This document provides information on tea production technology, including details about: - Tea's botanical classification as an evergreen shrub native to Southeast Asia. - Important tea growing regions like India, China, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia. - Tea varieties, soil and climate requirements, propagation methods, planting, pruning, and other cultivation practices. - Shade management using trees like silver oak and methods for weed control.

1. PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY OF TEA (Camellia sinensis)

2. INTRODUCTION
Common name : Tea
Botonical name : Camellia sinensis
Family : Camelliaceae
Origin : South-East Asia

3. CONT..
Tea known as “Queen of beverage crop”. Which is native of China in
south-East Asia. As on today 38 countries grow tea, among which India,
China, Sri lanka and Indonesia have major share in area and production.
India is a largest producer, consumer and exporter in tea
industry. The major tea growing states of India is Assam, West Bengal,
Tamil nadu, Kerala, Karnataka.

4. BOTONY
• Tea belongs to the genus camellia and family Camelliaceae/
Theaceae. The original spp. Which produce tea were Camellia
assamica (Assam jats), Camellia sinensis (China jats) and their natural
hybrids like Camellia assamica sub spp. Lasiocalyx (Indo china or
cambod type)
• Being a highly cross pollinated crop, the present day seedling
populations are mixture of both the above too spp., however from their
major share of characters Assam or china type can be distinguished by
the following characters

6. • Morphologically, tea is an evergreen shrub or tree, leaves are simple,
alternate, serrate, flower bisexual, with superior ovary, fruit is a capsule. A
tea plant will grow into a tree of up to 16 meters (52 ft) if left undisturbed,
but cultivated plants are pruned to waist height for ease of plucking.
• In tea leaves are commercially used for preparation of tea. It contains
caffeine, poly phenols (tannins) and essential oils. The compounds
responsible for color of tea are Theaflavin and thearufigens.

7. VARIETIES
Clonal selection from seedling population was taken up by UPASI, Tea
scientific department, chinchona and also by others tea research
institute .
The important features of the promising clones are as follows:

10. SOIL AND CLIMATE
• Tea mainly grows in tropical and sub-tropical climates. Nevertheless, some
varieties can also tolerate marine climates.
• Temperature may vary from 16-32 ̊C. Tea plants require at least 125-150 cm
of rainfall in a year.
• The atmospheric humidity should be 80% during most of the time. Very dry
atmosphere is not congenial for tea.
• It grows in plains of North-Eastern states but in south India it is grown in
hill ranges from 600-2200 m above mean sea level.
soil
• Tea is a calcifuge crop requiring comparatively low amounts of calcium but
high quantities of potassium and silicon. They can be grown in lateritic, and
alluvial and peaty soils. Optimum pH range is 4.5 to 5.0 and soil depth
should be 1.0 to 1.5 m.

11. PROPAGATION
• SEED
Tea can be propagated by seeds and by cuttings. Seed propagation is
seldom practice now. Seeds collected from the fruits of seed berries and are
soaked in water and only heavy seeds which sink are alone used for sowing in
beds. Germination occurs in 20 to 30 days, at that stage they are carefully
lifted and transplanted in polythene bags. They will be ready for planting in 9
months.
• VEGETATIVE PROPOGATION
Approximately 0.15 ha (1500 meter square) nursery area is required
to produce 1.25 lakhs cuttings. Nursery area is to be provided with overhead
shed by erecting concret or stone pillars at a spacing of 3X3 m and spread with
6 m meter square mesh double strand coir mate which provide about 67%
shade.

12. • The cuttings for rooting are collected from the mother bushes which are will
mentioned near the nursery area. Such mother bushes are pruned well in
advance to induce juvenile shoots this juvenile shoots are collected in the
morning hours and 3 cm long cuttings each with a healthy mother leaf and a
active axillary leaf is prepared. Cuttings from top tender and bottom brown
wood should be avoided. These cuttings are planted in polythene bags (30
cm X 10 cm X 150 cm gauge) filled with growing medium (jungle soil :
river sand 3:1) in the bottom and rooting medium (red/subsoil :sand 1:1) in
the top 8-10 cm .the soil used for rooting media should have an optimum pH
range of 4.8-5 ,if i.e ,5.1-5.5 or 5.6 to 6, it must be drenched with 1 or 2 %
Aluminium sulphate solution respectively at 1 liter /cubic ft of soil this
treatment should fallow with drenching of twice the volume of plane water
to wash excess aluminium sulphate .
the cuttings are carefully planted at the centre of the bag in such
way that the petiole should not touch the soil and then they are watered
callusing starts in 4-5 weeks and rooting occurs in 10-12 weeks .

