NOAA News Release
Due to the rapid decrease in the Hawaiian monk seal population, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)’s Fisheries Service has proposed to revise the critical habitat area for monk seals, and is inviting public comment.
The proposed revision includes expanding the 1988 critical habitat designation in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, and adding new areas throughout the main Hawaiian Islands.
Community Contributed by G.T. Larson
Pattern Energy News Release
In March of this year, Pattern Energy was introduced as the preferred developer for a potential 200 megawatt (MW) wind project on Molokai Properties Ltd. (MPL) lands. Since that time, Pattern Energy has formed Molokai Renewables LLC and is working with Bio-Logical Capital to explore the project. We believe that a wind project on Molokai has the potential to help provide a wide range of benefits to the Molokai community and to generate clean energy for Hawaii.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service News Release
A rare plant, found only in the wet forests of eastern Molokai, was designated an endangered species in 2009. A draft Recovery Plan for the plant, called Phyllostegia hispida, is available for public comment, with the addition of a recent addendum. The draft plan is published by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Phyllostegia hispida, known only by its scientific name, is a nonaromatic member of the mint family (Lamiaceae). It is a loosely spreading, many-branched vine that often forms large tangled masses, and is known only from the wet forests of eastern Molokai at elevations between 3,650 and 4,200 feet.
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Community Contributed
By Diane Pike, Molokai Marine Mammal Response Team Coordinator
Two visiting scientists joined NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) researchers on Molokai last week to study the diet and feeding behavior of the Hawaiian monk seal.
The team collected scat (seal poop) samples and tagged animals. Researchers caught seals to deploy cellphone tags that collect detailed information on animal movements and diving behavior. This allows researchers to identify important feeding locations for the seals.
Dr. Charles Littnan, the lead scientist for NOAA’s Monk Seal Research Program, described the findings to date, “We have learned that a lot of monk seals from Molokai feed along Penguin Bank and the west coast of the island from shallow waters down to 350 feet or deeper.”
The research this week was building upon over four years of work on resident seals.
Dr. Alex Karamanlidis, a Greek researcher working on the endangered Mediterranean monk seal, has come to Hawaii to share experiences between the two seal programs in a hope to recover both species. The two types of seals separated some 12-15 million years ago but find themselves in the same dangerous position of near extinction today.
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A group of Molokai residents have banded together in hopes that a proposed wind farm on the island will blow away. The mission of I Aloha Molokai, or IAM, is to educate fellow residents about, and organize opposition to, plans for wind turbines on Molokai and an undersea cable that would carry that energy to serve Oahu’s energy needs.
They began those efforts publicly by inviting Robin Kaye of Friends of Lanai (FOL) – a group already vocally opposed to a similar project on Lanai – to speak on Molokai last week.
“There was an overwhelming 'no' from the people of Molokai [to industrial wind energy on the island],” said one of IAM’s organizer, Kanoho Helm. He was referring to a recent island-wide survey conducted by the `Aha Ki`ole, in which 93 percent of residents were opposed to a wind farm.
Meanwhile, wind company Pattern Energy continues to move forward in negotiations with Molokai Ranch and discussion with Molokai community members to build a proposed 200 megawatt (MW) wind farm on the island’s west end.
Strength in Numbers
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Berry Company News Release
Due to the continued interest in the Think Yellow, Go Green Recycling Program, The Berry Company, publisher of the Hawaiian Telcom Yellow Pages, has extended the collection deadline for this year’s Think Yellow, Go Green telephone directory recycling program on Hawaii’s Neighbor Islands to June 15.
The program kicked off on Earth Day, April 22, as a recycling contestbetween schools on the Neighbor Islands. The recentdistribution of the new 2011 Hawaiian Telcom Yellow Pages sparked a renewed interest among island residents to recycle their outdated directories.
With most Hawaii schools preparing for summer break, Molokai residents can drop off outdated telephone directories to Makoa Trucking.
I Aloha Molokai (IAM) News Release
The acronym IAM represents “I Aloha Molokai,” a newly formed working group comprised of Molokai residents opposed to the proposal to develop a 200 megawatt industrial scale wind power plant to serve the energy needs of Oahu. IAM’s mission is to share information, as well as educate the general public to the potential impacts of the project. This is a grassroots effort to raise awareness and provide balance as the developer and proponents of the project move forward in their attempt to persuade the island community to support the project.
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Community Contributed
By G.T. Larson
Molokai is well known for its spectacular sea cliffs, the highest on earth, but the event that created these beautiful sheer cliffs also contributed to the largest landslide debris field known on earth (with the Nuuanu slide on Oahu). Rock debris extends north from Molokai and northeast from Oahu over 100 miles across the ocean floor. One block of debris is approximately seven miles long by 15 miles wide and over 6,000 feet high; it is so large that it has been given a name, the Tuscaloosa Seamount. A natural question would be how did all that debris get there? To better understand these events, it is advantageous to examine an earlier, similar, though much smaller event, on the west end of Molokai.
Molokai was created by three volcanoes. The west Molokai volcano came up first and at its highest was probably several thousand feet higher than the present day elevation of 1,381 feet. The east Molokai volcano came up next and grew quite a bit larger, both in area and in height. Its lava flowed west up to and over the remnants of the eastern half of the west Molokai volcano, which formed the plain where now the airport and most of Molokai’s large farms are located. This area is called the Ho`olehua Saddle. The third and youngest volcano is Kauhako crater which built the Kalaupapa peninsula.
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Community Contributed by Glenn Teves, UH County Extension Agent
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