Babe Ruth in Hilo

With the World Series in progress it seems fitting to discuss Babe Ruth’s presence in Hilo on the Big Island -- particularly since his Hilo visit was memorialized in such a spectacular way.  The year was 1933 and The Babe was in Hawaii to play a series of exhibition games against various local teams.

About that same time several park commissioners in Hilo decided that it would be a good idea to have celebrities’ plant banyan tree saplings along the Waiakea Peninsula.  In late 1933, Cecil B. DeMille was on the island filming "Four Frightened People".  Several of the actors planted trees in their own honor, along with Mr. and Mrs. DeMille.  Some eight trees were planted in October 1933. And in addition to the movie stars, one tree was also planted by one of the most famous men in America, Babe Ruth.  This drive, now named Banyan Drive is also known as the "Hilo Walk of Fame.”

Over time probably some fifty trees were planted with many surviving until today having grown into a thick canopy, making it popular for walking.  The Waiakea Peninsula is anchored by the beautiful Liliuokalani Park and Reed’s Bay Beach Park, and not far from the Hilo airport.  The name comes from wai ākea which in Hawaiian means "broad waters,” and sometimes what is now called Hilo Bay was once called Waiakea Bay.

The Banyan tree is an example of a strangler fig that often begins life in the crown of another tree. Its roots grow down and around the stem of the host, their growth accelerating once the ground has been reached. Over time, the roots coalesce to form sort of a pseudotrunk.  Older banyan trees are characterized by their aerial prop roots that grow into thick woody trunks which, with age, can become indistinguishable from the main trunk. Old trees can spread out laterally using these prop roots to cover a wide area.

The first banyan tree in the U.S. was planted by Thomas Alva Edison in Fort Myers, Florida.  The tree, originally only four feet tall, now covers 400 feet.  Robinson Crusoe, in the 1719 novel by Daniel Defoe makes his home in a banyan tree.  Due to the complex structure of the roots and extensive branching, the banyan is also extensively used for creating Bonsai.  Taiwan's oldest living bonsai is a 240-year-old banyan in Tainan.

Big Island = Big Scary Story

As we approach the Halloween holiday, it may be appropriate to retell a frightening story that happened here on the Big Island; in fact just some twelve miles south of Hilo in the quiet village of Ola’a.

                                                   

Ola’a is in the sacred Ola'a forest, which was once an area restricted to bird-catching families (whose occupation was to collect hulu or feathers for the ruling class) until the abolishment of the kapu system in 1819 and the arrival of the missionaries shortly thereafter. A small church was established in 1835 to serve Hawaiians living in the area. As Hawai'i island developed with small coffee farms and with the establishment of sugar plantations in the 1890's Ola'a saw the arrival of immigrant labor.  Soon the church and community embraced an ethically and culturally diverse plantation community.  Ola'a Church

Ola'a Church

In 1947 in Ola’a children were playing near the local pond when one of them fell in and drowned.  The boy, named Tanaka, was later found by divers sitting on a rock with his eyes and mouth open and body swaying with the currents.  Yet, he was dead and his corpse was retrieved and buried.

Later, people who walked by the pond would often fell something tug at the bottom of their trousers. Rumors spread that the boy’s spirit was trapped beneath the water.  In his book, Obake Files, Ghostly Encounters in Supernatural Hawaii, Glen Grant writes:

“On some evenings the villagers could hear a cry emanate from the pond in the middle of the night. At first most everyone believed that the haunting cry was the wind blowing through the tall sugar cane fields. But a few of the older people said they knew the spirit of the Tanaka boy- cold, wet, and desolate at the bottom of the pond. The soul was crying out for help and deliverance. Trapped in this world by accident, he sought someone’s spirit as a substitute. They would take his place at the bottom of the pond so that he could be free to go to the otherworld.


