Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/491350
30 STiR tea & coffee industry international Nigel Melican (right) observes planting of the first tea bushes at Jason McDonald's Filoli Tea Farm in Mississippi. Bob Sims (left) and Nigel Melican discuss work at Sims' Alabama tea farm. Modern growers provide meticulous care typical of American agriculture. is to have 150 acres under tea by 2020. "Once the bushes have matured in 3-5 years' time, plucking will be carried out mechanically using Japanese equipment and the leaf will initially be processed into black tea to suit the US market, but other hand-made specialty types will follow," he said. In New Orleans, Louisiana, pathologist Bill Luer has been growing and making tea as a hobby for 10 years, since he realized that camellias grow everywhere in his area. He has about 35 plants – a mix of six different varietals – which he bought from Camellia Forest Nursery in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and he has some growing in pots and some in the local soil to which he has added a small amount of sand to aid drainage. His low-lying property, with 60 inches of rain a year, and high humidity, suits the plants well. Alabama Donnie Barrett, director of Fairhope Museum of History, has been growing tea for more than 30 years. His tea garden on the western banks of Weeks Bay in southern Baldwin County, Alabama, is home to 40,000 plants which he propagated from three tea plants that he rescued from a burn pile. The rejected bushes had been planted in 1977 by a tea company at the local Au- burn Agricultural Experiment Station where Barrett's father worked, but two years later a hurricane destroyed the crop and the wrecked bushes were unceremoniously raked up and burned. Barrett's three plants, each a different varietal, somehow survived and with a little care and attention began to thrive. With a passion for horticulture and experience in camellia grafting gained by working alongside his father, Barrett set about rearing new stock and within a year had 1,000 plants. He subsequently created his own cultivar which grows row upon row at Fairhope. "We are sub-tropical here. It doesn't freeze every year and the tea continues to grow during the winter but becomes dormant during the 90 degree summer," he said. "I have to make the soil resemble a climax forest with lots of compost in the soil and layers of decomposing to freshly fallen leaves. The pH is good but I sometimes use a touch of lime and a good bit of chicken manure compost," said Barrett. To learn more about tea cultivation, Barrett travelled three times to various parts of China and studied Chinese method of processing leaves but he says, "It took me 10 years more before I could make the black tea aromatic and not flat. I do all my har- vesting by hand, using family and friends and also hire some help. I make a little black, some white but mostly green and oolong," said Barrett. "My best tea is young green buds that I roll into a sticky ball and dry over low heat," he said. Bob Sims started researching the possibility of growing tea in his native Alabama some 15 years ago. With his wife Carol, he established his tea business, Tea Embassy in Austin, Tex. in 2004 and has long dreamed of growing tea as well as retailing it. Having found the right piece of land with suitable acid soil in Andalusia, Covington County, Alabama, Sims hired Melican as a consultant and together they set about preparing the 11-acre site, planning the construction of greenhouses and finding the right varietal for the climatic conditions here. Andalusia can get quite chilly in winter and so they chose a hardy, drought-resistant cultivar from Georgia in Eastern Europe, where it has to survive temperatures of minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit. In February 2011 a nursery in Georgia shipped 20,000 seeds (on what was supposed to be an overnight delivery that actually took seven days). Once safely in Andalusia, they were planted in greenhouses. In October 2013, using a tractor and augur, a row was prepared for planting the seedlings 36 inches apart and the first 600 new plants went into the ground. While the bushes are maturing over the next 3-5 years, Sims will build a processing factory and looks forward to creating jobs for local people: "It seems to be the DNA of my heart and soul for a project that blesses a community with great value – not just a $$ enterprise but more!" The US League of Tea Growers encourages growers to plant tea in every state. In the March issue Jane Pettigrew summarizes activities in the states of Florida, North and South Carolina, Virginia, New York State, Michigan and Hawaii and considers some of important economic and production issues facing America's new tea farmers. Preparing the ground at Bob Sims' new tea farm near Andalusia, in Covington County, Alabama.