44 years ago, coffee was planted in the mountains to breed the legend of "Arabica" in Taitung.

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Forty-four years ago, a young man rode a Kawasaki motorcycle from Chiayi through the Nanhui Highway and rode 20 kilometers from Tai Ma Li to plant 50 Arabica coffee saplings. The former youth is now nearly 80 years old, and coffee has been naturally propagated and propagated. There are tens of thousands of offspring in Taitung.

Zhang Guanmiao, Zhang Zongqin and Zhang Hongdian father and son (from right) hold Arabica coffee beans and recall the story of growing coffee 44 years ago. (photo by reporter Huang Mingtang)

The "Arabica" coffee tree planted by Zhang Guanmiao 44 years ago in the mountains of Nanhui has produced countless offspring throughout Taitung. (photo by reporter Huang Mingtang)

The coffee industry in Taitung is booming. Arabica is one of the main varieties, and you can see it when you return to Longgu from the south. Zhang Guanmiao, 78, was at first a layman who ate "coffee fruit" raw, but he didn't expect that the coffee seedlings he brought in that year had blossomed everywhere in Taitung.

Zhang Guanmiao, a native of Chiayi, is engaged in the auto parts business. he rides a motorcycle to Taitung to do business every month. He is not frightened by the winding and rugged Nanhui Highway. Instead, he rides to an altitude of 800 meters and goes deep into the mountains. He reclaimed dozens of hectares of land near the "Yellow Hot Springs" on the banks of Jinlun Creek. Coffee is only a small part of planting fruit trees and afforestation.

Zhang Guanmiao said that he had never drunk coffee, but just happened that his cousin gave it to him and planted it. As a result, he picked ripe red fruit to eat. Later, his wife fried it in an iron pot and drank it. I still feel sour and miserable.

The fruit trees in the mountains were allowed to grow, and he continued to do his job, while the children came from Chiayi to help organize the orchards during the summer vacation. No one walked through dozens of hectares of land, and the rate of fruit harvesting was not as fast as that of monkeys and masked palm civet, and he almost forgot the existence of coffee trees.

It was not until more than 70 years ago, when Gukeng Coffee became famous, that the family realized that they also had coffee trees and decided to build a coffee kingdom, and both sons came to grow coffee after leaving the army. They found the coffee trees they planted that year and found them all around, so they dug up the seedlings and planted them. They bought another 16 hectares of land at the foot of the mountain and planted them in large quantities.

They also sent seedlings to others to plant, and some people came to dig them uninvited. Arabica thus expanded from the Jinlun Creek to the south back to the mountains, and then to the vertical valley.

Arabica, randomly planted by Zhang Guanmiao, was carried forward by his two sons, Zhang Zongqin and Zhang Hongdian, to create the brand "Ellangor" and to create a complete ecosystem with natural farming methods to produce diversified agricultural products, including coffee.

Arabica was originally planted in the mountainous area, but the road was blocked by the "August 8 typhoon." the Zhang family recently cut through difficulties and walked back and forth for seven hours from where they were accessible by car. They found only five coffee trees planted 44 years ago. Zhang and his son pruned a little, paid tribute to the old trees, and worshipped the land and mountain gods, appreciating the career foundation they laid for the Zhang family.

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