“Those who were present at the second accident swear that the other boy was pulled into the water against his will. It was the noon hour. He was walking about 50 yards behind his father along the edge of the pond, occasionally picking up a flat stone to skim across the water. When he fell, he screamed out to his father that something was pulling him into the pond. He clawed at the earth, trying to hold on, to fight back. But in what seemed like an instant, the force tugging at his legs pulled him into the watery depths of the pond. By the time the young boy’s body had been located, it was found sitting naturally on a rock on the bottom of the pond. He seemed so natural sitting there- arms placidly at his side, eyes and mouth open, swaying gently to and fro in a light current. Fortunately, the rescuers were able to bring him back to the surface in time to be resuscitated.

“A Shinto priest was brought from Hilo to bless the waters, and the haunting cries finally ceased. Yet, on peculiarly dark nights when the evening skies seem bathed in black ink, those who live closest to the pond say that they sometimes hear the Tanaka boy’s cry. But are the cries melancholy or sinister? And will the Tanaka boy ever find peace?”  Weird Hawaii

Pretty spooky…..I’d say!

Sugar Cane in Hawaii

By the mid 1800s, the Hawaiian kingdom’s economy was not very bright.  Sandalwood, (wesisland.blogspot.com) an important trade item, was almost gone from the forests of Hawaii.  And whalers who wintered in Hawaii and restocked their boats were fewer in number; partially because the need for whale oil had diminished as petroleum became a source of fuel for lamps.

RagTime

The Great Mahele of 1848 allowed for the private ownership of land for Hawaiians and foreigners for the first time. Many American and European businessmen quickly gained control of large tracts of land that led to the development of agriculture and especially the sugar industry in Hawaii.

Sugar was brought to the islands by the early Polynesians who chewed on the plant as a source of energy and food.  In 1778, when Captain Cook happened upon the Hawaii islands, the lands were already abundant with sugar cane.  The first serious sugar plantation was at Koloa, Kauai in 1835 by Ladd and Co.

In September 1835, Ladd & Co., began the first major Hawaiian sugar plantation. Hooper, Brinsdale, and Ladd managed to do something that no one else had previously done in Hawaii. With the help of missionary settlers, they obtained the first major land lease in Hawaiian history.  The lease comprised 980 acres in Koloa, Kauai, which was set aside for sugar cane production. The lease ran 50 years at $300 per year.

Sugar Mill

The missionaries were bent on making farmers of the Hawaiian natives so Ladd & Co. fell nicely into those plans. By employing Hawaiian natives, they would be teaching them the skills missionaries felt were so necessary.  However, perhaps not so surprisingly, native Hawaiians were far from eager to work the fields and the native population had been reduced to 70,000 people by the 1850s, diminished greatly by disease. Ladd history

Sugar meant plantations and mills and the need for workers. Plantation owners turned to workers in devastated areas of the world that were ravaged by wars and famine initially in China, and then Japan, the Philippines and Portugal which explains the rich, varied racial make-up of present-day Hawaii.  http://www.hvcb.org/media/bigisland/

Sugar Cane Production

The Big Island's lava soil and regular rainfall offer ideal conditions for growing sugar cane.  Ah Kina, a Chinese planter, began raising cane at Amauulu above the town of Hilo in 1851.

Among the biggest producers of sugar cane was the Pepeekeo Sugar Company not far from where we now live along the Hamakua Coast. When it was established in 1857, it was named Metcalf Plantation after the owner Theopilus Metcalf.  When Metcalf died in 1874, the new owners of the plantation changed its name to the Pepeekeo Sugar Company.  http://www.hawaiistateinfo.com/pepeekeo.php

In the early 1960’s Hawaii produced a million tons of sugar cane annually.  One of every twelve workers participated in the sugar industry.  And these workers were among the highest paid in the world.

Ocean Vodka

Ultimately cheaper sugar from the Caribbean and other locales doomed Hawaii’s sugar cane industry.  The last plant closed on the Big Island in 1996.  However, the islands still possesses a rich agriculture industry, with large amounts of papaya, vegetables, coffee beans, flowers, and macadamia nuts still being grown and produced.  Hawaii Island is also known as the Orchid Isle due to its large production of tropical orchids. http://pinanius.org/tag/island-of-hawaii

Ancient Hawaiian Fish Ponds

I spent a weekend recently at the Fairmont Orchid at the Mauna Lani Resort, and learned that the Kalahuipua'a Fishponds are the spiritual center of the area.  Predating even the earliest Western contact, the ponds are from the days when the land and sea supported the Hawaiian Ali'i (royalty) -- the original inhabitants of the land.

