Tea, a tree-like plant, is maintained shrub -like for the tea cultivation by regular pruning. Tea belongs to the species of the camellia. The evergreen shrub has got dark, ridged, leather-like leaves. The flower is white or rose-coloured; the fruit is small with a hard shell, similar to a hazelnut. Nowadays, its reproduction is rarely done through pollination but rather vegetative, where cuttings are grown on the high-yielding parent shrub.
Thea Sinsensis (or Chinese Tea) It remains shrub-like even without regular cutting and grows to a height of only 3 – 4 m. This shrub flourishes best in moderate climatic zones and can even withstand frost. The China-tea plant has been cultivated for many thousand years which resulted in an art variety of approximately 5,000, which are, however, not all cultivated in notable amounts.
Thea Assamica (or Assam-Tee) It becomes a grand tree of a height of 15 – 20 m if not cut back regularly. This tea shrub requires a lot of warmth and is a purely tropical plant. It was discovered in 1823 as a grown tree in the jungle of Northern India. Only a few years later it was already cultivated. The Assam plant leaves are larger than that of the China tea plant.
These two primal tea plants have been crossbred again in order to develop finer, more aromatic and, especially, more robust breeds. The so-called Assam-hybrid has proven particularly suitable. It is important to acknowledge that the differences in taste and quality not only depend on the plant itself, but also on the cultivation region, its climatic conditions and the diligent plucking as well as processing of the tea leaves.