Mission Blue – Jeremy Jackson
Jeremy Jackson spoke on the Mission Blue voyage about “how we wrecked the ocean”. Overfishing, overheating, and polluting are not the most uplifting of subjects, but important to hear none-the-less. And who better to lay out the shocking state of the ocean today than Jeremy Jackson.
He is the author of more than 100 scientific publications and several books. He received the 11th annual Roger Tory Peterson Medal presented by the Harvard Museum of Natural History, which celebrates and perpetuates Peterson’s tireless efforts to conserve the planet’s biological diversity. Past recipients of the medal have included Peter Matthiessen, David Attenborough, and Jane Goodall. He is the Ritter Professor of Oceanography and Director of the Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He is senior scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. The list of prestigious awards, positions, boards, fellowships, projects, and medals continues.
His research includes the long-term impacts of human activities on the oceans, and captures the extreme environmental decline that has accelerated in the past 100 years. Given that ocean warming, overfishing, and habitat destruction have fundamentally changed marine ecosystems and led to “the rise of slime”, Jeremy’s work focuses on the future of our oceans. Although Jackson’s work describes grim circumstances, he believes that successful management and conservation strategies can renew the ocean’s health and sustainability.
Acid Test
Acid Test is a film produced to raise awareness about the largely unknown problem of ocean acidification. Like global warming, ocean acidification stems from the increase of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere, which poses a challenge to life in the seas and the health of the entire planet.
Oceans, like forests, cannot fully absorb all of these greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, global temperatures rise, polar ice caps melt, ocean levels rise, and oceans become warmer. As oceans warm, they lose their ability to absorb carbon dioxide, causing them to become more acidic. These changes are causing coral reefs to not only stop growing but to actually dissolve.
The consequences of warmer ocean waters will be a collapse of marine food chain, affecting everything from plankton to polar bears to humans. Rising sea levels are a major threat to the economic livelihood, safety, and health of the millions of people who inhabit coastal communities worldwide. In 2006, the island of Lohachara (Bay of Bengal) disappeared beneath the surface leaving 10,000 people without a home. In 2007, one hundred residents of Tegua Island in the Pacific Ocean had to be evacuated due to rising sea levels.
Leading scientific experts appear in the film to argue it is not too late. They believe we can improve the overall health of our oceans. They believe we can and prevent serious harm to our world, but only if action is taken quickly and decisively.
Concert in the Sky 2010
Concert in the Sky is an annual Independence Day event offering the largest aerial fireworks show on Kaua`i, plus family fun and games, and great food from top hotels and restaurants. There will be continuous live entertainment featuring John Cruz, Shilo Pa, The Quake, and Halau Ka Lei Mokihana `O Leina`ala. Gates open at 4:00 pm at Vidinha Soccer Field in Lihue, and proceeds go to the Kauai Hospice.
John Cruz is one of the most talented artists from Hawaii and was named the Best Singer Songwriter by Hawaii Magazine in 2008. He delivers passionate, soulful vocals, and warm, heartfelt melodies that attract a loyal following. He has produced several CD’s, and the Hawaii Academy of Recording Arts has awarded him Na Hoku Hanohano Awards.
Shilo Pa’s music speaks straight from the heart, and this incredible singer, songwriter, and guitarist conveys a deep sense of purpose and honesty. Some get “chicken skin” when they hear him play. Shilo Pa was born and raised in Anahola and has a devoted fanbase throughout the islands.
The annual Concert in the Sky is a fundraiser for Kaua‘i Hospice which was founded in 1983 by volunteers who saw the need to provide this island with compassionate care for patients who face terminal or life-threatening illnesses. They are a non-profit organization whose philosophy is that the quality of one’s life is not determined by the quantity of time remaining to live. Their aim is to focus on the comfort of the patient rather than on the disease or its treatment. Services to the patient are provided in the patient’s own home, and address the physical, psychological, social, emotional and spiritual needs of the patient and family.
Canoe Plants and Kukui
The Kukui tree is a perfect example of the ancient Polynesians wisely choosing the plants they brought on their voyaging canoes. Kukui grows most commonly in mesic valleys and ravines, at low elevations up to about 2,300 feet. In a typical Hawaiian forest where kukui grows, the leaves are easily noticeable from afar by their distinctive pale green or silvery sheen.
Kukui (Aleurites moluccana) is a flowering tree that grows to a height of 50 to 80 feet, with wide spreading branches and leaves about 4 to 8 inches long. Kukui’s genus name (Aleurites) means ‘floury’, referring to the whitish hairs on the leaves that give them a pale green silvery look. Small creamy white flowers grow in clusters at the ends of the branches. In each of the tree’s flower clusters, about five or more fruits develop, each about 2 inches in diameter. The fruit has a fleshy green covering which turns gray as it matures, and inside the husk is a nut with a very hard coat and high oil content.