The first true fishponds were probably built during the latter half of the fifteenth century.  And increasingly thereafter as chiefs could command the labor necessary to transport the tons of rock and coral used in the enclosing walls. These ponds, which yielded several hundred pounds of fish per acre annually, were not only feats of engineering technology, but reflected chiefly power and were a major symbol of the intensification of agricultural and aquacultural production. nps.gov

Auburn University

The Hawaiian people practiced the most advanced fish husbandry among the original peoples of the Pacific.  Fishponds (Hawaiian: loko I’a) were typically shallow areas of a reef flat surrounded by a low lava rock wall built out from the shore.  Several species of edible fish such as mullet thrived in such ponds, and methods were developed to make them easy to catch.  The Hawaiian fishpond was primarily a grazing area in which the fishpond keeper cultivated algae; much in the way a cattle rancher cultivates grass for his cattle.  Ponds were fed with cut grass, mussels, clams, seaweeds, and taro leaves. The porous lava walls let in seawater or sometimes fresh or brackish water but prevented the fish from escaping. servinghistory.com

zazzle.com

The ancient Hawaiians and their vast system of fish ponds are one of the foremost examples of successful fish farming in the world. Royal fishponds and ancient walled fish traps were part of the everyday landscape of old Hawaii.  When Captain James Cook reached Hawaii in 1778, there were approximately 360 fishponds producing almost two million pounds of fish per year. uhh.hawaii

The coastal fishponds and their resources were the exclusive property of the district chief and were not a major economic resource to the general population, who were prohibited by kapu from fishing, collecting seaweed, or polluting the pond. 

Joseph Farber

Commoners, especially women, were seldom in the vicinity of royal fishponds. There was little advantage for commoners to live near a pond for fear of breaking the kapu.  (Kapu means forbidden, though it also carries the meanings of sacred, consecrated, or holy.  In ancient Hawaii, kapu refers to the ancient system of laws and regulations.  An offense that was kapu was often a corporal offense, but also often denoted a threat to spiritual power, or theft of “mana.”  Kapus were strictly enforced. Breaking one, even unintentionally, often meant immediate death.)  Possibly after abandonment of the kapu system in the early nineteenth century did the population concentrate more around these ponds because the resources became available to them. www.nps.gov

By 1985 only seven ponds remained in use. It is estimated that the yields from the Hawaiian fishpond systems operating before the arrival of the Europeans would be on par with most contemporary extensive aquaculture systems; yet the traditional Hawaiian fishponds did not receive fertilization from animal or human wastes of any kind.  http://cmbc.ucsd.edu/Research/student_research/fishponds/

I have no idea how many fish ponds are in use today.  I did see notice of a recent study, supported by the National Science Foundation of a project at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation, whose goals were “to improve upon current techniques and management practices for marine aquaculture, through a detailed study of historical techniques that were used successfully throughout the Hawaiian Islands.” http://cmbc.ucsd.edu/Research/student_research/fishponds/

nal.usda.gov

With the world's fish populations dwindling at an alarming rate, interest in aquaculture is on the rise.  From the ancient loko iʻa to the advanced aquaculture research facilities at UH Hilo, Hawaii has a long tradition of innovation in this field.  The reemergence of the use of fish ponds may one day be an important source of ecologically sound and sustainable fish production and an important export business for the people and state of Hawaii.

Mark Twain: “The Cherimoya is Deliciousness Itself.”

“We had an abundance of mangoes, papaias and bananas here, but the pride of the islands, the most delicious fruit known to men, cherimoya, was not in season. It has a soft pulp, like a pawpaw, and is eaten with a spoon.”  (Mark Twain, The Sacramento Daily Union, October 25, 1866, Kilauea, June, 1866.)

