Bird trills, I thought, as I was practicing a Prokoviev symphony up in the highest reaches of my violin for my Kauai Community College Orchestra class. The Russian composer must have listened and elaborated on some very fine bird calls.
Bird trills, I thought, as I was practicing a Prokoviev symphony up in the highest reaches of my violin for my Kauai Community College Orchestra class. The Russian composer must have listened and elaborated on some very fine bird calls. Interestingly, the birds in our garden were responding noticeably.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, however, I can remember a day of silence. A day with no bird song.
This was the second shock as we cautiously went outside after Hurricane Iniki, Sept. 11, 1992. I remember thinking, “This is what it must be like after an atomic blast” — only the moisture-laden air in that cruel dawning was breathable, the water sources, not tainted with poisonous fall-out.
But where were the birds that usually frequented our garden? The squeaky mynahs? The roosters, hens and chicks? The coo-roo-roo barred doves? The feisty cardinals, and chirruping sparrows? The shamas, mejiros, meadowlarks, mockingbirds, and twittery Java sparrows?
Gone, “the way of the wind.”
Here, the neighbors, hauling out drenched furniture and carpets. There, the top floor of the a house, smack in the middle of the street next to a car looking like a smashed sardine tin. The hillside looked burned, all plants and leaves gone, and beams, glass, corrugated iron, tiles, and sodden paper and cloth were strewn everywhere among broken branches. But back on the pasture trail, here came a valiant horse to greet us, even as we took a walk through the debris to survey the damage before plunging into our own long recovery.
“Hullo, fellah,” said my husband, stroking its nose. “Aren’t we lucky to still be here? But where are the birds?”
As we listened, not one peep came from the tangle of albizzia and hau that prevented our walking further uphill. He answered his own question, “They’ve been blown away.”
Later, I found out that that was probably true (as with small pets) for many of our Kauai birds. So, during the hot and intermittently wet days that followed, being either blazed or drenched in our ruined, blue-tarped homes, we missed the heart-lifting songs of our birds. On the lowlands, where most of us live, the avian life — except for sea birds — is introduced, not endemic, due to avian malaria that struck down most native birds in habitats lower than about 3000 feet once mosquitoes arrived in ships’ water barrels.
And rats, too: another disastrous earlier introduction.
For myself, who spent many hours of my formative years in an Indian garden, watching and listening to birds, and for my husband, a retired biology teacher who was involved enough with Christmas bird counts and teaching about native birds to earn “bird” as part of his nickname, it would be a terrible loss not to hear bird songs. Our days would be like eggs without salt and pepper (or chili peppah watah). Luckily, enough of the remaining “alien” birds, who had managed to remain protected and hidden during Iniki, were able to make a recovery.
Birds have always symbolized elements of the spirit. In Hawaii, birds were considered to be messengers from the gods. Olelo (stories) recount the magic of birds, the watchfulness and protection they offered. There were popular boasting contests staged between island storytellers who were vying to convince each other of not only the superiority of their waterfalls and rainbows, but also, birds.
The mountain forests were rarely visited. They were considered frightening in their mists and chill. At first, it was the Feather Gatherer who entered the unknown forest realms to pursue the royal red and rarest yellow feathers.
Last Monday, it was Kumu Keahi Manea with Kumu Heu`ionalani Wyeth and five other members of Ka Imi Institute who made the trip up into Kokee to an area near the upper Kalalau viewing platform to meet with representatives of the Kauai Forest Bird Recovery Project to deliver an original blessing chant composed by Kumu Manea and guide a prayerful ceremony, following Hawaiian cultural practices. This was the third year that Ka `Imi was invited for the purpose of blessing the projects that are hoping to save our endangered birds. Earlier, the focus was the Puaiohi (Kauai thrush), that was reintroduced in Kokee after a successful captive breeding program using facilities in Makawao and Keauhou for feeding and raising the flock. The Recovery Project staff is now concentrating on the Akekee (Akepa) and Akikiki, Kauai-only endemic birds (found nowhere else in the world) with rapidly dwindling numbers. If something is not done very soon these birds will join the death-knell list along with the Hawaiian Mamo, and the Kauai `O-o `A-a, never seen since the 1980s and thought to be extinct.
If you’d like to learn more about and support programs for our many endangered birds, our jewels of the forest, you can access the website www.kauaiforestbirds.org. Details of how the Recovery Project staff hope to locate nests, recover eggs, and host a captive breeding program that will increase the flock are available through links and published articles cited. Another interesting site is that of the Hawaii Audubon Society www.hawaiiaudubon.org that uses the Elepaio name for its newsletter, and image for its logo, and stars many of our Kokee jewels along with other threatened and endangered birds of all the Hawaiian islands.
• Dawn Fraser Kawahara and her husband Delano Kawahara live “with books and birds” in Wailua. They paired to teach a course on native birds for Hawaii Pacific University’s Elderhostel Program. Dawn also taught a course on bird lore touching on the feather arts of Hawaii through Pacific Islands Institute. She chose her business name, TropicBird, because of the white-tailed tropicbirds that inhabit the Wailua cliffs near their home.
