SHADE IN COFFEE CULTURE. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The shading of coffee is one of the vexed questions of tropical agri- 

 culture, and the literature of the subject abounds in opinions of the 

 most contradictory import. B}^ some shade is condemned as always 

 and everywhere hurtful, while others insist with equal emphasis that 

 it is a necessity for the healthy growth and productiveness of the 

 coffee tree. Some experts admit a limited use of shade at low altitudes 

 and in regions subject to drought, while others insist that coffee can 

 not be profitably cultivated where shade is necessary. A favorite 

 argument for shade is the greater longevity of the trees, but this is 

 answered by the assertion of greatly decreased productiveness. The 

 occasion of the present bulletin is the attainment of the belie! that the 

 above arguments and others noticed in detail below are based, when 

 they have any rational justification, on local conditions merely, and do 

 not represent facts or principles of general application in the culture 

 of coffee. To ascribe to the shade itself the effects of fertility imparted 

 to the soil by the roots of leguminous shade trees is a natural and by 

 no means unique error of judgment; but it is, nevertheless, somewhat 

 surprising that this primary cause of so many contrary opinions should 

 not have been apprehended long ago. 



Testimony in favor of shade has come almost entirely from Central 

 America, Venezuela, and Colombia, in which region the custom of 

 planting leguminous trees with coffee is general; in Brazil and in the 

 East Indies where experiments have been made with figs and other 

 nonleguminous trees theory and practice have generally ignored or 

 directly opposed the use of shade. To reconcile these contrary ideas 

 it is necessary only to observe that the coffee and cacao planters of the 

 Central American region have been practicing unconsciously a system 

 of soil fertilizing. Like the clovers, vetches, and other fodder and 

 soiling crops now extensively used and highly valued in the agriculture 

 of temperate regions, the leguminous shrubs and trees are also able to 

 avail themselves of the atmospheric nitrogen by means of their root 

 tubercles and attendant bacteria. Although the planting of a legum- 

 inous soiling crop with coffee was suggested many years ago in Java, 

 and although several writers who favored shade have mentioned the 



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