How to Seed Coffee Beans

Coffee beans bring aromatic delight.

Imagine the delight of brewing a pot of coffee from beans you grew from seed. Use ripe coffee cherries or green coffee beans for the seeding process. Devote your time and attention to preparing the seeds for germination, handling your coffee seeds appropriately and planting them in correct soil conditions. With time, perseverance and patience, you may experience the satisfaction of roasting, brewing and drinking home-grown coffee beans.

Things You'll Need

• Ripe coffee cherries or green coffee beans
• Sand or vermiculite
• 6-inch pots

Instructions

1. Buy green coffee beans from recent crops and shipments. Select beans as equal in size as possible and of even, bright color, if Arabica beans. Look for signs of a live seed---an embryo at or near the crease in the bean.

2. Soak the seeds in water for 24 hours to pre-germinate them. Handle the soaked seeds carefully as you plant them.

3. Plant each seed in its own 6-inch plant pot. Plant the seeds 1 1/2 inches deep in wet, drained vermiculite. Place the seeds with creased sides facing down.

4. Maintain even soil moisture without over-watering. Keep the soil lightly packed with moisture-holding moss or mulched grass. Remove the top covering when seeds germinate in approximately 10 days.

Tips & Warnings

• Germinate fresh seeds in about two and a half months. Old seeds may take up to six months to germinate.

• Germinate and plant seeds indoors with artificial lighting unless you live in a tropical region.

• Identify a germinated coffee seed by the hypocotyl, a short root-like protuberance emerging from one end of the seed that will become the root.

• Coffee seeds become small plants in about four months.

References

• CoffeeResearch.org: Growing Coffee Beans at Home
• Sweet Maria's: Growing Coffee Arabica at Home
• Ohio State University Extension: Germination and Seedling Growth of Coffea arabica L. Seeds

Resources

• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations: Coffee Glossary