By Teresa Dawson
A couple, its two offspring, and a single male may be the only surviving ‘akikiki left in the Halehaha portion of Kaua‘i’s Alaka‘i plateau, and they may all die of avian malaria as early as next spring.
That’s according to Lainie Berry, forest bird recovery coordinator for the state Division of Forestry and Wildlife (DOFAW).
Last month, the state Board of Land and Natural Resources approved her request to rescue them as soon as possible and send them to a conservation center on Maui run by the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance.
There, after a month in quarantine, the endangered honeycreepers will join about three dozen captive-hatched-and-raised ‘akikiki.
The Kaua‘i Forest Bird Working Group concluded earlier this year that given the mosquito and avian malaria trends in the Alaka‘i plateau, it would be best to collect those ‘akikiki that are most in danger, Berry said.
The Halehaha unit has suffered significant losses over the past several years. In 2015, 35 separate ‘akikiki territories, including 70 birds, had been identified.
This year, only three territories remain and the decline in the number of birds is even more severe. In June, surveys located just 11 ‘akikiki, and by September, surveyors found just the five.
By capturing and banding the birds, managers have been able to track the ‘akikiki’s annual survival rate. In Halehaha, the average combined survival rate for males and females dropped from about 75 percent in 2015 to less than 50 percent in 2020.
“This is a major concern,” Berry said.
The decline coincides with an increase in mosquito numbers. Berry also noted that mosquitoes were caught in Halehaha this past spring, when they had never been caught in the spring before.
She said that increased mosquito numbers have caused an increase in the prevalence of avian malaria in all birds at Halehaha. In 1994, it was found in 2 percent of the birds. Now, it’s in 20 percent of them, she said.
Breeding Boost
In addition to saving the five ‘akikiki there from almost certain death, the division hopes their infusion into the captive population will boost its breeding success.
‘Akikiki were listed as endangered in 2010 and in 2018, it was estimated that there could be as few as 120 to as many as 886 of them left in the wild.
Experts now say there may be fewer than 100 left, and Berry said the species could go extinct in the wild in the next three years “or maybe even sooner,” as disease-carrying mosquitoes invade more and more of its habitat.
If that happens, the captive population is crucial to the species’ survival. But that population needs help, as well.
‘Akikiki eggs collected between 2015 and 2018 resulted in a flock of 36 founders, including 15 breeding pairs. Most of the birds are at the Maui facility, but a few are at one on Hawai‘i Island in Keauhou.
Berry said that while the birds have laid a considerable number of eggs, they’ve successfully produced just six offspring.
“They’re not breeding as well in captivity as we had hoped. The founders are aging out. We don’t think they can currently act as the insurance population against extinction that we had originally planned,” she said, adding later, “They are laying eggs, but the eggs are not hatching.”
The addition of the wild birds could “contribute to the genetic and behavioral diversity of the extant captive flock, ‘jump starting’ or reinvigorating the breeding program,” states an ‘akikiki protection plan prepared in October by the Hawai‘i Endangered Bird Conservation Program, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, Kaua‘i Forest Bird Recovery Project, Pacific Bird Conservation, DOFAW, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
To further aid in breeding success, Berry said that managers will try hand- rearing chicks, diversifying the birds’ diet, and enhancing the aviaries.
“In the wild, the territories are spaced out. They don’t have pairs next to each other,” she said, adding that in addition to being bigger and further apart, the aviaries will have “more solid barriers, so they can’t see or hear each other,” and the humidity and rainfall will be adjusted “to mimic more closely what’s in the wild.”
Mosquito Management
Once the malaria threat is addressed, managers plan to return the captured birds, which are endemic to Kaua‘i, to the wild, Berry said.
“Kaua‘i, if possible. That would be our priority. We’re also looking to establish a population on the Big Island where there is more high-elevation habitat than Kaua‘i,” she said.
In addition to continuing traditional mosquito-control efforts, such as removing feral ungulates, implementing a landscape-scale mosquito birth-control program is what resource managers hope will alter the survival trajectory of many of Hawai‘i’s endangered forest birds.
