I commenced by growing soft fruits – this was initially successful but after a few difficult years marketing our fruit it was clearly time for a change on the farm.  We needed to diversify and to find a way to ensure our long-term viability.  This was back in 2013, when after randomly thinking of perhaps growing tea, a quick internet search revealed that Tregothnan was successfully growing it in Cornwall and there was also an intrepid tea grower in Scotland.  Thus, my mind was made up, I was convinced we could grow tea in Wales.

Our first seeds were sourced from the Republic of Georgia by Nigel Melican (of Teacraft) who initially got us up and running with some much-needed consultancy advice.  We decided early on that growing from seed was likely to be the best option for us and something we could easily adapt to – we already had suitable infrastructure on the farm including Spanish polytunnels, a couple of fixed tunnels, and an irrigation system.

Since then we have propagated imported seed every year and steadily built up our plant numbers.  We now have around 10,000 plants in the ground and another 15,000 or so in our nursery area.  Around half of our planting is protected under polytunnels – a big factor in being able to successfully establish plants in this cool area, our climate can certainly be quite challenging at times!

We are also planting in the open field, our site is south facing and reasonably sheltered but we have found the young tea still takes a battering from gusty winds so we are increasingly incorporating the tea plants into a large agroforestry system – using fruit trees and Sichuan pepper.  These young trees are gradually increasing wind protection and enhancing the right microclimate for establishing tea.

We are growing organically and are finding that the use of cover crops between rows is hugely benefiting the soil biomass levels and reducing requirements for additional fertiliser.  Certainly, growing tea in Wales is not easy, our climate does seem quite marginal for tea growing and we still lose a few plants each year.  We are now using our very own harvested seed for new nursery stock and hold out hope that these plants will be better adapted to our conditions.

Our first very light harvest was made in 2018 and we had some guidance from Beverly Wainwright (of Tea Gardens of Scotland) on experimental processing.  To be honest, I was terrified to even try making tea myself and wasted quite a bit of leaf rather than picking it that year!

2019 was the first year we plucked enough leaf to offer very small amounts for sale – and although it gained some good feedback it was very much a case of trial and error and I wasn’t very confident in it.  I have found the learning curve for processing tea is very steep, there are so many variables to consider especially when using fresh leaf harvested from genetically diverse seed-grown plants.

This year we had planned to open our farm to the public; plans that of course did not happen, but that has instead provided us with the time to try different approaches and actually to have fun processing the tea.  We now have both green and black teas for sale this year and a steadily growing number of independent retailer stockists.  Impressively, both our teas have this year won Gold Stars at the UK Great Taste Awards – a very good year for a fledgling tea business and a rookie tea maker!

Lucy George @peterstontea - Vale of Glamorgan, Wales