Tea picking technical process

Picking properly increases productivity, product quality and helps the tea plant grow healthily and sustainably. Tea bud yield is closely related to the number of leaves on the plant. With the characteristics of the tea plant, each bud is born from one leaf axil, so many leaves have many buds, high yield. Therefore, picking buds and leaving leaves is closely related to tea yield.

1. The importance of harvesting techniques.

Tea buds are the final product of cultivation and also the starting material for the processing process, so the quantity of buds and bud yield are the concerns of the harvester, while the quality of raw materials, bud grades and bud standards are related to the finished tea after processing.

Picking with the right technique increases productivity, product quality and helps the tea plant grow healthy and sustainably.

Tea bud yield is closely related to the number of leaves on the tree. With the characteristics of the tea plant, each bud is born from one leaf axil, so many leaves have many buds, high yield. Therefore, picking buds and leaving leaves are closely related to tea yield.

Annual bud picking accounts for 60% of tea labor, so having a reasonable harvesting method not only regulates the growth of tea plants, increases productivity and bud quality, but also increases the efficiency of harvesting labor.

2. Picking principles

To meet the requirements of reasonable harvesting, it is necessary to follow the principles:

+ Balance picking and leaving, ensure increasing the number of batches, increasing productivity while ensuring the coefficient of leaves left and the growth of the tree (reasonable picking and leaving principle)

+ Based on the characteristics of each variety, based on the growth status of the tree in each hill, based on the quality requirements of the finished tea to determine the picking grade for each type of yield, do not pick too old or too young (principle of picking at the right grade)

3. Tea picking techniques.

In picking techniques, the two main steps are the technique of leaving buds and the technique of harvesting buds.

3.1. Spare techniques: There are the following forms of sparing:

+ Leave according to the season: Spring crop (March-April) leave 1 fish leaf + 2 real leaves, create a flat canopy. The shoots that are higher than the canopy surface are picked close to the fish leaves.

Summer-autumn crop (May-October): Leave 1 fish leaf + 1 real leaf, create a flat canopy. The shoots that are higher than the canopy surface are picked close to the fish leaves.

Winter crop (November-December): Leave fish leaves in November, and fish leaves in December.

+ Leave according to the growth status of the tea plantation.

Leave less for good growth tea plantations, leave more for bad growth – Leave more for low-cut tea plantations than for high-cut tea plantations. In areas with high humidity, well-grown tea plantations with the ability to actively irrigate can apply leaving from the beginning of the season with a height of 10 – 15 cm from the cut, depending on the cutting frame, then continuously pick without leaving.

3.2. Bud harvesting technique: Based on processing requirements, there are the following bud harvesting methods:

+ Picking whole bud: In Vietnam, this method has not been applied yet, but some countries that process specialty tea have applied it.

+ Picking 1 bud + 1 leaf.

+ Picking 1 bud + 1.2 leaves.

+ Picking 1 bud + 2 leaves.

+ Picking 1 bud + 2.3 leaves.

+ Picking 1 bud + 3 leaves.

+ Picking old tea (usually harvesting white leaves, late-season tea is rarely used)

Different picking methods give raw buds of different lengths and make the maturity of the buds different. However, the maturity of the buds is also determined by the ratio of young and old. Therefore, in the classification of fresh tea buds, there are regulations on the maturity level and the bud grading standards as follows:

Tea bud standards:

Type 1 tea: (A tea): Contains 0 – 10% old, young leaves.
Type 2: (B tea): Contains 10 – 20% old, young leaves.
Type 3: (C tea): Contains 20 – 30% old, young leaves.
Type 4: (D tea): Contains 30 – 40% old, young leaves.

Determine the percentage of young leaves by pressing and weighing.

Based on reasonable bud spacing and ensuring the quality of buds, the picking technique is specifically applied to different types of tea ages as follows:

3.4. Tea picking for production and business:

Picking every 7-10 days/batch when there are 30% of buds meeting the standards on the canopy surface.

In areas where tea grows well and water is actively provided, it is possible to apply the method of picking according to the growth status of the tea plantation (some tea companies such as Van Hung and Doan Hung have applied the method of picking according to the pruning as follows).

Pruning 60 – 65cm: Picking at the beginning of the season, 15cm from the pruning mark.

Pruning 65 – 75cm: Picking at the beginning of the season, 10cm from the pruning mark.

Pruning >75cm: Picking at the end, 7-10cm from the pruning mark.

This method ensures leaf coefficient from the beginning of the season, picking is easier than picking according to the season, and tea growth is good for young tea materials. However, we would like to emphasize that this method is only suitable for tea plantations that are actively irrigated or areas with high humidity and good tea growth.

3.5. Picking recovery tea: Tea is painful to cut, young cut tea is picked like KTCB tea at age 1,2.