I’ve spent the last few days visiting the Alishan tea region, hoping to find some high-quality Ershui tea. After searching for days, though, I couldn’t find anything good.
Tea lovers might ask, “Does Alishan even harvest Ershui tea?” Yes, absolutely! Actually, it’s not just Alishan—every tea region has it. Whether it gets harvested depends entirely on the quality of the leaves. If they don’t grow well, farmers won’t bother harvesting them, especially since labor costs for picking tea aren’t cheap. Plus, you can’t harvest it every single year; doing it too often tends to “weaken the bushes” (a term for when the tea plants lose their vitality).
To be honest, truly good Ershui tea is hard to come by. Mainly because May and June mark the arrival of summer, and the tea leaves gradually develop more astringency. Good weather is the most crucial factor for Ershui tea. The year before last, I managed to find an Alishan Ershui batch that turned out even better than the spring tea. But that time, the spring tea had been harvested early, and the Ershui tea sprouted back in early May while the weather was still quite cool, resulting in exceptional quality.
However, Alishan Ershui tea didn’t have as much luck this year. There was way too much rain in late May and early June, making the tea flavor not only astringent but also thin and watery. Naturally, tea like that gets rejected. Even so, this trip wasn’t a total loss—I’ve marked a few tea gardens that underwent medium pruning and received boosted fertilization. Based on past experience, the chances of getting fantastic winter tea from them are quite high.
Next up, ShanLinXi and Lishan will gradually have their own Ershui and bug-bitten teas coming in. I’ll be sure to update everyone once I find the good stuff.