Tong Mu - the Core Producing Area of Lapsang Souchong

After we published our blogs about Lapsang Souchong in April this year, we received a lot of emails and messages wishing that we would introduce more about Lapsang Souchong and Tong Mu, the core producing area of Lapsang Souchong. Today, we will let you know more about them. The photos we used were collected from the ones we took during our last three visits to there, mainly September, 2011 to the Guadun village of Tong Mu and March, 2012 to the Miaowan, Tong Mu. There are quite a few small villages scattered in Tong Mu. Among them, Guadun is probably the most well-known one, followed with Jiangwan, Mali and Miaowan.

Tong Mu (桐木), a village named after Tong Mu Guan (桐木关), at the center of the Wuyi nature reserve with an average altitude 1100 meters and the highest altitude of 2158 meters is at the north of Fujian province, bordering Jiangxi province. It is the fractured zone of Wuyi mountain largely covered with primeval forests. Wuyi nature reserve which is 565 square Kilometers in area is famous for the biodiversity. Set up as the national nature reserve as early as 1979, the ecological environment is well preserved here.  It is now praised as" the paradise of birds", "the kingdom of snake" and "the world of insects".

By the way, in 1848, Englishman Botanist Robert Fortune came to Tong Mu and succeeded in collecting the seeds of tea trees and obtaining the secrets of the tea production. Before that time, people in the West even didn't know that the black tea and green tea were made of the same tealeaves from the same plants and with the help of Robert Fortune, British East India Company began to grow and make tea in India.

The monument in the photo was set up around 2009 in memory of the birth of LapsangSouchong, the first black tea in the world in Jiangwan, Tong Mu.  It was unveiled by the 97 years old Zhang Tianfu, the famous and highly respected person of tea industry in China in 2009. The characters inscribed on it were" Zheng Shan Xiao Zhong Fa Yuan Di"(the place of origin of Lapsang Souchong in Chinese):

The panoramic view of Guadun village of Tong Mu:

 

The tea gardens in Guadun of Tong Mu:

 

 

 

The garden in Miaowan of Tong Mu:

 

Tea harvesting in Guadun of Tong Mu:

Only single buds picked for making Jin Jun Mei:

One bud with two or three leaves used for making Chi Gan black tea:

Tea gardens in Tong Mu have begun to be developed since several hundreds of years ago. Now with quite a large number of people moving from here to the outside urban areas during recent years, many of them were abandoned without human care. The tea trees in the photos were all more than 100 years and you can see it is taller even than one man. Black tea made of the tealeaves picked from such ancient tea trees is called as Lapsang Laozong which is quite good with a typical flavor people called as " Lao Zong Wei"(Ancient Tea Tree Flavor).

 

Some tea leaves of the ancient tea trees turn to be purple. Purple tealeaves were seen as the best by Lu Yu, the ancient Chinese sage of tea.

 

Related Posts:

Why the authentic Lapsang Souchong is pleasantly smoky

Zhengyan, Zhengshan and Bohea

Zhengyan, Zhengshan and Bohea

Bohea is the name used by people in the West for tea produced in the Wuyi Mountain during the ancient time. Wuyi Mountain is amazing. It produces two kinds of famous teas: Wuyi Rock Tea (Wuyi Yancha) and Lapsang Souchong. Questions about them are often raised. Are they produced in the same area in Wuyi Mountains? Are they made from the same raw material? Are they different just because of the production methods?

When tea professionals talk about Wuyi Yancha and Lapsang Souchong, they often ask whether they are produced in the core producing areas. Teas from the core producing areas are called Zhengshan or Neishan teas in Chinese, otherwise called Waishan (not from core areas) teas. For Yancha, they say Zhengyan instead of Zhengshan while Zhengyan has the same meaning as Zhengshan. Yan means rock in Chinese. The word Zhengyan makes it more prominent as for the character of Yancha than Zhengshan.

The Zhengyan Yancha and the Zhengshan Lapsang Souchong both grow in Wuyi Mountain but they are not from the same place. Quite a lot of people aren’t clear about their relations even for Chinese. Here I give you the following drawing and explanations. 

The Zhengyan of Wuyi Yancha often called Mingyan is the scenic spots of the Wuyishan City covering an area of about 70 square kilometers with the east to Chongyang Stream, south to Nanxing Road, west to Gaoxing Road and north to Huangbai Stream. The most famous areas of Zhengyan are the "Three Pits and Two Gullies”, namely Huiyuan Pit, Niulan Pit, Daoshui Pit, Liuxiang Gully and Wuyuan Gully, which are symbolic places of Zhengyan areas.

The Zhengshan of Lapsang Souchong with the Tong Mu Guan at the center, is a part of the national nature reserve covering an area of about 50 square kilometers with the east to Mashu, south to Pikeng, west to Guadun and north to Tongmuguan. The most famous places of the Zhengshan is Mashu, Guadun, Miaowan.

Zhengyan and Zhengshan are both located in Wuyi Mountains with a distance about 50 kilometers between them. It takes 1.5 to 2 hours from the Zhengyan area to the Tong Mu Guan by car.

As the areas of Zhengyan and Zhengshan are both quite limited, the prices of Zhengyan Yancha and the authentic Lapsang Souchong become very high. The teas produced in the areas between Zhengyan and Zhengshan can only be called Danyan Yancha or Waishan Souchong black tea.

The environment of Zhengyan and Zhengshan is different. The scenic spot (Zhengyan area of Yancha) has characteristics of Danxia landform at an altitude of about 350 meters. These places feature steep cliffs, bare rocks, low temperature difference between summer and winter. The soil of Zhengyan is highly permeable, rich in potassium and manganese, and proper in PH value. However, Zhengshan (of Lapsang Souchong for example Tongmuguan) doesn't has the characteristics of Danxia Landform, with high mountains covered by primitive forests, Tongmuguan has great amount of rainfall, lower temperature of 18C on average each year, high humidity and up to 100 foggy days each year. At an altitude of 1200 to 1500 meters, there is a huge temperature difference between day and night. The soil in Tongmuguan is soft, rich in minerals and abundant in water with high level of organic substances. 

The photos of the Wuyi Zhengyan:

The photos of the Miaowan, Tong Mu Guan: