Flossie, we hardly knew ya

The hurricane missed us with hardly a gust of wind, and then quickly degraded into a tropical storm. The trailing clouds are dropping a gentle rain now, but we are all breathing easy again.

Now up on the horizon is a tsunami advisory from the 7.9 earthquake in Peru.

This is not an island for the fainthearted.

Flossie, still waiting...

Waiting for a hurricane that is stalled offshore is like waiting for the dentist. Nothing but dread and impatience and the desire to get on with it already!

Hurricane Flossie was due mid-day and 8 hours later she hasn't arrived. Never believe the weathermen. Now that all preparations are complete, we are left twiddling our thumbs. So, what's a farmgirl to do but surf the web and look at Youtube video of the last Typhoon I weathered. That shrieking noise in the background....wind.

Keep praying for us, it seems to be working.

Hurricane Flossie, Part 1

We're battening down the hatches here as Hurricane Flossie is swinging our way. We're sure to get smacked pretty hard by wind and rain tomorrow.

The National Weather Service says...

THE CURRENT FORECAST BRINGS EAST TO SOUTHEAST WINDS OF 40 TO 50
MPH WITH GUSTS TO 60 MPH TO THE SOUTHERN BIG ISLAND BY NOON
TUESDAY. WINDS OF THESE INTENSITIES WILL CAUSE DAMAGE TO LIGHT
STRUCTURES AND TREES.

HOWEVER...IF THE TRACK OF FLOSSIE SHIFTS NORTHWARD...HURRICANE FORCE
WINDS OF 74 MPH OR GREATER COULD AFFECT SOME AREAS OF THE SOUTHERN
BIG ISLAND TUESDAY WITH MUCH GREATER DAMAGE POTENTIAL.

Ahhh damn. I remember how this works. I used to live on Guam and have ridden out my share of Supertyphoons and tropical storms. It's the "or greater" in the forecast that always comes back to bite you.

Preparing the farm was an all day job. Dozens of tools had to be stored away, rolling roofs locked down and light objects stashed. Laundry has to be caught up on and cars gassed up. This may all seem overboard, but having gone 6 days without gasoline, 17 days without water, 40 days without power and 6 months without cable after one storm on Guam, I'm not taking chances here.

I'm still not close to ready. This is a 60 year old farm with buildings that are sketchy at best. And the new house has yet to weather a storm so I'm not sure where the trouble spots are going to pop up. Keep your thoughts positive for all of us.

Oh yeah, and cross your fingers for the trees. We started picking coffee last week and there is a lot of ripe beans that will take the brunt of the wind.

The Season Approaches

It is the Final Days before the start of the harvest. The first of my picking crew has arrived. He is assisting with the suckering (removal of new growth) and prepping the field. I expect the rest my crew within 3-4 weeks and we should be picking in about a month.

From all accounts, it should be a bumper coffee crop this year. Five (5!!) flowerings in the spring have left the trees bent and breaking under all the coffee cherry. All over Kona, farmers are forgetting about last year's lean crop and excited about actually making money this year. It's a good feeling.

This should be a relaxing time, the last of the summer vacation. Instead, I feel like I'm on a slippery slope. There is the coffee mill refurbishment that is only half-way complete. The pulper is in pieces, bearings to be replaced, and the motors need reinstalling. The roof leaks on the Hoshidana (dry rack) and the darn foundation of posts and piers needs shoring up... a leftover from last October's earthquake.
And when am I going to have time to fix the pothole in the road that is about to swallow the farm truck?

But there is time. The projects never end. It is a farm after all. The mill will be ready. The road will get fixed. In the meantime, it's mango season and I must go pick some fruit. And the dogs are eating more ripe avocados than dog food this month, I can't forget to steal some from them for guacamole. And the lychee tree is fruiting too. Summer in Hawaii is good!

