The Tea Plant: Growing and Harvesting

The tea plant is Camellia sinensis, an evergreen shrub of the same family as the camellias in our gardens. It has glossy, serrated leaves and, in autumn, small white flowers with a heart of yellow stamens. All true teas, from white to black, from oolong to pu erh, come from this plant; herbal and fruit infusions are made from other plants.

Two main varieties are grown. The sinensis variety, native to China, has small leaves, copes better with cold and is grown in China, Japan, Taiwan and on the hills of Darjeeling. The assamica variety, discovered in Assam in India, has large leaves, loves the humid heat of the tropics and gives strong, full-bodied black teas. Crossing the two has produced hundreds of cultivars, selected for climate, yield or aroma.

In the wild assamica can grow into a tree up to 20 metres tall; on a plantation, however, every bush is pruned to about a metre, forming a flat surface, the “plucking table”, which makes picking easy and pushes the plant to keep producing new shoots. Leaves are first picked in the third to fifth year, and a bush stays productive for more than fifty years.

Tea grows well between latitude 42° north and 31° south, where temperatures are mild and steady, around 18-20 °C, and rain is plentiful and spread through the year. The soil must be acidic, rich and above all well drained: the plant cannot stand waterlogging, which is why plantations are so often on slopes.

In the tropics tea is grown up to 2,500 metres above sea level. Higher up the plant grows more slowly, in the cool and the mist, and the leaves concentrate more aroma: that is why high-grown teas are among the most sought after. Sunlight has to be measured too: many plantations grow tall trees between the rows to filter the strongest rays, which would burn the essential oils that give the leaves their fragrance.

In tropical regions such as Sri Lanka, Kenya or Indonesia, tea is picked all year round. Where the seasons are marked, as in China, Japan or northern India, the plant rests in winter and is harvested in a few periods from spring to autumn: these are the flushes, and the first spring harvest is usually the most delicate and prized (more in our guide to Indian tea).

Only the youngest shoots at the tips of the branches are picked: the unopened bud and the leaves just below it. Their number sets the quality of the tea, and the more leaves are taken, the more ordinary the tea:

• imperial plucking: the bud and the first leaf;
• fine plucking: the bud and the first two leaves, the standard for quality teas;
• medium plucking: the bud and three leaves;
• the lower leaves, the fourth and fifth, older and tougher, are used for more rustic teas, such as some smoked teas and pu erh.

In India, Sri Lanka and China the best teas are still picked by hand: skilled pluckers choose the shoots one by one and gather tens of kilos a day. In Japan, where labour is expensive, and partly on the large estates of Kenya, machines that trim the plucking table are used instead.

As soon as they are picked, the leaves begin to wilt and, if they are bruised or rolled, to oxidise: the same reaction that turns a cut apple brown. The kind of tea depends on how this process is guided:

• white tea: the buds and youngest leaves are simply withered and then dried, barely handled;
• green tea: the leaves are heated straight away, in a pan in China or with steam in Japan, to stop oxidation, then rolled and dried;
• oolong tea: the leaves are only partly oxidised, for a shorter or longer time, before the process is stopped with heat;
• black tea: the leaves are withered, rolled and left to oxidise fully, then dried;
• pu erh: after processing the tea is aged for months or years, sometimes pressed into bricks, and changes with time like a wine.

Each family then has its own nuances and styles: you will find them in the main varieties of tea, while our guide to tea leaf grading explains the letters that show their quality.

Yes: Camellia sinensis grows well in Italy too, wherever the climate is mild and the soil acidic. At Sant'Andrea di Compito, near Lucca, a land of camellias, tea has been grown since the 1980s on one of Italy's first tea plantations. And the shores of Lake Maggiore, where Blend Tea is based, have been famous for their camellia gardens for over a century.

To grow one in a pot or in the garden you need compost for acid-loving plants, a spot in partial shade, regular watering with water low in lime and shelter from hard frosts. In spring you can pick the shoots and try making a little green tea at home, heating them briefly in a pan and letting them dry: it won't be a great tea, but it is a lovely way to discover how tea is born.