Coffee and Carnivores

MANILA, Philippines - Though tiny, the Venus Flytrap looked murderous, its wide-open traps lined with long, sharp fangs.

Volker Heinrich pushed a stem into a trap, and the fangs closed instantly. No fly can survive that mean monster.

In the Pitcher Plant Farm in Malaybalay, Bukidnon, Heinrich has greenhouses full of the flytraps and other carnivorous plants, which can ensnare and devour everything from mosquitoes to rats. 

The farm is named after the most majestic of the plants. Heinrich says his largest pitcher plant can hold up to two liters of water and trap and digest a medium-sized rodent. He has developed varieties that thrive in the lowlands, including Metro Manila, and he ships his plants all over the country.

Heinrich, 42, is a horticultural scientist from Mainz in Germany, who left his country in 1998 to be with Filipina sociologist Janet Arnado from Cagayan de Oro. They met in 1997 when Heinrich was doing his doctorate in Mindanao, and now live with their children Samuel, 8, and Sophie, 4, in the one-hectare farm in Kalasungay, Malaybalay. The kids speak Cebuano, English, German, and a smattering of Tagalog.

The property, just outside the Mt. Kitanglad Range National Park, harnesses solar power for all its electricity needs. A hot shower in the Heinrich house and the two-bedroom cottage guesthouse must wait until the sun has been up for at least an hour.

North American pitcher plants

Massive terra cotta cisterns collect rainwater, which are piped throughout the property. Heinrich told me there is never a shortage of rainwater in Malaybalay, even during summer. Behind his house he has built an outdoor Jacuzzi that also uses rainwater heated by a solar-powered device he designed.

Nearby is a small mud oven where he bakes the whole wheat bread that’s available for continental, American or Filipino breakfast.

Malaybalay is cool enough to require no air conditioning in the two-story guesthouse, which has a fully equipped kitchenette and free Wi-Fi. A concert of crickets and night insects (with a dog’s howling the only jarring sound) lulled me to sleep, and the crowing of roosters and chirping of birds roused me at daybreak.

The overnight stay in the unique “garden resort” was one of the highlights of my recent visit to Malaybalay, a city lush with gardens and farms planted to cash crops, particularly pineapples, bananas, rice and sugarcane. Cattle bred in the area are renowned for yielding beef that is tender and succulent — qualities that have been attributed to a diet of pineapples.

YUM YUM: A Venus Flytrap senses an intruder… and instantly clamps shut.

Vineyards are visible along the scenic winding mountain road from Cagayan de Oro City, where the flight from Manila lands at the Lumbia Airport, to Malaybalay, although even locals admit that producing sweet, quality grapes in the area is a work in progress.

Bukidnon is also famous for its highland coffee. I went to Malaybalay, about 95 kilometers from Cagayan de Oro, mainly to see the Monastery of the Transfiguration in Barangay San Jose, where Benedictine monks grow my favorite brand of Philippine coffee, aptly named Monks’ Blend.

Benedictine monks from the Abbey of Montserrat in Barcelona, Spain, arrived in the Philippines in 1895 and took over missions in Mindanao from the Society of Jesus.

The Benedictines withdrew from Mindanao during the Philippine-American War, turning over their missions to the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart and relocating to Manila. But in 1981, the Abbey of Montserrat sent word that it wanted to set up a foundation in Mindanao.

The retired Rev. Eduardo Ma. Africa discussed this with Malaybalay Bishop Francisco Claver, who suggested two sites in Bukidnon that were offered by friends of the Benedictines. Africa inspected the two sites and picked the property in San Jose.

The king of the farm, the pitcher plant can devour a rodent and can grow large enough to hold up to two liters of water.

Construction of the monastery started in July 1982. It was blessed and inaugurated on Aug. 6, 1983, and became autonomous on Jan. 25, 1986.

Africa’s family was involved in the coffee business in Lipa, Batangas. He initiated the planting of coffee at the monastery in Malaybalay, in a plot that would eventually cover several hectares.

Shrubs bursting with green coffee beans lined an area just outside the pyramid-shaped house of worship, a masterpiece of the late National Artist Leandro Locsin. The monastery sits on a hill from where I watched the sun set over Malaybalay on a rainy Saturday.

The city, 622 meters above sea level, produces fine Robusta but the monastery buys Arabica coffee from other places in Mindanao for that unique monks’ blend. This was according to the Rev. Pachomius Ma. San Juan, OSB. Now in his 40s, he has spent most of his entire adult life at the monastery.

Apart from working in the coffee farm, the monks spend their days in contemplation, manual labor, spiritual reading, and prayer seven times a day, in accordance with the example set by St. Benedict. The monks also cultivate rice, peanuts, and another key crop in the region: corn. Bukidnon and Misamis Oriental are major producers of corn oil.

Benedictine monk Pachomius Ma. San Juan welcomes a guest to the Church of the Monastery of the Transfiguration.

The monks were selling their coffee only in the local market when a Belgian coffee expert, Emil Baenz, settled in Malaybalay and taught the monastery the art of roasting coffee and creating its own blend.

With a second-hand coffee roaster provided by Baenz, the monks began roasting in the 1990s. By 1995 they were selling their own blend of 100 percent high roast coffee, with no preservatives or additives. The returns were enough to allow the monastery to buy newer roasters from Germany, which could handle several tons of coffee beans, all sourced from Mindanao, per month.

Aromatic and with a strong flavor, Monks’ Blend premium coffee does not have the unpleasant acidic aftertaste that comes, I’ve been told, from wrong roasting of coffee in some other parts of the Philippines.

The Monastery of the Transfiguration is steward to 14 hectares of public forestland.

Those forests are endangered by illegal loggers, whose massive logs roared down the slopes and smashed into Cagayan de Oro a week before Christmas last year, leaving hundreds dead in the city and nearby Iligan.

The beauty of the forest, and Bukidnon’s tribal heritage, are still visible in Kaamulan Park, in the center of Malaybalay, where the traditional homes of the Manobos, Higaonon, Talaandig and other tribes are on display amid pines and other trees.

In the forests of Bukidnon, bird watchers can have a rare glimpse of the Philippine Eagle, hanging parakeets and owls.

At the Pitcher Plant Farm, an evening trek can lead to a rare treat for a visitor from Manila: fireflies. The sight is a memorable way to end the day in a city where visitors feel close to nature. Even when surrounded by carnivorous plants.

Cut flowers are among the products of Malaybalay, and adorn the entrance to the church.