Ever since I read this quote by Mark Twain almost one year ago (see Monkey Pod Tree) I had been searching out the cherimoya.  We spent this past weekend in the Waipio Valley on the Big Island, considered one of the ten most beautiful valleys in the world, and home to the steepest county road in the nation, at a fund raiser for the Slow Food Organization -- and to my great pleasure, I was given two cherimoyas.

http://skysukai.net78.net/

The taste has been said to be indescribable, or a mixture of banana and pineapple, but to me it seemed slightly pear-like in its flavor.  The texture was of custard.  And, yes it was magnificent!

Even Purdue University had this to say, “Certainly the most esteemed of the fruits of the genus family annonaceae, also called the custard apple family, is the cherimoya.”

The family is comprised of flowering plants consisting of trees, shrubs or rarely lianas (vines).  With about 2300 to 2500 species and more than 130 genera, it is the largest family in Magnoliales (yes, like the magnolia tree). The family is concentrated in the tropics, with a few species found intemperate regions like the paw-paw in the Midwest of the U.S. which is the largest edible fruit native to America.

The cherimoya is believed indigenous to the interandean valleys of Ecuador, Colombia and Bolivia.   In 1790 the cherimoya was introduced into Hawaii by Don Francisco de Paulo Marin. It is still grown in the islands and naturalized in dry upland forests.  http://www.hort.purdue.edu

The flesh of the ripe cherimoya is most commonly eaten out of-hand or scooped with a spoon from the cut open fruit. It really needs no embellishment but some people in Mexico like to add a few drops of lime juice. The skin and seeds are not to be eaten.  Occasionally it is seeded and added to fruit salads or used for making sherbet or ice cream.  The seeds are often crushed and used as an insecticide.

I had read that it was probably apocryphal that Mark Twain really said on tasting his first cherimoya that it was “deliciousness itself,” but entering in Google the words “Mark Twain” and “deliciousness itself” yielded 916 results, and then on page two, I found it!

http://www.feedbooks.com/

“We had an abundance of fruit in Honolulu, of course. Oranges, pine-apples, bananas, strawberries, lemons, limes, mangoes, guavas, melons, and a rare and curious luxury called the cherimoya, which is deliciousness itself.”  (Mark Twain, Roughing It, 1872)

Two famous botanists from the middle of the 19^th century had this to say about the cherimoya.

Thaddaeus Haenke, geographer and explorer in South America, called it a "masterpiece of nature.”

And, the famous fruit expert and botanist, Dr. Berthold Carl Seemann, who traveled widely and collected and described plants from the Pacific and South America. said, “The pinapple, the mangosteen and cherimoyas are considered the finest fruits in the world, and I have tasted them in the places where they are said to be at their best and reach their highest perfection--the pinapple in Milagro (Ecuador), the cherimoya on the slopes of the Andes and the mangosteen in the Indian Archipelago."  Dr. Seemann's unhesitating choice was reported to be, of course, the cherimoya.

I am not aware of any Hawaiian cherimoya mail order farms, but you can buy them from California growers.  One example is http://www.rain.org.  You indeed owe it to yourself!

Big Island = Big Cattle Ranch

http://www.honokaa.org/

You could probably win many bets on the mainland, especially in Texas, asking people to guess where the largest U.S. cattle ranch in the country’s history was located.  It certainly surprised me to learn that it was in Hawaii and, in fact, right here on the Big Island.

And it is still the largest ranch under a single private owner, and the fifth largest beef producing ranch in the nation.  It is also one of the country’s oldest ranches, with more than 160 years of history.

http://pica-org.org/

This is yet another story involving King Kamehameha I and his impact on Hawaii.  It began in 1809, a single generation after Captain James Cook first encountered the Hawaiian Islands (or the Sandwich Islands as he called them).  It also started very modestly when the British Captain George Vancouver presented Kamehameha with just one bull and five cows 21 years earlier in 1793.

From these animals released on the Big Island, which reportedly arrived in a very beat-up condition, they generated a huge heard of thousands of feral cattle roaming about the Big Island, causing untold problems for the subjects of the great King.  You may recall that David Douglas (for which the Douglas Fir tree is named) fell or was pushed into a “bullock pit” and died in 1834.

