Response of vegetation to coffee pulp addition

Applying nutrient-rich agricultural by-products, such as fruit peels and pulp, to degraded land has been proposed as a strategy to overcome a number of barriers to tropical forest recovery. While such linkages between agroindustry and restoration represent win-win scenarios, practical applications remain largely unexplored. In this case study, we tested coffee pulp as an amendment to catalyze forest succession on post-agricultural land in southern Costa Rica.

A 0.5-m-deep layer of coffee pulp was deposited across a 35 × 40-m area and an adjacent similar-sized control plot (no coffee pulp addition) was delineated. Over two years, we measured changes in soil nutrients, ground cover, understory vegetation, tree establishment, and canopy cover across both coffee pulp and control treatments.

Our results show that soil carbon, nitrogen, phosphorous were significantly elevated in the coffee pulp compared to control treatment after two years. Coffee pulp addition significantly altered the...