From Common Forest Trees of Hawaii

Arabian Coffee
Coffea arabica
Madder family (Rubiaceae)

Post-Cook introduction

Coffee, the source of one of the world’s most popular beverages, is an introduced shrub or sometimes a small tree scattered on moist lower mountain slopes and grown in plantations, mainly near Kona, Hawaii. Generally a compact shrub 5–10 ft (1.5–3 ) high, but if not pruned it becomes a small tree 12–15 ft (3.7–4.6 ) high and 3 inches (7.5 ) in trunk diameter, with spreading foliage.


©2018 Forest And Kim Starr
Bark light gray, thin, much fissured, becoming rough; inner bark whitish and tasteless. Twigs are many from the main axis, long slender, spreading and slightly drooping, green when young but changing to light brown, with paired long-pointed () 3⁄16 inch (5 ) long at

Leaves hairless, with leaf-stalks of 1⁄4–1⁄2 inch (6–13 ). Blades elliptical, 3–7 inches (7.5–18 ) long and 1 1⁄2–2 3⁄4 inches (4–7 ) broad, long-pointed at and short-pointed at base, upper surface and edges often slightly wavy, a little thickened shiny dark green with sunken veins on upper surface: paler green beneath.

Flowers are many, fragrant, several together on stalks of 1⁄8 inch (3 ) at leaf bases along twigs, about 1 1⁄4 inches (3 ) across the five long white consists of five minute teeth on green tubular base () less than 1⁄8 inch (3 ) long; white and showy, with narrow cylindrical tube 3⁄8–1⁄2 inch (10-13 ) long and five widely spreading narrow pointed 5⁄8 inch (15 ) long; five, white, inserted in mouth of tube; and with two-celled inferior and slender two-forked white

Berries elliptical, 1⁄2–5⁄8 inch (13–15 ) long, red, containing thin fleshy pulp and two (sometimes one) elliptical seeds 5⁄16–1⁄2 inch (8–13 ) long, flattened on inner surface. There are about 1000 coffee beans to a pound (2208 to a kilo). In Hawaii, flowering is mainly in spring and the coffee harvest season from September to January with peak in November.

The wood is whitish, hard, heavy, and tough, seldom used.

Coffee is an important agricultural crop in many tropical regions. The seeds, which contain caffeine, are roasted and ground to produce the familiar drink. This species is the most widely grown of several and has many cultivated varieties. Elsewhere, classed as a honey plant, producing white honey with a characteristic flavor.

It is reported that coffee was introduced into the New World first to Suriname by the Dutch in 1714. The same year a tree was presented to King Louis XIV of France as a peace gesture during the signing of the Treaty of Utrecht. From that royal tree, seedlings were smuggled to Brazil in 1727. Nearly a century later, in 1813, coffee was first planted in Hawaii by Don Marin. In 1818, missionary Samuel Ruffles grew ornamental shrubs at Kona. Many plantations were established mainly between the years 1840 to 1856. Losses from insects and fungus disease caused abandonment of most plantations and replacement by sugar cane.

Coffee is still produced commercially in a narrow belt on the west side of the Island of Hawaii. Kona coffee, known for its unique flavor, is grown on many small farms in a narrow subtropical belt with high rainfall at 1200–2000 ft (366–610 ). A coffee mill is located near the seaside village of Napoopoo on Kealakekua Bay. The Kona Coffee Festival in early November celebrates the coffee harvest season.

In Hawaii, coffee is naturalized locally on moist lower mountain slopes of the islands of Kauai, Oahu, and Hawaii.

Range
Native of Ethiopia but early introduced into Arabia (14th century) and extensively planted and escaping or naturalized through the tropics. In the New World, coffee is grown commercially from Mexico and Central America south to Brazil and through the West Indies including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Planted also as a novelty or ornamental shrub in southern Florida and southern California.

Other common names
Kona coffee, Arabian coffee

An evergreen tree retains a large portion of its green leaves all year.

node -- The point at which there is attached growth, as in the place where each leaf is attached.

style -- This is a long and thread-like structure that connects the stigma with the ovary. A flower may have a single style, or several of them.

scale -- A very small leaf around a dormant bud. Also other things that might remind one of fish scales on the surface of ferns, stems and the like.

cm -- A centimeter which is about 0.4 inches.

In an opposite leaf arrangement the leaves come in pairs with one leaf on each side of a stem.

mm -- millimeter. About 1/25th of an inch.

corolla -- The name for all the petals of a flower taken together.

m -- A meter is about 10% larger than a yard.

The apex is the tip or the furthest point from the attachment.

calyx -- the sepals of a flower, typically forming a whorl that encloses the petals and forms a protective layer around a flower in bud.

The hypanthium or floral cup is a cup-like structure formed by the fused bases of the stamens, petals, and sepals.

stamen -- the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower; The stamen consists of an anther supported by a filament.

stipule -- A leaf-like structure that occurs where the leaf joins the stem; stipules often occur in pairs.

An annual plant is a plant that completes its life cycle, from germination to the production of seed, within one year, and then dies.

lobe -- Rounded parts of a leaf (or other organ). Lobes bulge out about 1/4 of the leaf diameter.

An ovary is a part of the female reproductive organ of the flower. Above the ovary is the style and the stigma, which is where the pollen lands and germinates to grow down through the style to the ovary.

A pistil is the female structure of many flowers. It contains one or more carpels. Each carpel contins an ovary, style and stigma. The stigma receives the pollen which grows thru the style to reach the ovary.