Check out the Union of Concerned Scientists Website

I recently got an email referral from a friend I’ve known for about 8 or 9 years who knows we are an Organic Coffee Farm (he even buys our coffee!)... Genetically Engineered Crops is something most of us has heard about.

Part of the email he forwarded to me read:

USDA Caves to Pressure: Second Chance to Protect Our Food
Dear UCS Activist,

Last fall the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) tried to rush through new regulations, including those relating to pharma crops--crops genetically engineered to produce pharmaceuticals and industrial chemicals. After thousands of letters from UCS activists and others, the USDA has been forced to reopen the public comment period.

UCS scientists and independent experts agree that if food crops such as corn and rice are engineered to produce drugs and other chemicals and grown outdoors, these substances are very likely to contaminate the food supply and pose serious human health and environmental risks for years to come.

This is your chance to tell the new administration that the USDA’s proposal will significantly weaken restrictions on pharma crops and threaten our nation’s food supply. We need stronger—not weaker—regulations for these dangerous crops!

I have clicked on the email link and was pleasantly surprised at what I found, and wanted to let the readers of this blog know about this resource as well.

At the website of Union of Concerned Scientists you will find easy to navigate topics that should concern most anyone, but is especially relevant to those of us in organic farming in Hawaii.





You can sign up for various newletters and alert feeds...

Coffee Can Be Good Medicine for Asthma, Bronchitis and Allergies!

According to the book Food Your Miracle Medicine by Jean Carper:

“To dilate bronchial tubes, try caffeine...For one thing, coffee drinkers appear to have less asthma. A major study of 72,284 Italians over age fifteen concluded that regular long-term use of coffee, presumably because of caffeine, both reduced the intensity of bronchial attacks and prevented their occurrence. In regular one-cup-a-day consumers, asthma odds dropped 5 percent; for two-cup-a-day drinkers, the odds fell 23 percent, and for drinkers of three or more cups, the risk went down 28 percent...The doctors said the caffeine in three cups of coffee had about the same bronchodilating effect as a standard dose of theophulline.”

The book continues to quote a study in the US by Harvard researcher Scott T. Weiss, M.D., that looked at over 20,000 Americans and found that:
“regular coffee drinkers had about one-third fewer asthma symptoms than non-coffee drinkers. Coffee drinkers were particularly less likely to suffer attacks of wheezing, as well as bronchitis and allergies.”


“One of the commonest and best reputed remedies of asthma is strong coffee” -- Dr. Hyde Salter, Edinburgh Medical Journal, 1859

So Where Are We Way Up on the Mountain??

This “aerial” photo is a set of several layers from some tax key maps and screenshots from Google Maps.
Way above us are the Rainforest Preserves. Right above us is the Sanctuary of Mana Ke’a Gardens
We outlined our plot in a light orange-yellow to help you find us.
The light squiggy yellow line curving its way down is our dirt road or coffee land road. It currently has no official name, that’s right we don’t have an official street address or rural route!

Way under us in a direct line is the City of Refuge.


When we give directions for people to visit, it is based on Mile Markers (along the main highway) and watching your odometer for tenths of miles.

First time visitors often get lost unless they will set their odometers at the bottom of our road and watch it carefully. Then a few correct turns and you are there. But as you can see from the map -- it is a fur stretch -- a bit more than 2 miles up from the bottom of the highway!

Happy Thanksgiving from the coffee farm and Dressing Recipe

I was just trying to remember where I had put my favorite Thanksgiving dressing recipe. Turns out it is in my recipe program (I use MacGourmet). And just in case you were looking to try a nice recipe, this one works very well whether for a pan of dressing or used to stuff the bird. Click here to download the recipe in PDF format.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

EVERYONE ENJOY THE HOLIDAY!

November 2008, We get more serious about the website

With the stock market going up and down like a butter churn and many businesses and industries having flat or slower than expected cash flow from flat or slower sales, we had already been adjusting and working on our websites on and off for several months.

It happened thru mostly a fluke that we ran into a website we had been to probably three years or a bit more before which made mention of an offer for Kona Coffee which used to come from this very farm. An email inquiry or two and we find our web optimization and marketing now being carefully considered and greatly assisted by Scott Supak...

"ta da:"


Scott has some common interests with us, like organic practices and sustainable living. He has even been to the farm here -- what kind of deja vu or voodoo is that?

We want to welcome Scott and we appreciate his help that's for certain.

You can take a break from our adventures (but be sure to come back!) and surf for a long time just following Scott's wide range of threads and the various sites he is involved directly or indirectly in -- perhaps the easiest to start with is the site named with his last name at Supak.com.

October 2008_A Sampling of Sunsets and Moon Shots At the Farm

I don’t know about you, but sunsets are something I look forward to, but I have to admit some days we completely forget to look. Occasionally we remember to grab a camera to preserve the picture.

Here are but a few of hundreds of sunsets and moon filled skies we have experienced here in Hawaii.... (right click and choose "view image" to see the full-size version of each picture).

September 2008_Aka Has A Birthday

We baked a small homemade cake for Aka, and although she had a long day she came by to share some of her birthday with us.




I can’t remember -- oh yes, now I do, you know those annoying little trick candles?



However, Aka took it as a divine sign she should get three wishes since the candles kept coming back, why didn’t I think of that when it happened to me?



Well we are into the party spirit now -- with package wrapping on our heads and into reading the birthday wishes on cards!



Looks like a successful party!

August 2008_We add gift wrap to our coffee options

Ric actually loves to gift wrap. We used to have a retail store in St. Louis Missouri and two of our peak periods were Christmas and Valentines. We would have customers come back year after year for the special customized gift wrapping.

You can order most any of our coffee products with gift wrapping -- even the automatic monthly shipments!

Here are a few examples of his work with gift wrapping coffee bags!

July 2008, What is so close to us -- Hokena Beach

We often work so hard we can forget we have a wonderful beach just about 15 minutes away from us.


Here we are July 7th -- with a very nice and relaxing spot.




Lot’s of people see the beach, but what about what is up higher? This is a view from way up in the caves looking out from the side of the mountain! It’s a steep climb up to these caves, and no specific trail, but very doable. Take your water and also a camera!


And what do the caves look like inside? Here Ric and I are in the middle of an inside fork.
As you can tell it is massive.


People actually can come and stay for $5 a person a night at this beach. It has its own outdoor shower for washing from swims, and then a complete bathroom with plenty of hot water. There are a nice number of camping sites some with barbecue pits. You just need to select a site and see a park attendant to pay your fee before it gets dark... Since we are about mile marker 105, it is just a two mile trip down our mountain, then from 105 to 101 and then maybe another 2 miles down to the beach. Along the way there is a nice local grocery store where you can stop and buy sandwiches and drinks if you want. Often times (unless we just pick up and go -- which can happen if we get rained out from work) we will make our own tuna sandwiches or spam musubis.


<<CLICK HERE To download this whole brochure about Hokena>>

June 21, 2008, Kona's First Annual Gay Pride Event

Another historical event, Kona does it’s first ever Gay Pride Parade and Fair. We spent a lot of time scurrying to get all our stuff in order to attend. We were invited right at the last moment and there was some confusion several times, not too difficult to imagine since this was the first ever time and they were doing everything from ground zero.

We were next to some realtors, not far from a health booth and across from the Pilagro for Mayor booth.

Here we are -- we were in a narrow slot with landscaping all around us.


Jerry came with and helped us with the pre-set up and set up, and he helped sell products during the expo.



Our menu so to speak...




We were visited by royalty..



The group poses -- very cute!



As usual, Jerry knows a lot of people!