Male Culex quinquefasciatus mosquitoes carrying a unique strain of the Wolbachia bacteria are ready to be released in field trials. When they mate with local female mosquitoes, which carry a different strain of the bacteria, the eggs produced should fail to hatch and total mosquito numbers will drop over time.
Berry reported that managers hope to start trials next year and implement landscape-scale mosquito control in high- priority forest bird habitats on Kaua‘i and Maui the following year.
Lisa “Cali” Crampton, leader of the Kaua‘i Forest Bird Recovery Project, has estimated that it will take a couple of years of regularly releasing the lab-reared male mosquitoes to reduce wild populations to levels safe enough to return the birds back into the wild.
At a recent Hawai‘i forest bird conservation crisis summit, experts agreed that the ‘akikiki and ‘akeke‘e on Kaua‘i, and Maui‘s kiwiku and ‘akohekohe will go extinct due to avian malaria without some kind of intervention.
Board member Kaiwi Yoon said he hoped the timeline for landscape-scale mosquito control could be expedited. “2024 is probably breakneck speed for us. I think you’ve said by 2025, if all else fails, this species will be extinct. That’s a tight time frame,” he said of the ‘akikiki.
Berry said that functional extinction, which is when there are too few breeding pairs to sustain a population, could come even sooner than 2025 for ‘akikiki. “We are very, very concerned,” she said.
“The good news is we do have a captive population. Unfortunately, it’s not breeding as well as we had hoped but part of that could be because the birds were collected as eggs. Bringing adult birds into captivity could help with the success of the breeding,” she added.
She said that at least a dozen ‘akikiki territories in the Alaka‘i outside Halehaha are not showing the same kind of decline as inside. “It could be because they are up on the pali and the mosquitoes may not be able to occupy the pali area as well as they occur in the Haleahaha area,” she suggested.
If the birds in those other territories start to decline, “we may need to act again” she said. “For the moment, we wanted to leave those birds in the wild because they seem relatively stable.”
Board member Sam Gon, senior scientist and cultrual advisor with The Nature Conservancy of Hawai‘i, said as someone who has worked with all four of the birds at risk of extinction, “it really saddens me to see their decline. It’s good to see action is being taken, rather than standing by and watching. … We have modified nature so much it really is our kuleana to take action where we can.”
He seconded Kaua‘i board member Tommy Oi’s motion to approve DOFAW’s request to move the birds. It was unanimously approved.
(For more on this, see our April 2021 Board Talk item, “Fate of Endangered Forest Birds Hinges On Landscape-Scale Mosquito Control,” and our July 2021 New & Noteworthy item. Both are available at www.environment-hawaii.org.)
Board Denies Petition For Rules on Appraisals
On November 12, the Land Board unanimously rejected a petition by the Sierra Club to initiate the Department of Land and Natural Resources’ rulemaking process to develop guidance for appraisers who may be tapped to determine the fair market value of a water lease to be sold at a public auction.
The organization had submitted its petition in response to guidance prepared by the department’s Land Division and presented to the Land Board for approval on October 22.
Because water in Hawai‘i is considered a public trust resource and not a commodity, appraisers have expressed reticence about determining a market value for state water leases.
Several entities across the state have been diverting water under annually renewed revocable permits for years and are eager to secure long-term leases or licenses to continue their diversions. The guidance drafted by the Land Division was intended to help them — and any future water lessees — reach that goal.
The guidance laid out several factors that appraisers should consider and recommended that the starting point for valuation should be the current revocable permit rent. Those factors included the amount of water diverted in proportion to what’s available from the diversion source, delivery costs, and the avoided cost of getting the water from practicable alternative sources, among other things.
Before voting to approve an amended version of the guidance, the board denied an oral request for a contested case hearing by Department of Hawaiian Home Lands director William Aila, who believed the guidance failed to ensure that an adequate upset rent would be established. The agency did follow up with a written petition for a contested case hearing, which the board will take up in January.
