Dancing Tea Plant
My good friend, Joe Javorchik, gave me 4 dancing tea seedlings last spring. I knew nothing about the plant and he hadn't grown it before, either. I did some searching on the internet and found that it's from Thailand, from the town (or area) of Udorn. It is reportedly a cross between Codariocalyx motorius and Ohashi leguminosae.
Dancing tea is also known as the "Telegraph Plant", due to the plant's ability to respond to sounds like music, singing, gentle talk, and supposedly, to meditation and telepathy by moving it's leaves with movements comparable to the Thai classical dance. Extracts from this herb has been used ancient Thailand as a preventive against several diseases. They called it by the name Cha Chalor Chara, meaning "anti-aging tea".Dancing tea is a medicinal tea herb and you can find more information about it here: http://www.kirjon.com/sacred-sites/orchid.htm
The intriguing habit of the plant is to respond to music. It will "dance" to whistling, singing or music on the radio. Here's an interesting video from YouTube to demonstrate what the plant does: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBqlluBPjCo
I wasn't sure whether it was a sun-loving or a shade loving plant, so I planted the 3 plants Joe gave me as seedlings, in full sun, part sun and almost full shade. The two that thrived were the shade and part shade located plants. The part shade plant reached more than waist high by mid summer. I've not tried the leaf tea yet, but I have dug the plants and brought them indoors.
The plant is important because of it's high concentration of antioxidants and considerable research is being conducted in Thailand on the plant's healing and anti-aging properties.
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