Family Company's Agronomist currently living in Rwanda, Central Africa. 

Earthworms are found worldwide, burrowing throughout the soil while improving aeration and soil nutrient bank.  These tiny creatures even attracted the attention of Darwin as documented in the 1881 Charles Darwin's treatise, "The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms."  This is perhaps among the least well known of Darwin's many published scientific observations in which  the brilliant naturalist measured and calculated that earthworms could turn over, almost effortlessly, over four tons of soil per hectare per year.  

In fact, when Pete Rogers reflected on the excessive amount of chemicals and synthetic fertilizers required to produce coffee, and how the mineral rich coffee pulp was being wasted in dormant piles, often contaminating the groundwater, he was urged to find solutions once and for all.  This is how we got our hands full of red wriggly worms or Eisenia foetida.

Pete wanted to be more aggressive with the program, and so he funded the project to transfer the worm technology from Finca Irlanda, in the southeast mountains of Chiapas, Mexico and Selva Negra, Nicaragua to the Rogers' own, newly-planted, coffee farm named "Hacienda Barbara" in Panama.  Our goal was to improve the system and treat, transform and recycle some 5,000 tons of coffee pulp contaminating the Caldera River in Boquete Panama into a nutrient rich organic fertilizer. That fertilizer was to be given to small coffee holders as an incentive and to promote organic coffee cultivation. 

Challenges are opportunities.  The first one faced early on was the slow reproduction of the worms, which was cleverly resolved by creating a special diet made of fish meal and coffee pulp, to induce the worms to reproduce rapidly due to the extra protein source found in the fish.   The second was to contain the invasion of mites, birds and the hammerhead Planaria which can be devastating.  The third challenge was to learn and test the fertilizer and disease fighting properties of worm castings in organic coffee production.

Today, many of our wetmills are encouraged to practice vermiculture.  The coffee pulp is removed from the wetmill soon after processing and treated with effective microorganisms, molasses and calcium. Once it cools down, it is fed to the redworms, which transform it in humus.  

Each worm is capable of digesting an amount of food equivalent to their own body weight daily.  Being hermaphrodite has its advantages, if you are a worm, creating a unique reproductive strategy.  With both sexual organs active at once and well fed with the appropriate diet, the worms' population peaked every three months.  After starting with a handful of 100 worms, in less than one year we had some 10,000 square meters filled with a billion worms.

The worm castings, or humus from coffee pulp, contain a rich microflora, macro and micronutrients and humid acids essential for soil health.  The castings are also water soluble, which allow a solution known as ‘wormtea’ to be sprayed on coffee leaves and used in the nursery for germination and transplanting of coffee seedlings. 

The castings can also be added directly to the soil. This brings millions of worms to the coffee fields, which in turn, augments the food source and protein supply of birds and the small animals triggering the whole food chain as experienced in our own organic farm Hacienda Santa Barbara, Panama.  

Since 2009, we have taken this concept to Africa, where nutrient depleted soils are a threat to food security and sustainable coffee production.  (Click here to see our Rwandan worms in action on our Rwanda Blog.)

Comments

[Janet Amaral]

Do you ever sell/donate any of the castings locally here in the US? I'd love some for my organic garden!

[Dan Moore]

Hi,

Great project!

Just wondering why you decided to use E Foetida rather than worms more suited to the tropics (Perionyx excavatus, for example).

Thanks,
Dan

[kippah]

Your post was very informative. Because I have a hard time with insects and worms, this was pretty shocking - I now have more appreciation for the finished, fragrant product!