The world famous old tea trees.

Tea is native to China, and believed to be originated in South part of China, Yunnan province. In Yunnan, we can find many old wildly grown tea trees surrounded by other old trees. On the south part of Yunnan, there is a mountain called NanNe in Munglihaixian where the Thai ethnic group inhabit. In this area, there was used be a 800 years old tea tree existed, but unfortunately, it withered in 1998. The huge tea tree is described in the book "Chajin", which is about the same size two adults can barely hold. It is not certain if such a large tree really existed. However, there are many old large tea trees in that area, and they make us to believe the existence of the huge tree which was described in Chajin. (Old tea in Badu mountain) There is famous tea tree with 20m height, 0.8m diameter, and 2.5m perimeter on Badu mountain in Yunnan province. Tree is called the king of tea tree. We can see the evidence of firming in this area, and it tells us that people used to use the leaves of this tree to make tea. (Old tea from Zien Yuan Xian) Zien Yuan Xian is located in North of Sisuanbanna, foot of Ai-lao mountain (3160m) in Yunqui highland. There you can find 2000 years old tea trees. The height is 25.6m, diameter-0.9m, and perimeter of tree is 2.8m. Also, in Vietnam and Myamer, existence of this kind of old tea tree is proved.

(Satoru Matsushita)