Winter Whales and Whatnot

No dust on me. Between the rain in the fields as I prune away old coffee growth to the saltwater rinseoff I take in evening, everything has been washed clean. Yes, a busy winter as usual, with little time to blog. But Spring is here!

Last night, while paddling with my outrigger club, Keoua, a humpback whale and her calf surfaced close to the boat. The whales spend winter with us, and this may be the last we see of them as they head off to Alaska for the summer. It's fantastic to be at eye level when they blow. A little humbling too, as their size and speed is deceptive from a distance.

The pruning season is a hopeful time, as we walk through the trees and watch the flowers turn into beans. The air is filled with the perfume of a million flowers and I compete for tree space with bees anxiously pollinating. This year, the early rains have been heavy and the trees are dense with beans. Large beans. Wait, is this just the end of March? We had our third round of coffee flowers two weeks ago. The oldtimer adage is a rule of 3, "three months from third flowering is picking time". That means (counts fingers...april...may..june..) June picking??!. That's two months early. Dang! Guess my 40th birthday may be spent with a basket around my neck as Gabriel and his picking crew won't be back until August.

Yes, 40 this year, my friends. To make me feel even older, I am going to be a step-grandparent. Here in Hawaii, young'uns are polite enough to call us oldsters "Auntie". So that's my word, and I'm sticking to it. Yes, I will be an Auntie to my partner's grandson, due to arrive last week. He's already right on "island time".

Some of you may be waiting for me to comment on the whole political mess about coffee labeling. I don't have it in me right now. To tired from too much real farmwork. Needless to say, I sleep well at night. Don't know how some other people do, what with all the bullshit they pass off as "truth in labeling". But that's all I'm going to say on that. For now.

Big News about Bad Coffee

Whooohoooo! A small step forward in the fight against deceitful labeling on Kona 10% Blends was achieved this week. Our Hawaii County Council passed Resolution 18-06 stating that coffee blends should have at least 75% Kona in the bag to wear the Kona label. That's a nice step up from the 10% currently mandated by the State Legislature.

Many of you have read my discussions on blends before. They are a blight to Kona coffee name and a ripoff to the consumer. In the long run, they harm the farmer because they devalue the Kona brand. The only way we can compete against third world coffee practices (cheap land and labor) is by maintaining the excellent name and quality of Kona coffee. Blends of 10% Kona and 90% mystery beans labeled as "Kona Coffee" put out a bad cup and tarnish our image.

The Resolution will be passed on to the State Legislature, which will hopefully provide more ammunition for the next level. We need a law, not just a resolution. We have lost in the Legislature before because of the lobby money that flows from the Big Blenders. We're not going to stop fighting this issue though. For the farmers, our survival depends on it. The Big Blenders and their Mainland money don't seem to care if they devalue our brand to the point of economic collapse. They will go back to the Mainland. For the hundreds of farmers who live and eat on coffee, this issue is vital.

A big MAHALO NUI LOA to the County Council!

News on this issue:
Kona Coffee Farmers press release
Honolulu Advertiser
Pacific Business News

Back to the Regularly Scheduled Coffee Season

Excitement's over folks, back to work.

It's a mild coffee season here in Kona. Not terribly bad, but nowhere near good. I'm hitting my biggest round right now. The beans are beautiful, huge and very very ripe coming off the trees. Should be tasty coffee. The downside is that I'll just have one more small round in November and should be done by early December. My guess is that I'll be down about 50% from last year's bumper yield. I'm hearing similar reports from some other farms.

The wholesale price is at $1.25 per pound cherry (30 days net). Still not great, nor livable. Usually a poor year bumps prices. Since it's not, I'm not selling any cherry. Instead, I am processing every single bean I can fit onto my hoshidana. With the scarcity, the price for parchment (dried coffee) should rise in the offseason. It's called "value-added", and it's how the modern farmgirl survives.

Selling roasted coffee is the ultimate value-added move. Glad I took that Econ course in college.