Abstract

This research was carried out to determine micronutritients status of tea (Camellia sinensis L.) plantations in the Eastern Black Sea Region of Turkey. Soil and leaf samples were taken from the 220 tea gardens belonging to 36 tea processing plants during the 2^nd shoot period (between July 15^th and 30^th July in 2003) by taking into consideration the tea planted areas and production potentials of these tea gardens. According to the results, Fe, Cu, Zn and Mn contents of soils varied within the range of 2.1 to 168.9, 0.02 to 14.69, 0.01 to 8.45 and 0.4 to 101.4 mg kg^-1, respectively. Fe, Cu, Zn and Mn contents of leaf samples were determined as 86 to 959, 4.5 to 73.9, 5.6 to 46.3 and 141 to 2767 mg kg^-1, respectively. Consequently, it is possible to state that the tea plantations of Rize and Artvin Regions have some places involved with insufficient micro element concentration. On the other hand, it was detected that there was no deficiency in the study area, when the mean values for both soil and leaf samples were taken into consideration.

Key words: Tea plant, micronutrients, Eastern Black Sea Region.