A couple of days ago, I saw a competitor selling Fushoushan and Biluxi teas, and thinking the tea owners were unfair for not notifying me about the harvest, I rushed up the mountain, only to realize I’d been bluffed by the competitor. Fushoushan Farm and the area around 88K haven’t started harvesting at all; the tea leaves are still quite tender.
The Songmao and Huanshan tribal tea areas have indeed started harvesting, mostly from gardens below 1,700 meters. The manager went up the mountain on May 8th and inspected several tea gardens above 1,700 meters. The tea leaves were at a moderate stage of maturity, and the owners said they would begin harvesting as soon as the rain stopped. Harvesting is expected to get underway on the 9th and 10th.
▼ The teas at Fushoushan Farm and its surrounding areas are still very tender, given their high elevation of 2,100 to 2,400 meters. The earliest they can be harvested is mid-May, and Fushoushan Farm’s tea won’t be ready until around June.
Due to the severe pandemic and the fact that our store manager is from northern Taiwan, we decided to pass on stopping by for tea this time. We simply requested some tea samples and checked the condition of the tea leaves. This year’s spring tea leaves from Songmao and Huanshan in Lishan show a “bimodal distribution”—the good ones are quite decent, while the poor ones are subpar. Overall, they fall far short of Cuifeng, Qilai Mountain, and Fanzitian, and can’t compare to the Cuiluan tea area on the back mountain either.
It was raining that morning, but some tea farmers still went ahead with the harvest. These are what we call “rainy-day leaves,” which lack both aroma and aftertaste. It’s quite a shame; had they waited for a sunny day to harvest, these might have turned out great, but harvesting in the rain destines them to be secondary grade.
The manager requested a few samples labeled #6 and #7, mostly from tea gardens below 1,600 meters in elevation. We plan to wait for the teas harvested from the 9th onward before deciding whether to purchase.
Note 1
The 9th and 10th were sunny. Rain started around 4 PM on the 10th, and it rained all day on the 11th in the Lishan tea region. The manager is currently waiting for the tea samples from the 10th and will purchase if any exceptional teas turn up.