Experimental Honey Lot
Sakami Ranches Ltd is a family owned farming company established in 2004, engaged in coffee, macadamia, avocado, dairy, and vegetable production. It is co-owned by Gloria and Jarmo Gummerus. Sakami Coffee is a trademark for coffee produced at our farm in Trans Nzoia County, in western Kenya on the slopes of Mt. Elgon, at an altitude of 1800 meters.
The first coffee trees were planted in 2011, and since then we have been increasing the number of trees annually.
Currently, we have about 60,000 trees growing, youngest planted in spring 2018. We are growing Ruiru11, Batian, SL 28, and K7 varieties. All coffee is grown inter-cropped with macadamia trees. We have also a coffee nursery where we produce 10-100 thousand seedlings annually for our own use and for sale.
We dedicate our resources to grow the best possible coffee and secure the consistent quantity and quality during growing season up to the picking, pulping, fermenting, washing and drying. Our coffee has been cupping around 85-89 points.
Only fully ripe cherries are accepted for pulping, each cherry is hand picked by our dedicated women, up to over 100 during picking season.All this is done at our farm and only dry milling is so far done with commercial millers. In near future we intend to get dry milling equipment at our farm, so we’ll have 100% control of each green bean leaving the farm and can offer full growing and processing information for each bag.
Our whole estate is equipped with drip irrigation, using solar pumps and spring water for irrigation and washing.
Coffee is grown under the shades of Macadamia trees, which contributes to improving quality as the shade increases in the course of the coming years.
Coffee is fertilized mainly with the manure from our cows, goats, and sheep, a foliar spray is done on the farm from worm tea, which we produce ourselves from the worm castings and manure at our worm nursery. Worms are fed with pretreated cherry pulp, targeting as closed as a possible nutrient cycle within the farm. Washing water is used to irrigate forage for cows. Coffee pollination is done by wild African bees residing in beehives around the farm. We are also cooperating with our neighbors and are prepared to process and sell their coffee in case of larger quantities required than what we can produce at Sakami. The quality control will be done by us and only the ripe berries will be accepted for pulping, we would not take any parchment or green beans outside our farm, just to guarantee the quality of beans. We are open to process our coffee according to client requirement, be it fully washed sun-dried coffee, honey or natural processed.
Sakami Ranches Ltd has a growers export license, so we can sell directly to foreign buyers, and we can assist in logistics to get the consignment for shipping economically and secured to high seas.
Our directors are members of SCAA and Women in Coffee. We are ready to give more information about our coffee and the prospect of Mt Elgon region, and you are welcome to pay a visit to us at any time. Our website is still under construction but I hope it will be fully functional in a couple of weeks and the progress of activities at the farm can be followed through the website as the crop develops.
