Glimmers of a forest bird future

Posted on September 30, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

O`ahu is depauperate when it comes to native forest birds. Only 3 species `Elepaio (Chasiempis ibidis), `Apapane (Himetone sanguinea) and `Amakihi (Chlorodrepanis flava) are known with any confidence on the island. What is hopeful is that all 3 species are showing signs of resistance to avian malaria. While still just a glimmer, O`ahu has a very real possibility of having native forest birds in people’s backyards, This very obliging `Apapane preening away in a koa tree could be a sight seen in backyards in the urban landscape in the near future. A lot of it depends on what we are willing to do.

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Small Victories, Large Gains

Posted on August 31, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez
Mamaki

For all my consternation on where to take this blog into the future, what doesn’t change is the restoration work itself. While I am pondering the social media landscape, native plants are trying their darndest to survive.

Case in point above, this mamaki (Pipturus albidus) opportunistically germinated and started growing on an old rag on one of our water catchments. The current zeitgeist is that native hawaiian plants are very sensitive with specific requirements, yet here is a plant making the most of a surprising opportunity.

In some ways the reforestation work I do is kind of like a herder: The plants are doing all the hard work, I’m just doing what I can to shepherd them along and give them every advantage I can. The fact that they are the ones doing the heavy lifting means we see compounding interest. These small victories add up. I’m sure I’ll post a picture of this tiny mamaki that started it’s life on a rag 5 years from now, marveling at its size.

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Getting to know your Hawaiian Lobeliads #45 Brighamia rockii

Posted on July 30, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez
Pua ala

Brighamia rockii

  • Conservation status: Endangered
  • Distribution: Windward coast of Moloka`i
  • Identification: : Form– Unbranched stem succulents 1-5 m tall stems stout, fleshy Leaves– 6-22 cm long, 5-15 cm wide Flower– calyx lobes oblong to elliptic, 2.5-8 mm long; corolla white, the tube green to yellowish green, 8-13 cm long, 0.2-0.4 mm wide
  • My notes: It took me long enough to finish off one of the clades of Hawaiian lobeliads. This species seems a bit more finicky in cultivation compared to B. insignis, hopefully with time and better genetics that can change. I sat on these photos of Pua `ala for so long that I forgot when exactly I took them. Some of the most spectacular sea cliffs in the world happen to be this species home range, perhaps one day I’ll get a chance to check it out. Again, I’m at a cross-roads where to take the blog. 10 years ago it was Flickr and Instagram, nowadays it’s the benefits of iNaturalist that is giving me pause. I’ll figure it out. In the meantime enjoy some photos of this gorgeous native plant.
  • Additional Photos:
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Snapshot: Manu-O-Ku

Posted on June 30, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

Growing up in Chicago, seabirds were not something that I normally encountered. Here in Hawai`i, we are blessed with a number of species that regularly visit our shores. And this species in particular we on O`ahu are quite proud of.

While quite common elsewhere in the Pacific and especially the northwest Hawaiian islands, Manu-O-Ku (Gyrgis alba) has a uniquely restricted range in the main Hawaiian islands. Their main population is in the urban core of Honolulu. They along with the kolea, are one of the few native species that one will easily come across while visiting O`ahu.

I mentioned them in a post about 15 years ago, and the population has only grown since then. This pair were sitting on a egg for a while on a tree above a sidewalk and I was happy to see that it had recently hatch. Given my work with trying to saving native species and the rather intensive energy needed, seeing the continued success of these little seabirds amongst the urban hustle and bustle with little aid gives me all the more resolve to keep going. Small efforts like planting baby plants and watching baby seabirds thrive.

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Snapshot: small efforts

Posted on May 31, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

DLNR has dedicated this year as the year of the community forest. While we have plans to highlight the work we’ve done over the last 20 years, at the end of the day a lot of it boils down to this photo. Quietly adding more native plants to the forest, shifting that trajectory back toward native.

Here, the 2 native Touchardia lineages (T. latifolia, T. glabra) are ready for outplanting. It might not be loud or flashy, but it is the backbone of our work.

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Searching for Gympie Gympie Trees

Posted on April 27, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

Plant blindness can be quite the challenge for the botanical community. Getting people to care can be a difficult thing: plants for a lot of folks tend to disappear into the background whilst people focus on something else. Some plants do break through the backdrop every now and then. While I was in Australia I figure I would try and look for one of these infamous plants. I didn’t realize that I would also end up with a spectacular image of Hawai`i better than I could have imagine…

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Snapshot: My first Megapode

Posted on April 18, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

Megapodes are a cool radiation of galliformes centered around Australia and spreading up to the Philippines in the west and into parts of Polynesia in the east. Unfortunately many insular Pacific forms went extinct.

So while during super touristy things around Manly, I was surprised and happy to come across this Australian Brush-Turkey (Alectura lathami) sitting next to a sidewalk.

Now for most Australians, seeing a megapode isn’t a big deal. And for me, that’s also why it’s cool. Seeing your native biota shouldn’t be a big deal. One shouldn’t have to go to a museum or a zoo to interact with native biota. So you’ll have to excuse me when small things like this put a smile on my face.

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Native birds around Perth

Posted on April 18, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

Living in Hawaii gives me a certain immediacy when it comes to native biota. Where I’m from, we have seen so much loss. Traveling lets me appreciate how other places are handling modern challenges for their plants and animals. So while other bloggers and YouTubers might judge a place on its food scene or its urbanism, I like to walk around the urban core and see what native things I see taking advantage of modern aesthetics. A few days ago, my wife and I walked to Kings Park in Perth to see what’s around.

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The Quokka of Rottnest Island

Posted on April 8, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

I started this blog 15 years ago with a basic goal in mind: what would the world look like if conservation was a success? How are we interacting with the healthy population of species that are now our next door neighbors? How do we share the planet? There were places that I knew that were examples of this. Back in 2006, I was able to visit one of those places: Puerto Ayora on Santa Cruz in the Galápagos Islands. Now, almost 20 years later, I was finally able to visit another one of those spots. On Monday, I took the ferry to Rottnest Island of the coast off Perth, Australia.

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A Celebration of Hawaiian Forest Birds

Posted on March 30, 2025 by Sebastian Marquez

The last time I talked about Bishop Museum on this blog was that in-between phase where I wasn’t really posting often. At the time, they had put on display a rare specimen of kioea and I had commented on how it allow folks to emotionally engage with a long extinct member of the Hawaiian avifauna. Well last year, during the year of the forest bird, Bishop Museum once again did a showcase on native Hawaiian birds and it did not disappoint.

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