Botanical Description and Cultivation

Botanical Description and Cultivation

Camellia sinensis. The Tea plant. Properly speaking, tea is the beverage brewed from the leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant. Camellia sinensis is an evergreen tropical plant which can grow upto 10 meters in height in the wild. An average estate in India may have up to 56 million plants.

The Tea plants may be grown from seeds, which are usually hybrid seeds and also by means of vegetative propagation. Seed varieties are more robust, but may vary in uniformity of yield quality and behavior from plant to plant. Plants grown from vegetative propagation are more uniform and inherit all the characters of the mother plant. An average estate in India may have a nursery with 2-4 lac plants.

Tea prefers an acidic soil, with the soil ph in the range of 4.5 to 5.5. The soil must be well drained up to a depth of 1 meter. Some shade is useful to keep the leaf temperature low in very hot climate. The shades grown are evenly spaced and are of the leguminous variety, which help replenish nitrogen in the soil from atmosphere. Drains are laid and cut on contours after surveys to prevent soil erosion.

The tea plant is trained from the time of its planting to form into a dense shrub with a flat or slightly curved top surface which is also known as the harvestable surface. Up to 16000 plants can be planted in a hectare of land with a spacing of 100 cm X 60 cm X 60 cm. This population is denser than the vegetation of even the densest forests in the world. Ideally the foliage of plants intermingle in such a manner that it gives an impression of a thick green carpet like surface, through which direct sunlight cannot penetrate to the ground below. This prevents growth of weeds that may compete for nutrients with the Tea Plants. Until 3 years of age, the plants are categorized as Young Tea.

Harvesting of the leaves may be done with huge mechanical harvesters (Japan), by using shears or traditionally by hand. Hand plucked leaves are the best for making premium quality Tea, but shortage of and increase in cost of labor necessitates mechanical harvesting. Harvesting of leaves can be done at intervals of 7 days to 14 days. Proper control of harvesting rounds is essential to achieve a good quality harvest. Shorter rounds give lesser crop, better quality and lesser leaf per plucker. Pluckers are paid incentive on quantity of leaf plucked. This arrangement goes against the goal of harvesting a good quality crop.

Maintenance of the vast fields is an arduous task. Economical harvest can be obtained even from a 100 year old plantation if it has been properly maintained. Maintenance of a Tea Plantation requires an integrated pest management system, adequate drainage, scientific manuring, irrigation, Pruning, De-snagging, Hoeing, Forking, Shade maintenance and a highly trained and committed workforce to carry out these activities scientifically. A lot of physical labor is required to do these jobs. Physical fitness is of prime importance but malnutrition, alcohol and illiteracy are a hindrance