TV23
One of the most widely planted of the Tocklai Vegetative clones released for the Assam and north-east Indian industry, selected for yield and for the strong, coloury liquor that CTC manufacture and the domestic blending trade require. The TV series is the reason modern Assam is a clonal crop rather than a seed-grown one, and it changed what an Assam garden looks like as much as what it tastes like.
Where it sits in the botany
TV23 is recorded under Camellia sinensis var. assamica, the variety group one level above cultivar. It is associated with India, which is where it was selected or is most widely planted rather than the only place it grows.
Registration code: TV23. A breeding or registration code identifies the selection in an institutional register and is often the name a grower uses when the trade name is not.
Also transliterated as: tv23, tocklai vegetative 23.
Where it came from
Released by the Tocklai Tea Research Institute in Assam as part of its numbered vegetative clone series.
How firm this is: Inferred rather than taken from a primary breeding or registration record. The clone designation is genuine; the release year and parentage were not verified against a primary source.
What the plant is like
High-yielding assamica clone giving a strong, coloury, brisk liquor. Selected for CTC performance rather than for aroma.
What it is usually made into
The categories this cultivar is typically processed into. It is a statement about common practice, not a limit — processing decides the category, and a cultivar can be taken down more than one route.
- Black tea — Tea taken deliberately through full enzymatic oxidation, giving the dark leaf, amber-to-red liquor and malty or brisk character most Western drinkers think of as simply 'tea'.
Teas in the catalogue made from TV23
Other cultivars in Camellia sinensis var. assamica
- Assam indigenous jat
- Benifuji
- Benihikari
- Benihomare
- Benikaori
- Betjan
- Camellia sinensis var. assamica
- East African seedling tea
- Fengqing Da Ye
- GMB 7
- Kiara 8
- Lingyun Baihao
- Manipuri jat
- Menghai Da Ye
- Mengku Da Ye
- Miang landrace
- PH1
- Shan Tuyết
- Sri Lankan seedling tea
- Tai Cha No. 8
- TRFK 301/4
- TRFK 303/577
- TRFK 306/1
- TRFK 31/8
- TRFK 6/8
- TV1
- TV25
- Yinghong No. 9
- Yunkang 10
- Yunkang 14
- Yunnan Da Ye Zhong
- Zi Juan
- Zi Ya
Sources
- TeaHQ editorial synthesis — TeaHQ
This page is TeaHQ’s own synthesis throughout. No breeding register or institutional record stands behind the account above, which is why the origin note carries its confidence in the open rather than reading as a citation.
Written comparisons
Where TeaHQ has set this cultivar against something it is routinely confused with, and argued the differences out in full.
- TV1 vs TV23 — Two Assam clones released decades apart into an industry that changed what it wanted in between. TV1 is where Assam’s shift from seed-grown gardens to clonal ones begins; TV23 is what that programme produced once CTC had become the destination for most of the crop.
- TV23 vs TV25 — Two high-yielding Assam clones that between them supply an enormous quantity of blended black tea. They are close relatives in purpose and differ in the trade-offs each makes between drought tolerance, body and the manufacture it suits.