When it comes to harvesting the kava plant, the waka is all the roots, nothing else, the lewena is the chips but chips of what part of the plant??? it is the stump or the corm of the kava plant, that is what they make the chips from, I like that part, it tastes better and it still full of kavalactones. On average the root will have 5%-%10 more than the corm or stump of the plant.
When I harvest a plant the stalks look like bamboo, what I do is cut from the last joint, that way there is no stalk in the kava, only stump (corm) and the lateral and vertical roots as well as the hair like rootlets that grow out from the laterals, those are the best and most potent. I like to drink them all to see what they do and then I mix different amounts of each and see how it changes the effect, I can actually change the chemotype just by adding different amounts of root and stump.
Aloha.
Chris