14. PLANTING
• The land is cleared off the roots ,fallen trees and drainers are taken at
suitable intervals depending upon the slope to conserve the soil.in the
olden days ups and down system of planting at 1.2X1.2 m are
followed. Presently contour planting either in a single edge or double
edge system is followed .
• Contour planting double edge method as many advantages over the
other methods like early and high yield, better soil conservation, less
weed growth in the edge and efficient cultural practices.

16. • Planting season normally coincides with June or July or September /October for
S-W monsoon and N-E monsoon .pits of 30X30X45cm size are dug and plants of
12-15 months old are planted by removing the polythene bags.
AFTER CARE
Immediately after planting the soil surface around the plants should be
mulched .care must be taken to keep the mulch material away from the collar
region to prevent collar discharge.
SHADE AND ITS MANAGEMENT
Tea requires filtered shade and if it is exposed to direct sun its growth is
affected .shade is hence essential and beneficial to tea as follows:
It regulates the temperature.
It maintains the effects of drought and radiation injury.

17. It increases the soil fertility.
It helps in recycling of nutrients.
It helps in getting even distribution of light.
It serves as windbreak.
• In south India silver oak(Grevillea robusta) is used as the permanent shade tree as
it posses the desirable characters of a good shade tree.
• The seeds of silver oak are very light and fresh seeds are sown in the raised beds
in line at 5X2.5 cm spacing during December- January and covered with thin
layer of soil they germinate in 10-20 days when they develop first pair of leaves.
They are pricked and transplanted in the polythene bags and kept in shaded area.
shade is gradually removed to harden them, 6-9months old seedlings are ready for
planting.

18. • Silver oak seedlings are initially planted along with the tea rows at 6X6m spacing.
As and when they grow lower branches may be lifted periodically. when it attains
8-9m height the tree is pollardad at site having the girth of 10-15cm.Below the
pollardad site, one branch in each direction may be left in 3-4tires and the excess
ones are removed .
• Before every monsoon, the lateral branches, erect growing branches and shoot
growth in the main stem are removed. when they are about 10 years old, shade
trees are thinned out before pruning season by removing the alternate trees in East
–West rows.
• In mid elevation till silver oak seedlings grow, temporary shades are employed i,e
Indigofera teysmanni is normally planted at 3X3 spacing. They are removed once
silver oak trees get established.in frost prone areas instead of silver oak another
shade tree Viz., Seedlings of acacia mernsii are planted at 3X3m spacing and are
pollardad at 3m height. Being a shallow rooted and surface feeding tree, These
trees are replaced in once in two pruning cycle.

19. WEED CONTROL
Manual weeding is never recommended in tea because more soil erosion
and damage to surface roots and collar region .hence the following
chemical weed control is recommended in tea.
Type of Weeds Herbicides Dosage
Dicots paraquat 1.12lit/ha
Dicots Fernoxone 1.4lit/ha
Grasses Dalapon
Glyphosate
5.6lit/ha
3.2lit/ha

20. Training young tea
• In tea the young tea, when it has established well centering i.e removing the growing
point leaving 8-10 mature leaves from the bottom is done to induce secondaries.
When the secondaries reach more then 60 cm they are tipped at 50-55 cm height by
removing 3-4 leaves and bud to induce tertiaries. Therefore, plucking at mother leaf
stage is continued for better frame development. It takes nearly 18 to 20 months from
planting to reach regular plucking field stage .
PRUNING
Pruning is done in tea
 To maintain the convenient height for plucking.
 To induce more vegetative growth.
 To remove dead and defunct wood.
 To remove the knots and interlaced branches. pruning is normally done 4 to 6 years
interval depending upon the altitude of the garden.

21. The bushes marked for pruning should have adequate starch reserves in roots
otherwise the sprouting following pruning will be less. This can be normally
tested by the common iodine test and if the starch reserve in less bushes are
allowed to rest for 2-3 months.
The different types of pruning are as follows:

22. Immediately after the rejuvenation or hard pruning, the cuts ends are removed
with a paste made of copper oxychloride and linseed oil (1:1). The pruned
bushes are given washing with 10% lime solution using No. iv nozzle of power
sprayers in order to kill the epiphytic growth of moss and lichens so as to induce
easily and even bud break. Lime washing also minimises sun scorch to the bush
frame.

