Commercial tea farms keep their plants short – two or three feet – and harvest new growth every few weeks. In an ornamental landscape, c. Sinensis can grow to 10-feet tall.

When brewing your tea, avoid dunking or plunging the tea bag, releasing the bitter tannins in the tea. If you like sweeter tea, avoid squeezing the tea bag, and instead, let it steep for 2-3 minutes.

Nearly 300 varieties have spread globally: to Charleston, S.C. (home of what’s billed as the only tea farm in the U.S.), to Brazil, to the foothills of the Himalayas.

Bill Luer, a hobbyist tea farmer, grows 35 camellia sinensis bushes in his Uptown yard in New Orleans. Many of the plants, bottom, grow along his front porch on Friday, June 12, 2015.