Jingmai
A Lancang mountain area known for very old tea gardens interplanted with forest, and for a distinctly floral, orchid-scented sheng that is unusual among pu-erh origins.
Elevation
Recorded at 1200–1600 metres.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.
When it is picked
Spring, rainy season and autumn, worked in ancient forest gardens where tea grows interplanted under canopy rather than in cleared rows. The mixed planting slows growth and complicates picking, and it is the reason the landscape is managed as heritage rather than as plantation.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.
How production is organised
Household tenure of trees within a recognised cultural landscape of forest tea gardens, farmed by Blang and Dai communities. Managing tea as forest rather than as a field crop is an agricultural system in its own right, and it is one of the few places where that system has institutional protection.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.
How the name is written
Also transliterated as jingmai, jing mai. Romanisations of a district name vary by system and by vendor, and a packet spelling one way is not describing a different place.
Teas this region is known for
- Jingmai sheng pu-erh — Noticeably floral for a pu-erh, with moderate bitterness and a bright sweetness. The most aromatic of the well-known sheng origins and the least like the category’s reputation.
Other growing regions in China
The neighbouring districts are the useful comparison: they share a country, a grading convention and often a cultivar, so what differs between them is closer to terroir than anything a cross-border comparison can isolate.
- Ailao Mountains
- Anhua
- Anji
- Anxi
- Bada Mountain
- Bailin
- Beiyuan
- Bingdao
- Bulang
- Changxing (Guzhu)
- Dongting Mountain
- Duyun
- Emei Mountain
- Enshi
- Fengqing
- Fu’an
- Fuding
- Fuzhou
- Gande
- Hekai
- Hengxian
- Huangshan
- Huoshan
- Jinggu
- Jingyang
- Junshan Island
- Lao Ban Zhang
- Laoshan
- Lincang
- Lingtou
- Lu’an
- Lushan
- Manzhuan
- Meijiawu
- Meitan
- Mengding Mountain
- Menghai
- Mengku
- Mengsong
- Nanjing (Yuhua)
- Nannuo Mountain
- Phoenix Mountain
- Pingshui
- Pu’er (Simao)
- Qimen
- Rizhao
- Shengzhou
- Shifeng (Lion Peak)
- Songyang
- Taiping
- Tanyang
- Tianmu Mountain
- Tongmu Guan
- Tunxi
- Weishan
- Wenzhou
- Wudong Mountain
- Wuyi Mountains
- Wuyuan
- Wuzhou
- Xianghua
- Xigui
- Xihu (West Lake)
- Xinyang
- Xiping
- Xishuangbanna
- Xiushui
- Ya’an
- Yangloudong
- Yibang
- Yibin
- Yichang
- Yingde
- Yiwu
- Yixing
- Yongchun
- Youle
- Yuan’an
- Yueyang (Beigang)
- Yunnan
- Zhangping
- Zheng Yan (Wuyi core)
- Zhenghe
- Zhenjiang
- Ziyang
Sources
- TeaHQ editorial synthesis — TeaHQ
This page is TeaHQ’s own synthesis throughout. No external document stands behind the elevation band, the climate note or the character described above, which is why each carries its confidence in the open.
Written comparisons
Where TeaHQ has set this region against something it is routinely confused with, and argued the differences out in full.
- Jingmai vs Menghai — Two Yunnan pu-erh areas that stand for two different things: Jingmai for old forest-interplanted gardens and an unusual floral sheng, Menghai for the factory where wet-piling was industrialised and the reference shou style was set.