Hawaii’s
Back yard
Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi
Love affair with lei
business flourishes for
family at Molokai Ranch
Professional beekeepers Dick and Aome Wheeler moved from the Big Island to Molokai in the early 1980s to oversee the hives and honey production for Molokai Ranch. Today, they're getting a buzz from growing sweet plumerias.
CORRECTION
Tuesday, June 8, 2004Dick and Aome Wheeler are proprietors of Molokai Plumerias. A headline that ran on Page F1 Sunday incorrectly implied that the business is part of Molokai Ranch. A photograph on Page F3 is of the Wheelers' three grandsons. A caption incorrectly referred to them as their sons..
The Honolulu Star-Bulletin strives to make its news report fair and accurate. If you have a question or comment about news coverage, call Editor Frank Bridgewater at 529-4791 or email him at corrections@starbulletin.com.
The Wheelers are the proprietors of Molokai Plumerias, the state's largest plumeria farm. While they were working for Molokai Ranch, they extracted honey at the 10-acre site (originally a dairy) that is now their farm.
Molokai Plumerias
Where: 1342 Maunaloa Highway, 2 1/2 miles west of KaunakakaiHours: Tours offered between 9 a.m. and noon on weekdays; reservations are recommended.
Cost: $15 per person. Groups limited to eight people.
Call: (808) 553-3391
E-mail: info@molokaiplumerias.com
Web site: www.molokaiplumerias.com
"We worked for the ranch about five years, then thought we'd love to own this place and wound up buying it from a hui (group) of people over 15 years ago," Aome said. "There were a couple hundred plumeria trees on the property, but they were only about waist high."
From the beginning, the Wheelers were charmed by the trees. Their dream was to make a living cultivating them, and over the next 12 years, they took cuttings from the initial stand and kept planting them until trees filled their entire 10 acres. Their home -- the cleverly renovated barn of the old dairy -- is now surrounded by several thousand trees, primarily Celadine, the classic Hawaiian yellow plumeria.
Along with the orchard, the Wheelers' business flourished. Molokai Plumerias fills orders for clients throughout Hawaii and the mainland, including florists, hula schools and individuals in Seattle, San Francisco, San Diego, Las Vegas, Boston and Washington, D.C.
With proper care, including refrigeration and a light sprinkling of water, the hardy Celadine can last for days.
"A lady in Pennsylvania told me she was stringing leis with our flowers for two weeks," says Aome. "She used to live on Maui, but moved to the East Coast when her husband found work there. The plumeria is her all-time favorite flower, and she really missed it so she called me last fall and I sent her a box of plumerias for her niece's 16th birthday.
"She invited her niece's girlfriends to her house after school one day, and they all made leis for the occasion. Being the plumeria addict that she is, she kept the flowers around the house for two weeks, and they kept their fragrance all that time."
Molokai Plumerias sells leis as well as single blossoms. It takes about 50 flowers to make a standard single-strand garland. The longer hula length requires 60 blossoms, the double calls for 70 to 90 flowers, and more than 300 are needed to create the elaborate spiral, which weighs about a pound.
"Our leis are yellow plumeria," notes Aome. "That said, from time to time, we'll add color. Pretty pink trees are scattered throughout the orchard.
"I know where they all are, and I'll pick pink plumerias for special leis that customers want."
Discarded lei flowers are tossed, forming a soft and fragrant playground for Dick and Aome Wheelers' three sons.
FOR A LONG TIME, curious passersby would drop by the farm, and if it was convenient, the Wheelers would show them around. They decided to launch more structured hour-long tours about a year ago.
"We said, 'OK, we're going to be professional and organized about this,'" Aome said. "When people come here, though, we'd like them to remember that this is our home. It's not Disneyland. We are sharing an experience that we enjoy. We don't want to make it a big deal. We only want to attract people who really want to be here. That's why we don't have a big sign out at the front. That's why we've been subtle about promoting the tour."
Although the Wheelers have not formally advertised, visitors from all over the world have found their farm via word of mouth and flyers printed by other residents wanting to promote activities and attractions on Molokai.
"It's amazing!" says Aome. "We've had guests from Iran, Japan, El Salvador, Australia and New Zealand. They want to know about us and we want to know about them. It's fun; it makes for lively conversation."
She, Dick or their daughter, Nicoya, will accompany each group through the orchard. "They usually have a lot of questions," says Aome. "There's sap on the flowers and they're curious about that. They want to know about the seed pods and how the flowers are propagated. We'll take them to the colored trees and have them smell the flowers. Some of these flowers have fragrance, others don't -- and none of them smell like the yellow!"
Every guest leaves with a fresh plumeria lei that they've strung themselves. They also take their lei needle so they can make leis at home if they wish. "We show them what flowers to pick for their lei, and how to pick them," says Aome. "If they want to add colored flowers to their lei, they can."
The selection process requires a keen eye. Aome advises guests to pick plumerias that are at least the size of their thumb.
Flowers without spots, bruises or other imperfections also are desirable, as are those with "straight" petals.
"I don't like to use flowers that are curled back," says Aome. "Some people like them, but to me, they're not fresh; they're going to be dead in no time."
Participants are delighted to handle the flowers and discover they're not as fragile as they initially thought. "But they can't get over walking into the lei room and seeing how we are throwing the rejects on the floor," says Aome. "There will be a carpet of flowers by the time we're done because we're very selective when we're making the leis. The people on the tour don't want to walk on the flowers; they think it's disrespectful to step on something so beautiful. But to us, when you crush the flowers, their fragrance is released. It's a good thing."
MOLOKAI HAS ALSO been a good thing for the Wheelers. "It isn't much different today than what it was 20-something years ago," Aome says.
"There still aren't any traffic lights on the island. We'll be driving and there won't be a single car in front of us on the road. We feel so peaceful and safe."
Nicola, her husband and their three young sons live on the ground floor of the Wheelers' two-story home. The kids have built little forts in different parts of the orchard, one in what they call the "monkey tree."
To the Wheelers, being able to be around their grandsons as they grow up is a blessing. "This is the perfect place for boys, and for us," Aome says. "We have always loved nature and the laid-back life. Our bedroom faces east, and every morning we wake up to sunrise. We see flowers through every window of our house. We are professional flower children, and we couldn't be happier."
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Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi is a Honolulu-based free-lance writer and Society of American Travel Writers award winner.