So it was that in 1809 King Kamehameha asked John Parker, a 19-year-old New England sailor from Boston (part of the family owning the Parker House Hotel), to round up the wild cows.  His story is fascinating as well --  Parker had jumped ship here in Hawaii and somehow soon came to the attention of King Kamehameha who, in turn, entrusted him with important assignments.  With the help of Hawaiian workers, Parker established a booming beef, tallow and hide business with visiting whalers and sandalwood trading ships.

http://www.bigisland.org/

Due mostly to Parker’s efforts, salt beef eventually replaced the increasingly scarce sandalwood as the island’s chief export. As the need for beef increased, so did his fortune and influence. And in 1815, Parker married Kipikane, the daughter of a high-ranking chief, who bore John a daughter and two sons, and the Parker dynasty began.  http://parkerranch.com/Parker-Ranch/161/history-of-parker-ranch

By 1832, Parker was desperate for help. He worked with King Kamehameha III to contract Mexican vaqueros, expert horsemen with plenty of cattle experience. They arrived with boots and saddles, a new language and a flamboyant new lifestyle for the island. Called “paniolo” (“espanol”) by Hawaiians, these cowboys trained local men to rope and ride 20-30 years before their American counterparts in the Wild West. Their contributions to local culture included the guitar, ukulele and slack key tuning, and a lifestyle of hard work, close-knit family ties and music that thrives to this day.

http://www.kakufm.org/

The beef business boomed and Parker Ranch was born. Over the next century it grew into the world’s largest privately-owned cattle ranch with 150,000 acres raising 30,000 head of prime Angus and Charolais beef cattle. (At its peak it spread over half a million acres.)  And until 1992 the ranch was controlled by a descendent of John Parker, after which the ranch has been governed by the Parker Ranch Foundation Trust.  http://www.bigisland.org/activities-cultural/464/history-of-paniolo-ranching-on-hawaiis-big-island

Today the Parker Ranch is a respected cattle ranch across some 175,000 acres of the Big Island and known for its quality beef, producing 10 million pounds of beef each year and ranking as the fifth largest cow-calf operation in the United States.  http://www.hawaii247.com/2010/06/24/parker-ranch-waives-admission-to-historic-homes-june-26/ 

Hawaii’s “First Industry” -- Sandalwood

The history of Hawaii after European contact can be traced through a succession of dominant industries: first sandalwood, followed by (beef on the Big Island), whaling, sugarcane, pineapple, military, tourism, and education. Since statehood in 1959, tourism has been the largest industry, despite efforts to diversify.

Sandalwood ('iliahi) is the name of different fragrant woods. These woods are often used for the essential oil they contain. The wood is heavy and yellow in color as well as fine-grained, and unlike many other aromatic woods it retains its fragrance for decades. The sandalwood fragrance is very distinctive and is used in countless applications. Sandalwood has been valued and treasured for many years for its fragrance, carving, medical and religious qualities.

Unlike most trees, sandalwood is harvested by toppling the entire tree instead of sawing them down at the trunk. This way, valuable wood from the stump and root can also be sold or processed for oil.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandalwood

By the time Captain Cook landed on the Hawaiian Islands in 1778, India's supply of sandalwood was nearly depleted.  This set the stage for Hawaii's entry into the international commercial market. During the 1800s, traders made deals with Hawaiian chiefs to cut down the native sandalwood trees, and sailing ships carried thousands of tons of heartwood to India, Asia and Europe. Soon the native forests of sandalwood and other beautiful hardwoods (such as Acacia koa) were all cut down, a massive deforestation from which the islands have never recovered. http://www.indiadivine.org/audarya/hinduism-forum/189256-sandalwood-india-hawaii.html

http://www.pacificislandbooks.com/cookislands.htm
(Sandalwood trade in Rarotonga)

In 1811 Kamehameha controlled the sandalwood trade as a near-monopoly through the use of his agents. While a few individual chiefs also dealt directly with traders, it was not until the death of Kamehameha I that a wholesale pillaging of sandalwood forests took place. While Kamehameha I still held the reigns, he placed a kapu on young trees and no transaction was ever done on credit.

