In the first of a series of articles about new tea growing regions, Jane Pettigrew discusses the research work that is driving the new industry and how Hawaii is fast becoming a successful new tea producer.

Hawaii’s first tea garden was established as long ago as 1887 when the Hawaiian Coffee and Tea Company planted out a five-acre plot in Kona but the production of tea was not considered to be financially viable and so the plants were abandoned. 

In the 1960s another small area was planted out at Waiakea Research Station with a mixture of varietals which thrived, and in the late seventies four more varietals were brought in from Kyoto University and planted at the Lyon Arboretum on O’ahu. But the plant was never seriously thought to have potential as a commercial crop. 

Then, when the sugar cane industry declined in importance for Hawaii in the 1980s, local farmers had to find alternative crops to replace it. Francis Zee of the US Department of Agriculture Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center (USDA PBARC) suggested that tea might grow well in Hawaii Island (The Big Island) and the first plants were brought in from the Taiwan Agricultural Research Institute. Cuttings were also taken from plants at the Lyon Arboretum and trial plantings were made in different eco-climates at various elevations. Each island in Hawaii has a number of different micro-climates and the new tea growing enterprise demanded (and continues to demand) a good deal of trial and error to decide which cultivars to grow, which areas to grow them in, what types of tea to manufacture, and how to manufacture them. 

The past 15 years have taken the new tea growers on a fascinating journey. “It’s been a decade of dedication for us tea growers, learning as we go and finding our way with tea,” says Eva Lee, Big Island premier tea producer, Propagation Chair, former president and vice president of Hawaii Tea Society, and spokesperson for tea growers leading Hawaii’s new industry. 

The first of the growers on Hawaii was John Cross, previously in charge of sugar cane production and tasked with finding suitable replacement crops. He still successfully produces lychees, mangoustines, asparagus, and kava from the trial plants he established at ‘Johnny’s Garden’ the same time as his now thriving tea plants. His mix of assamica and sinensis varietals, developed at the university of Hawaii Wailua Experiment Station, grow at 275 meters above sea level in Hakalau, on the slopes of The Big Island’s now dormant Mauna Kea Volcano. Out of 100 varietals available at the time, Cross selected two that he thought the healthiest and had the highest level of silvery down on the leaves and the crop is now harvested and processed into black tea. His biggest challenge is combating the damage caused by Chinese rose beetles which strip the more mature leaves back to the veins, creating a lace effect, and weakening younger bushes. The problem can be alleviated by planting decoy plants which the insects prefer, such as Sunn hemp, amongst the tea bushes, or by wrapping young bushes in stretched cloth to deter the beetles’ attack.

While Cross was experimenting with low grown plants, others were researching cultivation and processing at higher elevations. At Volcano Tea Garden, a 0.2 hectare area at an altitude of 1,100 meters on The Big Island, Mike Riley now produces oolong and black teas from bushes that grow on a south-facing slope of well-drained volcanic soil. Native forest trees have been left undisturbed to provide approximately 50% shade - ideal conditions in which to grow tea for the remarkable blacks and unique oolongs that Riley now manufactures. Made using traditional historical Chinese techniques, his teas require five hours per pound of hand processing, and retail at approximately $880 per kilo. The teas, fruity and sweet with hints of papaya and apple, sell out very quickly every year and experts have told Riley that, with the ideal soil, clean air, and lack of pests and plant diseases at the farm, he is on the way to producing some of the world’s finest oolongs.

A little way away near Volcano Village, at an altitude of 1300 meters, Eva and Chiu Lee make very high quality white teas from bushes that grow in the dappled shade of the forest trees that surround their home. In establishing their tea garden, they have left the native trees completely undisturbed, but had to spend countless hours cutting back rampant kahili ginger and other invasive species to clear the ground ready for the bushes. The soil here is rich with organic mulch and holds the moisture well, thus reducing the need for irrigation. Now growing in curving lines that follow the gentle contours of the forest and protected from the hot sun by the overhanging branches, the bushes grow slowly, concentrating sweetness and flavor in the new leaves and buds. These rare forest-grown teas have a powerful floral character that layers the sweetness of summer roses with citrus notes of tangerines and warm toast. 

