From the fruit-tree slopes of Dongting Mountain
Bi Luo Chun is one of the few teas in China grown intercropped with fruit trees — loquat, peach, plum, apricot — on the steep slopes of Dongting East and West Mountains, two islands sitting in Lake Tai near Suzhou. The bushes share soil and air with the orchards, and that’s where the tea’s signature stone-fruit aroma comes from. It isn’t perfume added in processing — it’s literally what the leaves grow up breathing.
Chen Hui Yi selected this lot during her pre-Qingming sourcing trip in late March 2026. Her background is in Guangdong whites and sun-withering, so she approaches greens with a withered-tea sensitivity: she looks for leaves that smell sweet before any heat touches them. The grower is a small family operation on Dongting West Mountain working roughly 0.4 hectares of seed-grown qunti bushes, no clonal varietals, average bush age around forty years.
Picking standard is strict — one bud with a single just-opened leaf, harvested before sunrise while the down is still tight to the bud. It takes about 60,000 to 80,000 hand-plucked sets to make 500g of finished tea. Kill-green happens in a dry iron wok at moderate heat, then the leaves are rolled by hand into their spiral shape and finished at low temperature to preserve the silver fuzz.
This 5g sample is meant as an introduction — enough for two careful sessions. If it lands for you, the full tin lives on shop.thetea.app under Chen Hui Yi’s spring greens shelf.