After Kamehameha's death in 1819, his son Kamehameha II fell into debt with sandalwood traders. Having given away his own lands, he relied on the wood supplies of others. http://www.hawaiihistory.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=ig.page&PageID=274

In December 1826, the kingdom of Hawai'i enacted its first written law — a sandalwood tax. Every man was ordered to deliver to the government a half picul of 'iliahi, or pay four Spanish dollars, by Sept. 1, 1827. Every woman older than 13 was obligated to make a 12-by-6-foot kapa cloth. The taxes were collected to reduce a staggering debt level.

This period saw two major famines as 'iliahi was harvested to the point of near extinction in Hawai'i forests. The common people were displaced from their agricultural and fishing duties, and all labor was diverted to harvesting sandalwood.  http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2006/Apr/14/il/FP604140306.html

By 1830, the trade in sandalwood had completely collapsed. Hawaiian forests were exhausted and sandalwood from other areas in the Pacific (e.g., Rarotonga) drove down the price and made the Hawaiian trade unprofitable. Although forests were ravaged, sandalwood trees still survive today, tucked away on less accessible mountain slopes.  http://www.hawaiihistory.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=ig.page&PageID=274> 

Spinning Dolphins?

Last April we witnessed an astounding sight, at least for us.  Off of our lanai, too far out to be seen clearly, were what appeared to be about seven huge fish seemingly walking on their tails.  It turned out that they weren’t fish, nor were they walking on their tails – they were actually dolphins that were spinning while virtually totally out of the water.

And they are known as Hawaiian Spinner Dolphins (Nai’a).  They can leap into the air and make as many as seven complete spins rotating around their longitudinal axis before diving back into the ocean.  And, no one seems to know why they spin.

Around Hawaii, spinner dolphins congregate at night in large herds in the deep channels between the islands to feed. During the day, they break up into smaller groups and come near shore to rest and play. One of the places where they can commonly be seen is in Kealakekua Bay on the island of Hawaii.

Kealakekua Bay is twelve miles south of Kailua-Kona on the west side of the Big Island.  The bay is historic because it marks the site where Captain James Cook landed on the island. Cook was the first British explorer to establish contact with Hawaii in 1778 (on Kauai). Only a year later, he was killed in a skirmish with native Hawaiians in Kealakekua Bay.

A white obelisk on the shore of the bay memorializes his death. On the east side of the bay there is also the Hikiau Heiau (sacred temple) dedicated to the Hawaiian god, Lono.

Spinner dolphins are the smallest of Hawaii’s dolphins.  They are generally between five and six feet in length and weigh 130 to 200 pounds.  As mammals, dolphins bear live young and the mothers nurse them on milk and provide care.

Pasted from <http://hawaiihumpbackwhale.noaa.gov/explore/spinner_dolphins.html>

Dolphins are protected under the U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act.  It is against the law to harass, hunt, capture, or kill, or attempt to harass, hunt, capture or kill a dolphin. NOAA.  For the dolphins' sake, and for your safety, visitors and residents are asked to please not feed, swim with, or harass wild dolphins. People are encouraged to observe them from a distance of at least 50 yards.

Five Volcanoes !

All Hawaiians know the Big Island was created by the commingling lava flows from five immense volcanoes, but most visitors know only two – i.e., Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea.  And, somewhat uniquely, the volcanoes of Hawaii are not where plates meet, but actually thousands of miles from the nearest plate boundary in what is known as a “hot-spot” in the Pacific Plate.  Also, Hawaii’s volcanoes are not the type like Mt. St. Helens or Mt. Etna that can have explosive eruptions; they simply release flows of relatively fluid lava.

http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/kilauea/

Currently there are two volcanoes on the Big Island classified as active:

1.   Kilauea, actively erupting for almost the past 30 years is the world’s most active volcano.  It has been spewing lava continuously since January 1983.   Kilauea nestles into the side of Mauna Loa and was once considered a part of Mauna Loa, but subsequent research showed that it has its own “magma-plumbing system.”  http://hawaii.aloha-hawaii.com/hawaii/big+island+volcanoes/

