Recently, it seems as though there\u2019s a boom market in books about endangered species that have gone or are well on their way to extinction. And Hawai`i, unfortunately, offers no shortage of candidate subjects. Two years ago, there was Mark Walters\u2019 book on the `alala, Seeking the Sacred Raven.<\/i> As readers of Environment Hawai`i<\/i> may recall, that volume seemed to me an exercise in vain self-indulgence. It shed little light on the circumstances leading to the `alala\u2019s plight, while giving free rein to Walters\u2019 own existential angst.<\/p>\n
\tAn entirely different animal is Alvin Powell\u2019s new book on the po`ouli, The Race to Save the World\u2019s Rarest Bird<\/i> (Stackpole Books, 2008). Powell\u2019s account relies heavily on interviews with the biologists who discovered the bird in 1973 and studied it over the next three decades. His retelling of their hardships and joys makes for lively, engrossing reading. In several instances, Powell has provided the first published record of their experiences, making his work invaluable as an oral history, if nothing else (though it is much more). That there is a crying need for this type of record was underscored with the recent death of David Woodside, the former state biologist who was among those involved with the po`ouli and interviewed by Powell.<\/p>\n
\tIn recounting the factors that forced the po`ouli into ever higher, ever wetter, and seemingly ever more hostile habitat, Powell provides a succinct but well-grounded recap of human disturbance in the islands. The fateful introduction of the mosquito, a vector of devastating disease for many native birds, is one of the critical turning points in this history. Powell relates this event and its heartbreaking consequences with a fresh voice, diving deep into scientific literature going back half a century or more.<\/p>\n
\tAnd though Powell provides a good deal of helpful context, he manages always to bring the story back to the bird. For example, while there\u2019s no shortage of discussions of the ways in which feral pigs damage habitat for native Hawaiian forest birds, Powell describes the precise ways in which pigs affected the East Maui forest where the po`ouli was making its last stand.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cThrough the mid-1980s, [Cameron] Kepler and [Steve] Mountainspring became more and more worried by what they saw in the forests of Hanawi. Po`ouli numbers were declining, and increasing numbers of pigs were wiping out the forest understory. And the pigs\u2019 wallowing wasn\u2019t just clearing out the vegetation that the po`ouli relied on for the snails and insects it ate. It was also causing extensive erosion of the sloped forest floor, endangering the forest itself.\u201d The two measured soil loss over the next year, with Mountainspring telling Powell that, \u201cin areas there was really massive soil loss\u2026 The erosion was so horrific there.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tAt the same time, it became clear that po`ouli numbers were in steep decline. Although estimates of its population were always very rough, what data were available led scientists to believe that its numbers fell between 80 and 99 percent from 1975 to 1981.<\/p>\n
\tBy the mid-1980s, experts agreed that an integral part of any effort to recover the po`ouli and other rare birds in East Maui would have to be a fence to keep out pigs. But when the federal Fish and Wildlife Service sought to get the state\u2019s cooperation in building a fence, it ran into a brick wall. Powell provides details on the state\u2019s maddening foot-dragging at what might well have been a critical time for the po`ouli\u2019s chance for survival.<\/p>\n
\tAfter the federal government had approved funds for the fencing, Powell writes, Allan Marmelstein, head of the FWS office in Honolulu, wrote the director of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, Susumu Ono, in October 1985. Marmelstein cited \u201cthe drop in po`ouli numbers, the birds\u2019 limited geographic range, and the dramatic increase in pig damage.\u201d He noted that fences were an element in the forest bird recovery plan for Maui and Moloka`i, and that the federal government would be paying for the fences. Since the land was owned by the state, approval was needed from Ono\u2019s department.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cOver the next three months, the state tried to ensure that the proper paperwork was filed and that it wouldn\u2019t get stuck with the project\u2019s bill,\u201d Powell writes. \u201cTheir correspondences showed little concern that a remaining tract of intact native forest be preserved to secure the future of an imperiled native bird.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cThroughout this process,\u201d he continues, \u201cthere were signs that the state had little enthusiasm for the fencing effort. On October 31, 1985, a state official refused to meet with Marmelstein, saying \u2018there was nothing to discuss.\u2019 On November 7, Ono wrote to Marmelstein that they hadn\u2019t decided whether the project was a good idea.\u201d Even the Natural Area Reserve System Commission, which had a role to play since much of the area to be fenced was part of a state Natural Area Reserve, refused to cooperate, although the Hanawi NAR management plan \u201cclearly supported removing pigs from Hanawi,\u201d Powell notes. Then-NARSC executive secretary Robert Lee informed the FWS that the request for a special permit for the fence \u201ccontains little or no detail on method and procedure, the potential adverse impact on the native ecosystem, and the management of the installed project\u2026. We perceive our staff review and recommendation for a subsequent NARS Commission evaluation to be largely a matter of weighing the benefit of the project against detrimental effects that likely will occur to achieve that benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWhile the state was dithering over permits and dragging its feet on the paperwork, it was also adamant that its turf be protected,\u201d Powell writes. \u201cLee chastised Cameron Kepler for not waiting for the state to issue a special use permit for his research in Hanawi, warning [Ernest] Kosaka [of FWS] \u2026 that Kepler\u2019s permitless work was \u2018technically illegal\u2019 and that the state could confiscate equipment used in it, including the helicopters that touched down in the reserve.