All coffee species are woody evergreens, but the plants range in size from small shrubs to trees more than 10 meters tall. All coffee trees consist of an upright main shoot (trunk) with primary, secondary and tertiary lateral branches.
Leaves vary in color from yellowish to dark green, with touches of bronze or purple. coffee leaves are generally thin, shiny and waxed, elliptical in form and conspicuously veined. They typically grow in pairs that are opposite to each other on the branch.
A study of the effect of shade on the growth and production of coffee in Ethiopia showed that the shade stimulated changes in the physiology of coffee plants, including increasing photosynthesis and adding leaf area indexes.
Thus, the coffee plantations under shade have a larger and heavier coffee production compared to those without shade. Shade also increases the dry matter of coffee fields, which means it plays a role in storing carbon stocks.
The white flowers appear in small bunches at the nodes. After pollination, a fruit develops into a cherry about 3/8 to 5/8 inch (10 to 15mm) long containing two seeds (the coffee beans). Technically, the flowers form on the one-year-old wood that is only slightly hardened.
The fruit of the coffee plant is typically described as a drupe: a fleshy, indehiscent fruit with a pericarp that is clearly differentiated into an exocarp, mesocarp and endocarp.
Coffee plants