Eva and Chiu have also been trialing green tea manufacture using a Japanese ‘jotan’ rolling table. Eva explains, “We sought advice and assistance from Toshikazu Yamashita, Japan’s greatest expert in the hand-processing of tea (temomi) and the production of Gyokuro. He has won some of the most prestigious awards for his excellence in achievement, including (seven times) the highest national award from the Minister of Agriculture. He helped us build a temomi processing table and taught us how to make gyokuro.” 

The Lees also harvest the bushes grown by John Cross (since he is too busy in farm management) and hand-roll the leaves and buds to make neatly-twisted black teas that have a subtle sweetness and nuttiness. And Eva is a leading figure in championing Hawaii grown teas, in developing new planting stock, in teaching others how to make tea, and in marketing the best teas made on The Big Island.

Several other local residents are also making different types of tea by various methods. Some make green tea by de-enzyming the leaf in a domestic microwave; others use pans and woks; one or two have imported panning machines to replicate Chinese or Taiwanese manufacture

The Big Island’s local Volcano Winery has also been growing tea for the past four years and had to mechanically gouge out trenches two feet wide and two feet deep in the lava rock, fill the space with compost, phosphates and other nutrients, and lay irrigation pipelines before planting their bushes. Once established, it is hoped that the roots of the tea bushes will find their way through cracks in the rock to deeper pockets of rich soil, moisture and nutrients. The tea-flavored dessert wine launched at the winery in 2009 infuses black tea to local Macadamia nut honey alcohol to give an unusually vibrant and satisfying taste.

At Cloudwater Farm near Kilauea on Kauai Island, Michelle Rose started growing tea in 2002. From March/April through to late October, she plucks the leaf in the morning and, like many of the Hawaii tea growers, rolls the leaves by hand to make black tea and also plans to manufacture oolongs in due course. She will be joining a delegation to Taiwan later this year to learn more from their experience and skill.

At Na Liko Tea Garden in Upper Haiku in Maui, Liam Ball has spent the last two years establishing his tea nursery and preparing for tea production. He has roughly 6000 plants in the ground and says, “I’ve been propagating and concentrating on developing plant material with the generous help of Eva Lee and now I’m at the exciting stage where my nursery plants are field ready. I guess that by next spring, I might be able to harvest enough leaf for the commercial release of a finished product.” He says it takes patience to make good tea and is in no hurry to rush into production. Once he has acquired enough knowledge and skill, he plans production of Japanese Senchas, black tea, smoked black tea, and white teas, and has already dreamed up names using local Hawaiian words and connections to local people and places - the name of his garden, Na Liko, is the plural form of Hawaiian for ‘Leaf bud/newly-opened leaf/to put forth leaves’.

The Hawaii Tea Society (founded in 2002) is working hard to encourage and assist new tea growers and everyone involved has benefitted from the group’s support. Also lending enormous support, advice, expertise and assistance is the UH-Mänoa College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources (CTAHR) who work in partnership with the USDA Agricultural Research Service’s Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center (PBARC). And much of the newly-acquired knowledge and skill has been developed by working closely with experts in tea science from Japan, China and Taiwan. The research team is helping to create new opportunities for smallholder farmers to grow and process high quality teas and, like the farmers themselves, are constantly trying new methods, new machinery, and new approaches to improve the quality of the teas they produce.

A group of producers attended the 2010 World Tea Expo in Las Vegas to showcase their teas to world buyers, and Eva Lee commented afterwards, “We have started to market our teas outside the USA and are creating new tea relations that will patiently wait for Hawaii in providing more unique teas as time allows. I was struck by how the industry has shifted from a few years ago when large tea business either wanted everything Hawaii could produce or did not want to talk with us. It now seems that these larger companies appreciate our rare teas and have changed their thinking when it comes to working with us.”