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tThe state\u2019s recalcitrance was only the first stumbling block. Estimates of what it would cost to build the fence in rugged Hanawi turned out to outstrip the funds available for the project. As Powell writes, it would be another three years before the fencing project was launched. \u201cDuring those three years, pigs continued to run free through Hanawi, and the po`ouli lost more and more habitat. Though three birds were seen during the November 1985 trip\u2026 no po`ouli were seen at all in 1987, and though some were spotted in 1988, none were seen in 1989.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tThroughout the 1990s, sightings of po`ouli became even less frequent. In 1994, Michelle Reynolds and Tom Snetsinger found five or six po`ouli, which fed hopes that a last-ditch effort to save the bird might have a chance of success. A year later, the Maui Critically Endangered Species Project (informally called the Po`ouli Project) was up and running, Powell writes. Paul Baker, who headed up fieldwork for the project, mapped out home ranges of six birds, including two pairs. In 1996, the known population had dropped to five. \u201cWorse, in July, both pairs lost a partner\u2026 The remaining po`ouli population totaled three.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dissension<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
But as the bird\u2019s population crashed, dissent among those charged with its recovery soared. Much of what Powell describes is well known to those closest to the project. Those of us more distant heard occasional rumors of personality clashes, disputed decisions, and other disagreements, but knowing exactly who and what were at issue was usually difficult. Powell, however, was able to get those involved to speak candidly of their experiences, and the result sheds a great deal of light on the many problems that, perhaps inevitably, arise when dozens of individuals, agencies, and agendas are thrown together in a common effort.<\/p>\n
\tOne of the more bizarre angles to emerge from Powell\u2019s history is the role Mike Buck played. Buck, as head of the DLNR\u2019s Division of Forestry and Wildlife through the 1990s, was the boss of every state employee and contract worker involved with the po`ouli\u2019s recovery \u2013 which, Powell notes, Buck evidently thought was a futile process from the outset. Mark Collins, who headed up the Maui field work for several years, recounted to Powell a conversation he had with Buck while attending the annual Hawai`i Conservation Conference, a short time after Collins was brought onto the project. Collins, Powell writes, was pulled aside by Buck, who then asked him, \u201cWhat are we going to do about the po`ouli?\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cCollins says he began recounting the story of New Zealand\u2019s black robin, drawing lessons from an effort that recovered the robin from a single breeding pair. Then he stopped.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201c\u2018It turns out he wasn\u2019t really listening to me,\u2019 Collins says. \u2018That wasn\u2019t what he was referring to. He was thinking in the context of some kind of ceremony about the passing of the po`ouli. Here I am a couple of weeks into this, and they\u2019re talking funeral.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tA few pages later, Powell describes a meeting in April 1998 that Buck called, ostensibly to build \u201cmutual understanding of the available options \u2026 for po`ouli recovery.\u201d In talking with Powell, however, Buck described the meeting \u201cas something of a counseling session for those who had cared for a dying friend: the po`ouli.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cBuck says that because he had lived through the death of both his wife and father, he recognized what was going on with those involved in the recovery effort and what was behind the disagreements. \u2018I had a whole different perspective on grieving and on how to manage this issue. What we were really doing was managing an extinction. I knew that going in, and what I was seeing all around me were the kinds of things people do when they\u2019re grieving: blaming someone, fear, all those kinds of things.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\tAt the meeting, Buck said, \u201cI was trying to talk to people about how you have an extinction in a culturally appropriate way.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tYet others, including Robert Smith of the FWS Honolulu office, weren\u2019t giving up, although he acknowledged that the federal government should have given the bird\u2019s recovery higher priority.<\/p>\n
\tPowell writes: \u201cDespite Smith\u2019s acknowledgement, the lesson that delay would only further the po`ouli\u2019s decline appeared not to have been learned \u2013 or at least not heeded. Though these birds of unknown lifespan were already several years old, four more years of planning and paperwork still lay ahead before a single po`ouli was translocated, and six more years passed before one would be captured for breeding.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tIn gruesome detail, Powell describes many of the conflicts that led to that delay. No one can know exactly what role the dithering and conflicts and foot-dragging played in the po`ouli\u2019s ultimate extinction \u2013 a well-documented event that occurred near midnight on Friday, November 26, 2004, when the last known bird died in captivity.<\/p>\n
\tOne can say with certainty, however, that the years of turmoil did nothing to enhance the bird\u2019s slim chance of survival. By dissecting those conflicts, Powell has laid out a cautionary tale \u2013 and although the po`ouli is beyond help, his description of all that went wrong in efforts to save it should be required reading for anyone involved in future recovery efforts. For the rest of us, it\u2019s maddening, aggravating, informative \u2013 and well-written, to boot. Although the subject is hard reading at times, Powell\u2019s prose carries the story along.<\/p>\n
\tAnd, despite it all, he ends on an upbeat note. Powell quotes Jim Jacobi, who was as deeply involved in the po`ouli story as anyone else. \u201cKeep your eyes and ears open,\u201d Jacobi told Powell. \u201cI tend to be one of the optimists who feel we may still see another.\u201d<\/p>\n
— Patricia Tummons<\/p>\n
Volume 18, Number 10 April 2008<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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