The kukui nut had many uses to early Hawaiians, but it was most valued as a primary light source. Kukui kernels contain 50 to 75% oil, and the shelled nuts were skewered on a coconut frond midrib and burned one by one, from the top to bottom. Hawaiians also extracted the oil from the nut and burned it in a stone oil lamp called a kukui hele po (light, darkness goes) with a wick made of kapa cloth. As a result, the kukui is sometimes called the Candlenut Tree.
The kukui tree also had many other uses in ancient Hawai‘i. The wood was used in making canoe gunwales (pale). The nuts were used to make spinning tops (hū). The oil was mixed with charcoal to create a black paint used on canoes and surfboards (papa he‘e nalu). The oil was also used to grease the runners of sleds (papa hōlua). And the hardened sap (pīlali) was used to catch birds for their plumage to make royal capes and cloaks (‘ahu ‘ula). To preserve the species as a source of feathers, King Kamehameha IV declared that kukui oil be used to clean the sap from their feet so they wouldn’t stick to the next place they touched down.
When spearing reef fish at night, Hawaiians carried a torch (lama lama) fueled by kukui nuts to attract fish. During the day, fishermen were known to chew kukui kernels and spit the oil onto the surface of the water to provide a clear view of the reef below. The kernels were often prepared to eat by roasting, mashing, and mixing them together with sea salt, making a relish (īnamona). The husk of the immature fruit was used as a dye for tapa cloth, and also for soaking fishing lines of olonā to make them stronger and last longer. The white flowers, leaves, and nuts were all strung to make lei.
Kukui also had various medicinal uses in ancient Hawai‘i. The nut was used to treat skin sores and ulcers, mouth sores (‘ea), rheumatic joints, general debility, and constipation. The bark of kukui was used to treat hānō (asthma). And the sap of the kukui nut was an ingredient to treat bruises, cuts, and chapped lips.
Hula History and Iliili
Hula `Ili`ili was performed with water-worn pebbles, and was done sitting or standing. The dancer held two pebbles in each hand and clicked them together (similar to castanets) to make a sound. ‘Ili‘ili were very personal instruments, as their size was chosen to fit the player’s hands, and their density was chosen to fit the dancer’s ears. In early Hawaii most instruments used to accompany traditional hulas were percussive, therefore the main function of the ‘ili‘ili was to help the dancer maintain the beat.
`Ili`ili were round, flat, water-worn pebbles that had their origins in Hawai`i’s basaltic lava rock. They were porous in nature, which allowed their sound to resonate when clicked together. `Ili`ili were found where the river meets the sea, and the constant flush of water molded them into shapes and sounds perfect for hula. Heavier stones provided a louder sound, and the Bishop Museum has a few sets made out of hematite and manganese.
Hula `Ili`ili was sometimes a hula of intensity, and was performed with a stress of voice and manner which the Hawaiians termed ai-ha’a, but more often it was performed in a quiet natural tone of voice and manner termed ko’i-honua. Photo by Rebecca Breyer at the Merrie Monarch Festival.
Hawaii Telescope PS1
A new telescope on Haleakala will study brown dwarfs, distant quasars, black holes, supernovae, and search for asteroids and comets. The cutting edge Pan-STARRS 1 telescope will collect science data from dusk to dawn each night, and in the next three years PS1 is expected to discover about 100,000 asteroids, and catalog five billion stars and 500 million galaxies. PS1 will be able to compile the most comprehensive digital map of the 75 percent of the universe visible from Hawaiʻi.
It boasts one of the largest digital cameras of its type – 1,400 megapixels (1.4 gigapixels) that can photograph an area of the sky as large as 36 full Moons in a single exposure, which is much larger than any similar-sized telescope on Earth or in space. The giant digital camera will take over 500 exposures each night, collecting about four terabytes of data (equivalent to 1,000 full DVDs). Computers will rapidly compare each exposure with ones taken earlier to find objects that have moved or whose brightness has changed.
Designed and built by astronomers and engineers of the Pan-STARRS project at UH Mānoa, it has now become the PS1 Science Consortium – a group of ten institutions from Germany, United Kingdom, Taiwan, and UH Mānoa. PS1 is the experimental prototype for a larger telescope to be built called PS4, which will have four times the power of PS1 and is planned for Mauna Kea in Hawaii.
PS1 researchers will be focusing on:
- Searching for small bodies in the inner solar system
- Studying low-mass stars, brown dwarfs, and young stellar objects to learn how our solar system formed
- Discovering hundreds of supernovae that can be used as “standard candles” for measuring distances in our galaxy
- Finding the most distant quasars – black holes fueled in the earliest stages of galaxy formation
- Learning about the characteristics of dark matter
