Oolong and banji-leaf plucking (zhong kai mian)

Semi-oxidized tea
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mbanu
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Thu Feb 20, 2020 7:02 am

I was going through Seven Cups' YouTube channel and came across an interesting video:

If I am understanding correctly, normally they will look for leaf where the final bud has finished its growth and gone dormant; in India this is called "banji" leaf, and is not considered an especially good choice for tea, although sometimes it becomes necessary to include it. Four-leaves-and-a-bud is also not a very good plucking standard, but I have heard that here it is because it is quite difficult to partially ferment very small leaves, so better results are obtained from a coarser pluck.

Is this the only reason for using this kind of plucking standard? I would normally be suspicious that this is simply a marketing ploy, but Seven Cups is one of the most honest and knowledgeable Chinese tea dealers I have ever interacted with, so I am going to assume that this is for legitimate technical reasons.

Does anyone know more about this?
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Tillerman
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Fri Feb 21, 2020 7:11 am

@mbanu, we are taught from the beginning of our tea education that "two leaves and a bud" is the ideal plucking standard. As you saw in the video, however, this is not the case everywhere or for all types of tea. The four leaf pluck is standard for Taiwan oolongs; indeed it is considered not just the standard but the ideal.
Ethan Kurland
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Fri Feb 21, 2020 2:49 pm

Tillerman wrote:
Fri Feb 21, 2020 7:11 am
mbanu, we are taught from the beginning of our tea education that "two leaves and a bud" is the ideal plucking standard. As you saw in the video, however, this is not the case everywhere or for all types of tea. The four leaf pluck is standard for Taiwan oolongs; indeed it is considered not just the standard but the ideal.
Yes, Tillerman, lots of things are said to be standards that are not really what is done. E.g., I have heard lots of vendors in Taiwan advise using one gram of leaves per 50 ml of water before seeing them use a higher ratio of leaves to water than they just said what should be used.
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