Located in Volcanoes National Park near the caldera of Kilauea is the “fire pit,” which is known as Halemaumau (“House of Everlasting Fire”).  Halemaumau at times has a contained lake of boiling lava. The pit is enlarged periodically by steam blasts and collapsing walls. Typical eruptions consist of lava flows forming lava lakes in Halemaumau or elsewhere on the caldera through fissures and rift zones.  Volcanoes National Park is actually Hawaii’s most visited tourist attraction, with nearly 9,000 daily visitors coming to the park. http://www.hawaiilogue.com/active-volcanoes-in-hawaii.html

Pele, the Hawaiian Volcano Goddess, is said to live within the Halemaumau firepit.

2.   Mauna Loa (“Long Mountain”), which last erupted in 1984 is the world’s largest volcano. It is also considered one of the most active volcanoes, having erupted 33 times since 1843.

Both of these active Hawaiian volcanoes share the Hawaiian hot spot, but retain unique volcanic histories and compositions.

And three volcanoes on Hawaii are generally classified as dormant:

1.   Kohala, the oldest, which is believed to have emerged from the sea more than 500,000 years ago.

2.   Hualalai, with six different vents that spewed lava, two of which produced lava flows that reached the ocean. The Kona International Airport is build atop the larger of the two flows. It last erupted in 1801, but some still consider it still “active,” which would be a major problem for the population center around Kona-Kohala.

3.   Mauna Kea (“White Mountain”), reaching 13,796 feet above sea level is the world’s tallest mountain (measured from the floor of the ocean to its summit) which last erupted about 4,000 years ago.  It is often snow covered in winter.  It is also the site of 13 astronomical observatories and is expected to be home to what will be the world’s largest telescope, the Thirty Meter Telescope.

       http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/GG/HCV/haw_formation.html  //hawaii.aloha-hawaii.com/hawaii/big+island+volcanoes/

Since the vast majority of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occur near plate boundaries, how did the Hawaiian Islands which are entirely of volcanic origin, form in the middle of the Pacific Ocean almost 2,000 miles from the nearest plate boundary?

“J. Tuzo Wilson came up with the Hotspot Theory in 1963. According to his theory, the Hawaiian Island chain resulted from the Pacific Plate moving over a deep, stationary hotspot in the mantle, located beneath the present-day position of the Island of Hawaii. Heat from this hotspot produced a persistent source of magma by partly melting the overriding Pacific Plate. The magma then rises through the mantle and crust to erupt onto the seafloor, forming an active seamount.

Over time, countless eruptions cause the seamount to grow until it finally emerges above sea level to form an island volcano. As the plate movement carries the island beyond the hotspot, the magma source is cutoff, and volcanism ceases. As one island becomes extinct another develops over the hotspot.”  http://www.pdc.org/iweb/volcano_history.jsp

In fact right now a young submarine volcano called Loihi (“Long”) is growing about 20 miles south of the Big Island.  Its ascending summit is currently 3,000 feet below the ocean surface.  http://www.bestplaceshawaii.com/island_insights/bigisland/volcanoes.html

When most people envision a volcano, they think of a tall and cone shaped volcano (think Mount Hood outside of Portland, Oregon). These strato volcanoes tend to have dramatic and explosive eruptions (think Mount Saint Helens).

The five volcanoes of the Big Island are shield volcanoes, which are long and broad and have gently sloping hills.  Shield volcanoes’ lava has a lower viscosity, meaning that the lava is thinner and more fluid.  Because of the fluidity of the lava, major explosive eruptions generally do not occur.  This is why the almost constant flowing lava of Kilauea can be approached and seen by visitors to Volcanoes National park. http://www.hawaiilogue.com/active-volcanoes-in-hawaii.html

All the photos in this post are by Bryan Lowry, are © protected and usage requires his permission.  Please visit Bryan‘s website to see the vast collection of images by this award winning photographer whose photos have also appeared in National Geographic (http://lavapix.com). Significantly, 20% of Bryan’s website sales profits go to Easter Seals Hawaii on the Big Island.