I leap with excitement each time I see a new video of yours in my sub box! Thank you for the on the ground tea farming information, and an even bigger thank you for your pressing of the 2018 Tian Xiang. It is far and away the best young puerh I have ever had the pleasure of trying! The honey grape aroma and huigan are one of the most pleasing puerh experiences I've had. I can't wait to try your Laos cakes and grab samples, or maybe stretch to a whole cake, of some of your ancient tea garden pressings. If the gushu material has any thickness, aroma and flavour like the Tian Xiang I need a cake and I need it now!
Hi, could you please give more detailed insight about the harvesting periods and calling it spring / autumb flush? Are these flushes that are mixed from eg 3-4 flushes during a month or two? What is done with the leaves from the rest of the flushes to keep the plants yielding properly? Thx
I really enjoy your videos! They are very complete, interesting and informative. Do tea plantations experience occasional freezing temperatures (0 C or lower) during dormancy in certain Yunnan areas?
Thanks! The tea trees do experience freezing occasionally, it can kill them if it lasts for too long. Assamica is more sensitive to frost than Sinensis. This is one of the most common way of dying for the tea trees at high altitude.
Great information! You explained a couple of things about the flushing cycle that had eluded me. Btw, does it ever freeze where you are? Unlikely that it does but I was curious what, if anything, farmers do to protect the plants during cold snaps. Thanks!
so you are saying that Darjeeling First Flush doesn't necessarily mean it's really current year's first leaves? Because that's contrary to what you can read pretty much everywhere else. I'd be grateful if you could elaborate a bit on that subject. Do you mean all Darjeeling, not just lower elevaltion gardens, which are mostly assamica variety? Also thanks for another great video!
From what I get, first flush darjeeling is made from early March to early May, that's what we'd refer to as the 'early spring season' in Yunnan. The exact dates vary depending on the years, but you could say that's the first two months after the dormancy. In such a timescale, the tea tree has to sprout several times, especially when it's pruned wit a picking table and fertilized. Second Flush Darjeeling is the equivalent of 'Summer tea' in Yunnan, harvested from June to August and then the Autumn Flush from October to November, you can also count an 'in-between' flush in June and a 'monsoon flush' in September. I have failed to find a source mentioning explicitly how many times the tea trees are picked but it sounds hard to believe that their young, heavily pruned, usually fertilized tea trees grow at the same rate as our big, unfertilized and rarely pruned ancient tea trees. Plantation tea in Yunnan is harvested dozens of time per year, typically once every ten days in Pu'Er area. It'd be very interesting to read more about this subject, feel free to share any source you have. Thanks for watching!
great video! a bit late of a comment - but I'm wondering if you could tell me more about why the summer tea is of lesser quality / cheaper than spring and autumn tea. I actually have a big bag of summer maocha from nanben laozhai I got when I visited the village this summer - I find it is fine tea for daily drinking, but definitely flat in taste and with very little chaqi. Is it mostly just a factor of the weather?
Summer tea has a weak taste because of the heavy rainfall which changes how tea grows: the leaves will be less tender and will build up less polyphenols. This is probably a change in the tree's strategy of protection against the pest and disease. After the rain, nutrients are more easily available and the tea has the resources to grow thick leaves that won't be palatable to most pest. During the dry conditions of early Spring, it will have plenty of sunlight but not much nutirents from the soil, it will therefore prefer to build chemical defenses like polyphenols instead of thick leaves. This is only a hypothesis though...
