Tonglu, Hangzhou: Busy Picking of Spring Tea Leaves

In the past few days, with the weather gradually getting warmer, the early spring tea in Tonglu County, Hangzhou City, China entered its plucking season, which brought tea farmers in townships, towns and sub-districts into busy tea picking.

Local villagers are picking spring tea leaves

Recently, taking advantage of the good weather, more than 40 tea pickers came early to the Yinkengyuan Tea Base of Xinhe Township for the first harvest of spring tea of this year. In the tea garden, as patches of tea trees sprout, tea pickers are carefully picking each tea leaf.

Spring scenery in the tea garden

While the tea pickers are busy picking tea leaves, Zhong Minghui, the general manager of Tonglu Xueshui Yunlv Tea Co., Ltd. who is in charge of the tea garden, is also busy checking the growing of tea. As he mentioned, "Wuniuzao", a kind of early tea species currently plucked in the tea base, is now in low production, with about 100 jin (50 kg) of fresh leaves harvested every day. If every 5 jin (2.5 kg) of fresh leaves is made into 1 jin (0.5 kg) of dried tea, only over 20 jin (10 kg) of dried tea can be produced every day. "Longjing 43, Xueshui Yunlv, White Tea, Golden Buds and other varieties will be picked around the end of this month, leading to a busy season in the whole tea garden."

It is reported that there is currently a total of more than 60,000 mu (around 40 square kilometers) of tea gardens in Tonglu County, with more than 50,000 mu (around 33.3 square kilometers) in production. Among them, tea gardens with new varieties cover more than 10,000 mu (around 6.7 square kilometers), mainly producing "Xueshui Yunlv" and other famous tea. In addition to Xinhe Township, tea gardens in Yaolin town, Fenshui Town, Baijiang Town and other townships, towns and sub-districts also began plucking.

Yao Fujun, a chief tea expert and senior agronomist in Tonglu County, said that thanks to the better weather and proper management of tea gardens, the quality and output of tea in Tonglu this year will be significantly improved than that of last year. (Text/Photo by Cai Meilan, Liu Jie and Deng Xiaozhong)