Two Leaves And A Bud

125 years ago the vast t growing areas of India were covered in jungle 85 years ago the same was true of salon today future tea lands are being carved out of the East African jungle but the transformation of jungle into an estate of maturity is a long costly business like fighting a wall first a caring must be made by the advance troops wielding their fangers they hack a passage foot 5 foot through the dense undergrowth then in the wake of the pangas comes an army of sharp axes and strong tireless arms caring is done at the beginning of the dry season when operations will not be hampered by the ring this also gives time for tropical decay to rot down the cut jungle bro but Deadwood may promote the growth of fungal diseases in future tea bushes so all stumps and trunks are moved right out of the caring T will not grow on alkaline or badly drained soil the best soil is a medium loam deep porous tribal and acids virgin jungle and has all these characteristics and wealth of humors and plant food the accumulated fertility of centuries which the jungle growth has carefully protected from the weathering effects of Sun wind and rain why the land is still being cured the most important task is to select a site for a nursery this must be close to a perennial source of water where the land is flat and shuttered the first task is to dig the nursery beds to a depth of about 2 feet removing all stones and roots then a lattice roof of bamboo is built this will be overlaid with green thumb to protect future plans from the scorching Sun but one of the future plans let's take a look at them right from the beginning phone tea bushes originated from an evergreen tropical tree belonging to the camellia family after the tree has flowered small green nuts or seeds form this flowering and seeding takes place on bushes which are allowed to grow unchecked into trees 15 or 20 feet high a big estate has a number of these trees forming a seed garden collecting the Fallen seed is a task which provides the local children with pocket money after being sorted and graded the finalists selected seed is placed on prepared germination beds these beds consists of a layer of clean sand which contains no plant food of any kind the Seas contains within itself enough food for the period of germination all it requires is to be kept constantly damn warm and protected from the Sun by some form of shade meanwhile in the nursery beds are being prepared for the seed with this board a uniform planting distance is guaranteed and will make easier the future task of transplanting after three weeks the seed has germinated and is ready for planting each tea distaste crack downwards to ensure that the tiny roots will grow straight and strong within a few months their earth becomes a pattern of healthy plants during their life in the nursery they must be well cared for weeding watering and shading being the three indispensable in many nurseries from the north of India to Kenya plants are growing up from country to country even from district to district the details of nursery practice vary according to local climates and conditions but the essentials and the end in view are exactly the same after one to two and a half years in the nursery beds the plants are ready for removal to the gardens in this salon nursery the plants are being taken from the beds biomechanical transplanter by this method the plant and the earth around it are removed in one piece leaving the root system completely undisturbed the metal cup also protects the delicate roots from any damage during the transplanting and will be removed when the plant reaches its new home in this way thousands of the young plants are taken by the coolest to the new carryings out on the estates in Darjeeling tucked away in the foothills of the Himalayas a different method of transplanting is being used perhaps this was the forerunner of the mechanical transplanter the idea of leaving the roots undisturbed is certainly the same although here the plant must be first forked loose from its bed while the plants are being removed from the nursery lining is done in the new carryings as here in kina this determines the exact position for each plant so that the men doing the howling know exactly where to date the plants being used on this caring have been stumped cut 4 inches above ground level before leaving the nursery for really large scale planting this is perhaps the most economical method and from the very beginning it encourages push shaped curve just behind the planters some other workers with bundles of firms these provide both shade and protection against accidental damage for the barely visible star but shade is the chief purpose for the plants would quickly die if left exposed to the Sun the young plants are taking roots in their final home where they will grow to maturity and bedding and remain the full span of their lives perhaps more than half a century but they will never reach maturity and there's a great deal of care is given to their upbringing constant reading is ultra and tea growing is no exception by using hose not only are the weeds suppressed and removed but the soil is aerated and kept in a good state of tinted later in life the spread of the plants will itself help to suppress the weeds and it's to encourage this spread into a bush that pruning is carried out about a year are two going into the garden has dumped plants will be ready for its first up ruining this means that the plant is pruned normally three times had successively higher levels until it's brought to plucking gwenna bush has been in bearing for a few years it becomes necessary to reverse the procedure and down kunitz there are many different pruning systems each one suiting the elevation of the land and particular climatic conditions wherever the location however every bush must at some time received a heavier treatments in the form of a clean room all pruning whatever system is used aims at making the bush spread outwards rather than grow tree like upwards several months after putting a new canopy of foliage has grown on the bush a level and regular upper foliage is achieved fight tipping an operation repeated several times over a period of two to three months the girl is tipped to the height of a notch on their canes and every stalk tipped will form a future packing points eventually this forms the widest possible tracking surface the table T was originally a jungle plants growing in a highly fertile soil under the protective shade of heavy forest it is therefore in the interests of plants and soil to create sneah jungle conditions by a systematic policy of growing shade trees