The corn may have missed the bon dance, but it will be ready for Father’s Day. About three dozen volunteers from the Lihu‘e Hongwanji Mission were joined by crews from Pioneer Hi-Bred International as they attacked a plot of sweet
The corn may have missed the bon dance, but it will be ready for Father’s Day.
About three dozen volunteers from the Lihu‘e Hongwanji Mission were joined by crews from Pioneer Hi-Bred International as they attacked a plot of sweet corn that was ready for harvest, Thursday.
Ted Inouye, the chairman for the Lihu‘e Hongwanji bon dance which was celebrated last weekend, said the corn will be available Sunday at the church in Kapa‘ia as well as at booths set up at Wal-Mart and Kmart.
“Thank heaven for Floyd Libre of ‘Ohana Farms,’” Inouye said. “He got some of the Pioneer people to come out and help harvest the 16,000 ears that will be available.”
But that number differed from Libre’s estimate of closer to 30,000 ears from the plot that measured more than an acre.
“We’ve been growing corn for Pioneer for about five years, now,” Libre said. “We’re contractors and we do all the planting in the Lihu‘e area.”
Damien Lazaro and Audie Bernadino, both employees of Pioneer Hi-Bred, agreed.
“We have a lot of corn in this area,” Bernadino said. “There’re lots in Lihu‘e, up at Kukui Grove and in areas back of that.”
Although no estimate of how much corn is being grown by Pioneer in the area, Bernadino said they are no strangers to planting for community groups.
Earlier, he said they had a project going to benefit one of the Kalawai baseball teams.
“It’s always good to help the community,” Libre said.
For many of the volunteers, they exchanged their normal work clothes for leather gloves, thick fabric clothes and protection from the rapidly-rising morning sun.
Clesson Lee, coming off doing kitchen duty at the bon dance, quickly shed his T-shirt as he hefted bags of ears to a waiting pickup where more seasoned members of the church worked to clean the ears in preparation for the sale.
Inouye, working with Libre and the Pioneer crew, quickly learned how to spot the ears with worms and relayed that information down to the cleaning crews.
Wesley Shimokawa, normally a longshoreman who ties up ships at the harbor, emerged from one of the rows.
“This is work,” he said.
According to Inouye, the corn will be available at Wal-Mart, Kmart and the church between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. Sunday.
• Dennis Fujimoto, photographer and staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 253) or dfujimoto@kauaipubco.com.