23. The buds from the pruned shoots grow in a steady succession without any
cessation of growth. These are known as a periodic shoots or primary shoots.
These primary shoots should be induced to produce flush shoots,
otherwise known as periodic shoots by regular tipping operation. Tipping is the
removal of terminal portion of the shoot and it varies with jats and pruning height
as given below. Tipping height refers to the number of leaves that must be left
above the pruned cut while tipping in material refers to that portion of the
terminal shoot which must be tipped off.
Periodic shoot in tea

24. Pruning height (cm)
China hybrid assam hybrid
Tipping height (cm)
China hybrid assam hybrid
Tipping in material
China hybrid assam hybrid
35-45 35-55 5 4 3 leaves and 4 leaves
and
a bud a bud
45-55 55-60 4 3 4 leaves and 4 leaves
and
a bud a bud
55-75 60-75 2 2 4 leaves and 4 leaves
and
a bud a bud
_ >75 _ 1 _ 4 leaves and
a bud

25. MANURING
• Manuring to the tea in the field depends on many factors viz., young
or mature tea, organic and nutrient status of the soil, soil pH, nature of
pruning and yield potential of the tea bushes.
N:P:K- 160:80:160 kg/ ha
• Nitrogen : the following rates of application is suggested for every
100 kg of made tea anticipated.
Yield level (kg/ha) Rate of nitrogen (for 100 kg of
made tea)
No of split application
<3000 10 kg 4
3000 8 kg 5
3000 and above 9 kg 6

26. • 20% of the total nitrogen is given in the form of Ammonium sulphate during
March /April . Urea is recommended in May/June and receding monsoon
months avoiding very wet and dry periods and it will come to 65% of total
nitrogen 15% of the total nitrogen is applied in the form of CAN( Calcium
Ammonium Nitrite) during pre-winter (Nov-Dec).
• Phosphorous : this nutrient is applied once in alternate years @ 90 kg P2O5/ha
for fields yielding less than 3000- 4500 kg/ha. For field yielding between 3000-
4500 kg, 60 to 80 kg P2O4 / ha is recommended every year. For very high
yielding fields (>4500 kg/ha) 80 to 100 kg P2O4/ha is suggested every year.
The fertilizer should be placed at 15-22 cm depth.
• Potassium : nitrogen and potassium are always applied together N K ratio of1:!
Is used for plucking fields while for pruned field 2:3 N K ratio is recommended
for rejuvenation pruned field 1:2 NK ratio is suggested . The enhanced rayes of
application in the pruned years is to encourage formation of healthy frames .
Murte of potash (MOP) is the source of potassium used in tea field.

27. • Micronutrients : among the nutrients Zinc deficiency is often manifested in young
shoots characterized by reduced leaf size, resetting chlorosis and formation of more
banjii shoots .
application of Zinc Sulphate @6-8 kg/ha for high yielding fields every
year. The above quality can be given in 4- 5 split applications during the high
copping months i.e April/ May and Sep/ Oct.
• Liming : in the hill soil due to leaching of bases by rain and also due to the
incessant application of acid forming fertilizers, the soil pH is often reduced, which
affects the physical and chemical properties of soil.
calcium carbonate and dolomite lime (calcium magnesium carbonate)
are generally recommended for tea soils roughly
lime @1.5mt/ha pH 4.5-4.9
@3.0mt/ha pH 4.0- 4.4
@4.0mt/ha pH < 4
The lime is applied by evenly broadcasting prior to pruning once in a pruning cycle.
Frist manuring following liming can be had after 6 weeks and a minimum of 15 cm
rainfall should have been received during this period.

28. PLUCKING
• Plucking consists of harvesting 2-3 leaves and a bud. It is most labor
intensive operation in a tea industry and also decides the yield and
quality of made tea. Normally a pluckable shoots takes 60 to 90 days
for harvesting since its sprouting from the axillary buds.
• When the shoot is plucked up to mother leaf it is known as light
plucking and if it is plucked below mother leaf, it is called hard
plucking
The plucking interval and plucking standers in relation to cropping is
given below:

29. Cropping pattern Months Plucking interval
1. High cropping or rush cropping
(60% of total crop)
April-June & Oct-Dec 7- 10 days
2. Low cropping or lean cropping
( 40% of total crop)
July-Sep & Jan- march 12-15days
It is essential to add one tiers of active maintains foliage to the bush every
year. This is done by mother leaf plucking during Jan –march. During the
rest of the period, level plucking can be carried out.