these trees must provide good shade and a heavy leaf for and both features are stimulated by frequent locking all leave whether it falls naturally or comes from lopping goes back to the soil is green manana but the trees can never supply all the green material required and are supplemented by Bush and shrugged a humanist plants growing between the rows of teeth these yield enormous quantities of Lawtons every year lawtons rich in nitrogen which form an evenly distributed covering of green manure on response from yard manure is also used to replenish the tumors content of the soil although planters usually find it difficult to obtain and in most t growing areas conditions are unfavorable to cattle ranching in kenya however this unusual combination has been quite successful the herd supplying milk and meat for the workers in addition to the valuable manure of the bushes but menorahs alone are never enough to maintain the capital value of the hard work soil and commercial fertilizers must be judiciously used especially during the vital periods of the bushes life all the tea growing areas of the world are tropical or subtropical with a high annual rainfall wet and warm the scribes of bad cup of tea and a good tea drain climbers at high altitudes such as Darjeeling and some parts of salon the team with the most characteristic favor is grown at these altitudes the air is cooler which retards leaf growth and improves its although consequently yield is less than on the planet unfortunately missed is common in the humid atmosphere of the tea growing district and in mist lurk the spores of various blights which must be vigorously fought there are many different kinds of flights and insects which ravaged leaves stems woods and groups of tea bushes to assist the plant of addys problem there are a number of research stations typical of them being the one in Korea Kenya in addition to the study of pests and diseases and evolving means of combating them these establishments cover every aspect of tea cultivation and conduct research into improving both the yield of bushes and the final quality of the tea perhaps the answers to many of these problems will eventually be found in the propagation of tea by vegetative means for this work bushes which are better than their neighbours in growth yield and resistance to disease are selected as the mother bushes each one will supply from 200 to 500 cuttings tea growing from seed does not produce progeny with anything like the same characteristics as the parent seed banner with vegetative propagation on the other hand each cutting is a progeny of a particular Bush all the virtues of the bush are fixed in the cutting there is still much to be learnt about vegetative propagation but already it has proved itself superior in many ways to growing from seed the conservation of tea is responsible for many headaches but a day dawns some five years after the plants went into the garden which repays form the bushes are ready for plucking in full flush at the planter faucet as the Sun climbs out over thousands of acres of tea growing country the pluckers leave their villages and make for the field to be harvested in the anomalous South India the little ritual precedes work perhaps the prayer is to the god of fertility perhaps to Dhamma who legend says discovered T by chewing the leaf during a 7-yard sleepless vigil thus the harvest is reaped lines of flutters moving across a table of tea tea growing on the gentle slopes of South India the high steep sometimes almost vertical hillsides of salon and Darjeeling and the plane light gardens of a Sam and East Africa a skilled army about their business for plucking is a skilled operation upon which depends not only the quality of the black tea but the future yield and health of the bush it's a disturbance of nature's order of growth inducing the bush to flash more rapidly than it would have left uncocks almost a light form of pruning light waves of locusts intelligent locusts sustaining ball that the tenderest roots the platters moved ever forward it's an army of quick discerning eyes and nimble discriminating fingers schooled to gather the golden flush to leaves and the pod friend kessian and brought skits are full it's time for women's as the leaf is weighed the girls do some quick mental arithmetic conversing weights into furnaces in a day a girl may pluck 30,000 troops some 40 pounds of green leaf which will become ten tons of black tea at a guess enough leaf is plucked throughout the world every year to make some two thousand million tons of manufactured teeth a fairly high yielding bush contributing some pay taxes towards the turtle now the leaf starts its journey from wayne shed to factory many contrasting means are used for transporting it by Surefoot attorney on the twisting narrow Hill Tracts darjeeling by arielle rough way over the switchback hills of south india by Lahti on the flat roads of kenya each method is best suited for the geography of the country throughout the day throughout the year at constant shuttle service feeds an endless supply of green leaf into many factories on arrival at the factory the lead goes up to the withering lot with as little delay as possible one method for doing this to the flower this is situated alongside the unloading bay and the lead fed into it is blown along a shoots nonstop to the withering locked in the loft the leaf will drive slowly for anything up to 24 hours spread out on the tats it will lose around forty percent of its waves by the evaporation of moisture and eventually be ready for rolling rolling ruptures the neap cells setting for you the staff and juices and starting the important process of fermentation which will continue for a few hours fermentation is finally arrested in the drying or firing machine car a current of very hot air reduces moisture in the leaf to almost nil below the machine the familiar black tea collects fresh warm and aromatic various sized screens remove stalk and sort the dried leaf into different grades trades with names like broken orange pekoe flower a broken or inspector frozen orange pekoe Fanning's in chests the tea is now ready for the far away unknown destination leaving the factory it may start the journey by overhead rough way for by Lahti it goes to the railhead then to a distant city of a domestic consumption or a port for sure promised Sam t comes all the way to Calcutta by River some of its will supply the people of North India but the bulk of it is for other Latin ambassador and colombo chests are going aboard ship on every time mooring that part is left and modern Clippers set course for the tea drinking countries of the world