Hawaii’s Back Yard Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi

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Green Peace

Hoomaluhia Botanical Garden offers a chance to fawn over flora in tranquility

To a family of four from Kapolei, the Koolau mountain range looked like the portal to Eden. Recent visitors to Hoomaluhia Botanical Garden in Kaneohe, they stood in the parking lot for a long time, mesmerized by the impenetrable wall of deep green before them, which soared 3,000 feet toward a canopy of clouds.

If You Go... Hoomaluhia Botanical Garden Address: 45-680 Luluku Road, Kaneohe Hours: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, except Christmas and New Year's Day Admission: Free Call: 233-7323 E-mail: hbg@honolulu.gov Web site: www.honolulu.gov/parks/hbg/hmbg.htm Notes: Guided walks are offered at 10 a.m. Saturdays and 1 p.m. Sundays. Wear a hat or visor and good walking shoes, bring insect repellent and rain gear. Camping at three campgrounds is available from 9 a.m. Fridays through 4 p.m. Mondays. The garden's catch-and-release shoreline fishing program is scheduled from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.. Saturdays and Sundays. Biking and horseback riding are allowed in designated areas. All activities are free; permits are required for camping, fishing and weddings (limited to 150 people). In addition, the garden periodically hosts lectures, art exhibits, and special programs emphasizing ecology and awareness of the plant world. Nonprofit organizations can rent meeting facilities.

Olive Vanselow, Hoomaluhia's program coordinator, has seen that happen many times.

"People from the leeward side of Oahu are often astonished to see how green and high the Koolaus are," she said. "This island is so developed now, a lot of them are living in neighborhoods that are wall-to-wall houses and don't have big expanses of greenery. Hoomaluhia is a place where they can get in touch with nature."

Meandering over 400 acres, with the magnificent Koolau mountains as a backdrop, Hoomaluhia is the newest and largest of the five gardens in the Honolulu Botanical Gardens system. (The others are Foster, Liliuokalani, Koko Crater and Wahiawa.) Opened in March 1982 under the auspices of the City & County of Honolulu's Department of Parks and Recreation, Hoomaluhia is observing its 25th anniversary this year.

In addition to being a serene oasis and home to the endangered native Hawaiian coot and Hawaiian gallinule, the garden has a 2,200-foot-long dam embankment and a 32-acre lake that were built in conjunction with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide flood control for Windward Oahu, where annual rainfall can exceed 100 inches.

Floodwaters in 1965 and 1969 stormed through Kaneohe, destroying homes and property, and leaving wide swaths of mud and debris. To prevent that from happening again, heavy rainfall now flows into the lake.

Although swimming isn't allowed, visitors can enjoy camping, fishing, biking, picnicking and nature walks year-round. In celebration of the garden's silver anniversary, a self-guided Tree and Plant Walk was launched in March, focusing on 25 unique plants from Asia and tropical America.

"We selected them because most people in Hawaii probably haven't heard of them, and they're interesting in terms of their history, appearance or uses," said Vanselow.

For example, the berries of the acai palm -- rich in antioxidants; fiber; potassium; saturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids; and vitamins B, C and E -- make delicious juice, smoothies and sodas.

In its native Central and South America, people weave the acai's leaves into hats, mats, baskets, brooms and thatch for the roofs of homes. Resilient against insects and other pests, its hardy wood often is chosen to construct buildings.

The acai's seeds are strung into jewelry, and ground for compost and feed. Those who follow traditional medicinal practices use its sap as an astringent, and its fruit and roots to alleviate gastrointestinal problems, according to Wikipedia.

"Acai is a great example of sustainability," said Vanselow. "Because so many parts of the tree have practical uses, people can earn income from it, making them more inclined to keep it growing. Also, instead of destroying a plant as is done with logging, the idea behind sustainability is to develop products from parts of it, which preserves the plant and allows the forest to stay intact."

HOOMALUHIA'S PLANTS and trees are arranged according to regions from which they hail, including Hawaii, Polynesia, Melanesia, Australia, Africa, India, Malaysia, tropical America and the Philippines. Most of the species were collected from their place of origin.

"They're not cultivated plants that were purchased from nurseries or the garden shops at a supermarket or Home Depot," explained Vanselow. "The goal was to gather them in the wild and provide another outdoor setting for them, similar to their home habitat, so they wouldn't be wiped out. When there are landslides, storms, fires, floods and other disasters, sometimes that does happen."

According to Vanselow, there are about 1,100 native Hawaiian plants, about 945 of which are flowering plants. The rest are ferns, mosses and algaes.

"The only way they could get to our isolated islands was to be carried by birds, the ocean or the wind," she said. "Many of them are now rare and threatened in their natural habitats by animals; insects; diseases; invasive introduced plants; and people clearing land for housing, farming and commercial ventures."

Among the 18 native Hawaiian plants in one area of Hoomaluhia are the akia (in ancient times, a poisonous drink was concocted from its bark to execute criminals); loulu (its fruit, which tastes like coconut, is eaten in times of famine); and naupaka kahakai (snorkelers use sap from its leaves to defog their face masks).

Hawaii's first settlers arrived around 500 A.D., bringing with them 26 plants valued for food, medicine, tools, textiles, construction and religious ceremonies. Hoomaluhia's courtyard spotlights these "canoe plants," including taro, the mainstay of the Hawaiians' diet; hau, whose lightweight wood was fashioned into floats for fishnets and outrigger canoes; and olena (turmeric), a spice used to make a yellow dye and a remedy for earache and sinus congestion.

Every plant in the garden has a fascinating story to tell.

"As more and more of Oahu is being developed, it's important to preserve open green spaces such as Hoomaluhia," said Vanselow. " 'Hoomaluhia' means 'to make a place of peace and tranquility,' and that's what we hope visitors will do here -- relax, slow down, and enjoy the beauty and diversity of nature."