TeaHQ

Yangloudong

A small town in Chibi, southern Hubei, and the manufacturing heart of the overland tea trade to Russia. Leaf from the surrounding hills was steamed and pressed here into the green bricks — qing zhuan — that travelled north by cart, camel and river through Kyakhta on the Mongolian frontier, a route that carried a large share of Russia’s tea for well over a century. Russian merchant houses established mechanised pressing here and at Hankou in the second half of the nineteenth century, which is unusual: foreign capital rarely reached back this far into Chinese production. The stone-paved main street, worn by barrow wheels, survives.

羊樓洞China50–500 metresAlso called ChibiAlso called Puqi

History on this page: TeaHQ synthesis

TeaHQ's own reading of well-attested general knowledge, with no single source behind it.

This district’s description dates something — a founding, a first planting, a period of expansion. The label above says on what basis, and it applies to the historical statements rather than to the elevation, climate or soil claims below, which carry their own confidence separately.

Elevation

Recorded at 50–500 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

A pressing calendar rather than a plucking one. Brick manufacture takes mature leaf and stem rather than a fine spring pluck — a standard that would be a fault in almost any other category is the specification here — so the material comes off the surrounding hills across a long season rather than in a premium window, and steaming and pressing follow it. Nothing about this district's year is organised around an early pick.

How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it. Recorded as the manufacturing season, because the town is a pressing centre working leaf from a surrounding catchment rather than a garden district.

How the name is written

Also transliterated as yang lou dong, yangloudong. 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

  • Qing Zhuan — Coarse, woody and robust — a tea built to survive a long journey and a hard boil, not to be appreciated in a gaiwan. Its interest is largely historical and cultural.

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.

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.

How TeaHQ handles sources