Research in Coffee Fields

Taking a break in the shade.

Wow. Research is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I always glamorized it in my head, thinking of PBS shows such as Nature or NOVA. Watching those, you don’t really think about the little things, like how they feel being under a hot sun for many hours a day, or if measuring the same kind of things over and over gets tedious. Or, very importantly, where they go to the bathroom! Don’t get me wrong, it has been a great experience. Coffee fields are a lot different than corn and bean fields though. One of the farms was VERY steep!! We had to GPS the perimeter, and there were many a time where we would fall slide down a bit. There was even one section that we turned into a slide, it was so steep (for those that have seen it, think Lemurs with John Cleese). The coffee bushes are sometimes very think and close together, and there also often at least some other trees in the field, so walking through it can feel like you are in a forest instead of an agricultural area.

Road going through one of the organic coffee farms

Coffee harvesting season starts soon for many farmers, and we could tell from the plethera fof red beans (this picture was taken at our class visit to a farm, so they weren't quite as red then, but i thought it would be a good reference). A nice small sugar snack was to pick a red bean and suck out the "honey" that is on the inside.

My job is to take soil cores in the sub-plots that we made in the fields. I am looking at the difference in carbon content between the conventional and organic coffee farms. I didn’t even think about the fact that soil holds carbon before I started this project, so I am excited to learn about it. Our research could be very beneficial to farmers, because if there farms store a lot of carbon they can apply to be part of a Payment for Environmental Services program. So that is exciting J

Back to soil cores. So there is this thing that is a bit like a shovel but with a core thing on the bottom that I push into the soil at each corner. Abby and I work together, she is taking the leaf litter from the area first (she is measuring the carbon content of that). We find ways to make the time pass, such as singing ridiculous songs at the top of our lungs (for example, Bohemian Rhapsody and Fergalicous were in our collection).

The tools that became my dear friends over the past couple of days. Most important: water bottle!

Abby taking her leaf litter samples. We kept losing the stakes for the set 30 cm x 30 cm square of string we had to use, and so would improvise with sticks. It got pretty interesting by the end of the day!

Today we got done early, and I think we will tomorrow too, so I think we are almost done with the data collection. Yesterday was the roughest day, so it was good that today was lighter. Lol yesterday when we got back at 4:30, I walked 10 steps into the dorms until I got to the living room and passed out cold on the mattresses that are in front of the TV. I don’t think I have been that physically tired in a long time!

So, on the whole, I think research is difficult but also very beneficial. And who knows, when I have to sit down and start writing the research paper, I might long for the days of data collection J