In the meantime, the Land Board had to deal with the Sierra Club’s petition for rulemaking. The group had argued that rulemaking was required by law for the kind of guidance that the board had adopted.
The group also proffered its own proposed rules. If adopted, they would establish two separate starting points for appraisals of water leases, licenses or permits: one for the use of more than five million gallons a day (mgd), and another for the use of less water.
Dispositions for “Native Hawaiian traditional and customary practices, appurtenant rights, the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, or for the instream, in watershed cultivation of kalo done in a traditional manner may be appraised at a nominal or gratis value,” under the Sierra Club’s proposed rules.
Those for the use of less than 5 mgd could be adjusted “based on a demonstrated lack of impacts to public trust purposes of water.”
And those for water solely used to produce food for sale solely within the state or “for renewable energy generation may be adjusted based on consistency with state planning act policies, provided that any adjustments shall not affect the amount of revenues to which the Office of Hawaiian Affairs or Department of Hawaiian Home Lands would be entitled based on the initial appraised value, and provided further that such adjustments shall not exceed 10% of the initial appraised value,” the proposed rules stated.
Also, adjustments could only follow consultation with OHA, the DHHL, the state Commission on Water Resource Management, the DLNR’s Division of Aquatic Resources, and “any other agency with relevant expertise, and only after a public hearing held with 30 days’ notice and within the community closest to the affected water source.”
The appraiser would also have to address each comment in writing and those responses would be posted on the DLNR’s website for a full month before the board would be asked to approve the lease, license or permit covered by the appraisal.
At the board’s October 22 meeting, the Land Division’s Ian Hirokawa argued that because the guidance had not yet been tested and was not intended for immediate, broad use, it was too soon to consider turning the guidance into rules.
In the division’s November 12 recommendation to the Land Board to deny the Sierra Club’s petition, it added, “The guidance is general, non-binding and provides significant discretion for an appraiser to utilize their expertise and professional judgment. … Furthermore, the board’s action should not be considered rulemaking as it does not affect private rights of, or procedures available to the public. While the petition raises important concerns about public trust obligations regarding the use of water, these issues are already directly addressed by the determination of instream flow standards by the Commission on Water Resource Management and the approval of a water lease by the Board, not the process by which water is appraised.”
In his testimony opposing the Land Division’s recommendation, Sierra Club of Hawai‘i executive director Wayne Chung Tanaka countered, “The appraisal guidance specifically concerns the valuation of water leases, which would clearly affect the rights of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands to a pro rata share of lease revenues. The guidance also specifically impacts the public auction process, which by its very nature is a procedure available to the public.”
He cited a number of court cases sup- porting his argument that rulemaking was required. After meeting in executive session, however, the board chose to approve the Land Division’s recommendation to deny the petition.
Before going into executive session, board member Chris Yuen pointed to what he saw as problems with the Sierra Club’s proposed rules. He also noted that should the department take those rules as written out to public hearings, it would likely have to go through the process again after amendments were made to fix those flaws.
“Do you think the board can establish a rule that guided how the lease would be appraised that would incorporate factors not [related to] fair market value? To be specific about this, there are things like whether the food grown is for consumption in Hawai‘i versus export for somewhere else,” he told Tanaka.
When the Land Board has departed from awarding leases at fair market value, it always points to a specific statutory authorization, Yuen continued. “You’re proposing a reduction essentially, potentially in what we would charge a water lease if it was for an agricultural purpose, whether the crop were grown for local consumption. … Certainly, somewhere, there’s state policy of growing food for local consumption. I’m not aware of anything that grants the ability for the board to grant discounts for that,” he said.
Tanaka said the board did have constitutional obligations, particularly with respect to water, which is a public trust resource.
To this, Yuen said he questioned whether the board could reduce the rent to an organization that wants to serve a public trust purpose but was not a non-profit that qualified for discounted rent under current laws.
“You could not really say that … we have the discretion under our public trust duties, we could discount rent because we like their purposes,” he said.
Volume 32, Number 6 December 2021
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