Camellia Sinensis Seeds

Camellia sinensis is nothing but the botanical name of the plants that produce tea. That's right! This species belongs to the plant genus Camellia and the family Theaceae. Common names include tea plant, tea shrub and tea tree. Many people wonder whether they can grow plants from the camellia sinensis seeds. As a matter of fact, there are both positive and negative possibilities, which means you can either succeed or fail in producing the plants with help of the seeds. Typically, tea shrubs are grown by propagation technique of gardening. However, you may also succeed growing tea plants at home by planting seeds. Let's find out how!

What to Do with Camellia Sinensis Seeds

One of the main reasons why layman gardeners struggle to grow camellia sinensis plants using seeds is the hard shell of their seeds. It is the reason why you can also grow your own green tea, oolong tea, white tea or any other tea variant by using plant cuttings. Secondly, the environmental factor. These plants thrive in high elevated regions of tropical and subtropical climates that receive at least 50 inches (127 cm) rainfall per year. These plants can turn into trees if they are left undisturbed, but they are often maintained to waist height, by pruning for easy plucking of the tea leaves. You can grow camellia sinensis plants in your herb garden and attain two main benefits, which are landscape design with the beautiful camellia sinensis flowers and homemade tea leaves and gain numerous health benefits of tea!

Materials Needed
Here are the things that you may need to gather for germinating tea seeds or camellia Sinensis seeds. The best thing to do that would be to germinate the seeds with the help of container gardening and then transferring the plants to the outdoors. Here are the things that you first need to gather, before following the instructions on growing the tea plants.

• Bowl
• Freshly harvested seeds
• Plant pot
• Plastic tarp
• Cheesecloth bag
• Shade cloth
• Spray bottle
• Potting soil
• Coarse vermiculite
• Granular slow release fertilizer
• Foliar fertilizer

Instructions
Start with filling the bowl with water. Then, put fresh seeds in the cheesecloth bag and submerge the bag in the bowl of water for about 24 hours. Then open the bag and soak the seeds in the bowl of water for about five minutes. Then discard the floaters and spread the rest of the seeds on the plastic tarp by creating a single layer. Put the tarp in a sunny place. Then mist the seeds by using the water spray and leave them until you find the seed coating cracked. In the meantime, keep misting the seeds to maintain their moisture. Then, fill a garden plantar or plant container with vermiculite and push the seeds in the soil at the depth of about an inch. Place the seeds in such a way that their eyes are parallel with the soil surface. Lastly, water the soil, until it starts dripping out of the drainage holes at the bottom of the container. Cover the container with the shade cloth and place it in a sunny and relatively warmer room.

Keep watering the container as soon as the soil gets dry on touch. This, you may need to do for about a month, which is the minimum time span that the seeds require to germinate. Then is the time to remove the shade cloth and place the container in the sun for about 1/3 of a day. Now you also need to provide the slow-release fertilizer to the soil by following directions that must be mentioned on the package. Also use the foliar fertilizer in diluted form and apply it to the plant foliage. You can also use organic seaweed fertilizer. While the plant grows, you need to keep watering the plant quite regularly. You also need to increase the amount of sun exposure that the plants get each week, by 1-2 hours. When the plants turn a foot tall, then that is the time to transfer the plants in a larger pot or the herb garden.

Always plant two different varieties of seeds so that you can increase the chances of cross-pollination and better quality. You also need to protect the plants from heavy winds, which causes browning of the tea leaves. Last and most importantly, never try to plant these seeds in soggy soil with standing water areas, because they will not thrive in it. All the best!