A coffee plantation in TanzaniaWIKIMEDIA, RJONES0856Some African coffee plantations have wild plants and animals to thank for bountiful harvests, according to new research. German scientists have found that bees, birds, and bats greatly impact both the quantity and quality of coffee harvests in Tanzanian plantations surrounding Mount Kilimanjaro.
Ingolf Steffan-Dewenter, a tropical ecologist at the University of Würzburg's Biocenter, and his colleagues studied coffee plants grown in traditional gardens, plantations planted with conventional shade-loving plants, and plantations with newer sun-tolerant, fungi-resistant strains of coffee plant. In all three cultivation systems, the team found that when birds and bats had access to coffee plants, those plants put out about 10 percent more coffee cherries, the fruits that harbor coffee beans. The researchers reported their results in Proceedings of the Royal Society B last week (February 5).
The team suggested that the birds and bats were benefitting the coffee harvest by preying on insect pests that would otherwise damage the coffee plants and reduce yields. But they also found that when pollinators were allowed access ...