30. Consequent to plucking, bush height increases every year in the
order of 10 cm over tipping height in the first year 7.5 cm, 7.5 cm , 5 cm and
5 cm over the previous year height in the second, third fourth and fifth year
respectively.
in some places a scissor loke mechanical shear harvester is employed
to pluck during the high cropping period it helps to manage the high crop
and overcome labour scarcity.
YIELD
2000 kg of made tea / ha – Low yield
2000 kg - 3000 kg of made tea / ha- medium yield
3000 kg and above made tea / ha – high yield

31. PROCESSING OF TEA
Manufacturing of tea :
basically, there are two types of processing Viz.,
1. orthodox method
2. CTC method
1) Orthodox method :
In which the rolling operation is done in a series of
rollers . The rollers have rotary tables with battens, jackets for loading the leaf
and pressure cup.
2) CTC method : (cutting, tearing and cutting)
which has a CTC machine consisting of series of a
pair of rollers mounted in such a way they rotate in a opposite directions and
the clearance between them is so adjusted to crush and tear the leaves.
Irrespective of the method manufacturing of tea involves the following steps.

33. 1. WITHERING
The objective of withering is to reduce the moisture content of the
leaves by spreading them in troughs which receive artificial air from fan
fitted on one end. At the end of withering the leaves attain a flaccid
condition for which it may take 12 to 18 hours depending upon the
weather condition.

34. 2. ROLLING
This operation is carried on by series of machine or in a single roller, during
which the cells in the leaves are broken to liberate the sap containing the
Polyphenol Oxidase an enzyme , which in the presence of oxygen oxidases
the polyphenols to produce Theaflavins and Thearufugines . These are
responsible for colouring of tea and is a prerequisite for next process Viz.,
fermentation , rolling takes place for 30- 40 min . Afterwards the fine sifted
rolled once are sent for fermentation while the course ones are again sent for
rolling.

35. 3. FERMENTATION
Rolled tea material are either spread in concrete floors or kept in
aluminum trays. In the presence of high humidity and proper
temperature, the properly fermented tea will take golden red color. This
step decides the quality i.e strength, color and briskness of tea.
Fermentation requires 1 hour or 2 hours depending upon the
environmental condition.

36. 4. DRYING
This step aims at stopping this fermentation process slowly removing
the moisture content without a burst smell but preserving the inherent
quality. This is achieved by passing the fermented tea in thin layers
through conveyors into a drier in which the inlet temperature is
maintained around 250-280 degree F outlet temperature is around 150-
200 degree F. proper drying takes 30-40 minutes.

37. 5. GRADING
Before grading the dried tea is removed of the stalky fibers, which affect
the quality by passing through fiber separator machine. The bulk tea is
passed through different sized meshes which aid in separation into
different grades.

38. • Orthodox grades
Grades Mesh size
1. pekoe >8 mesh sieve
2. Tippy golden orange pekoe
(TGOP)
8-12
3. Broken orange Pekoe
( BOP)
12-16
4. BOP- fannings 16-18
5. BOP- Dust 18-24
6. Dust -I 25-30
7. Dust- II <30

39. • CTC grades
Grades Mesh size
1. Flowering pekoe (FP) >8 mesh
2. pekoe 8-10
3. BOP 10-12
4. Pekoe fannings 12-16
5. BOP fannings 16-20
6. Pekoe dust (PD) 20-30
7. Red dust (R D) 30-40
8. Super red dust (SRD) 40-50
9. Super fine dust (SD) <60

40. PLANT PROTECTION
Diseases:
• Blister blight(Exobasidium vexans): spray copper oxychloride
350gm in 67lit. Of water In pruned field.
• Black root disease(Rosellinia arcuata) : the soil may be drenched
with Diethane @30gm.
• Brown root disease(Fomes noxius): Rehabilitate soil with gautemala
grass.
• Root splitting disease(Armillaria mellea): soil fumigation with
methyl bromide.

41. PESTS:
• Red coffee borer : larva bores the young stem, tunnels downwards
Control: Affected stems are cut, aldrin/ heptachlor is poured in the hole and
plugged with clay paste.
• Phassus borer : Aldrin/ heptachlor.
• Shot- hole borer : Heptachlor @8.5 lit/ ha
• Red spider mite : Tetradifon @ 1.25 lit/ha
• Scarlet mite : Dicofol or Ethion @1 lit/ha
• Pink mite : Dicofol or Ethion @1 lit/ha
• Yellow mite : Dicofol or Ethion @1 lit/ha
• Thrips : Phoslone or endosulfon @ 1 lit/ha
• Nematodes : carbofuron 3G @80 g/c3 met.

43. THANK YOU