This Earth Month, We Mahalo our MM Volunteers!

With volunteer week occurring April 17^th – April 23^rd  and Earth Day on Friday, April 22^nd, we wanted to extend a huge MAHALO to our volunteers and leaders here at Mālama Maunalua. We would not be able to do it without you all, and have so much gratitude for the time and energy you give us and Maunalua Bay. Read below for more information on Volunteer Week & about two amazing people we interviewed who have dedicated their time to Maunalua Bay for many years!

Meet Ralph!

Ralph has been a resident of Maunalua Bay for almost 40 years and has been involved with MM since 2010. MM’s vision is what inspired Ralph to volunteer and be involved in conservation upon retirement from teaching at Punahou. Ralph stated, “The vision and dedication of Mālama Maunalua opened my eyes to what needs to be done – and can be done.”  He currently participates in various projects, such as removing invasive algae, monitoring coral in the bay, monitoring and transplanting seagrass, and deploying sea urchins as natural controls on invasive algae.

Ralph described when he first started volunteering, he would attend small informal huki events at Paiko. There was one leader who led the events, a resident that would bring banana bread for the volunteers, and they used traffic cones in the water to mark their pull areas. He said they pulled huge amounts of very dense mudweed and used a resident’s yard for clean-up. They would often weigh the bags with a scale hung from a tree before taking the algae to Otsuji Farm to be used for compost. At the time, Ralph said that Paiko was completely covered by extremely dense mudweed concentrations that went a foot or more deep. In 2010, the great huki cleared it and MM has since been keeping it down.

Ralph also spoke on how over the years, he has watched different areas be overrun with invasive algae, “Wailupe Beach Park used to be a great place to take my marine biology classes on field trips in the 1980’s and 90’s – full of various forms of intertidal marine life. Today, it has been taken over by gorilla ogo, and the biodiversity of the area has dropped way down.”

Ralph finds great value in monitoring invasive algae by counting algae in the field and by tracking the large volume of data in a computer file.  However, he says one of the most rewarding aspects of volunteering is discovering outlier coral specimens on the reef. He explained how most of the living coral in the bay is concentrated out near the breakers, about a half kilometer offshore. Coral once lived closer to shore as well, but it is now overgrown by invasive and native algae. He detailed how this often occurs due to overfishing and the loss of algae-eating fish that would normally keep down the algae and allow corals to flourish.  Finding these outlying living corals closer to the shore is exciting for Ralph and his fellow volunteers, as it helps provide insight to whether the coral may be able to recolonize the nearshore areas over time.

“With climate change, sea level rise, and invasive species rightfully dominating so much of the environmental news today, the world needs all the help it can get. I especially appreciate that Mālama Maunalua provides an organized vehicle for willing people to make a difference.” -Ralph

Meet Molly!

Molly has been involved with Mālama Maunalua since 2016 and is currently a Community Huki Leader. Although her conservation efforts are now in Hawai’i, her love of nature started long ago and was inspired by her Auntie Eloise in Minnesota. Auntie Eloise, who is her mother’s twin sister, is a conservation educator in St. Paul. Molly attended her nature center programs and spoke about how rain or shine, they would spend their time outdoors. She mentioned how in the freezing cold, they would go out and do maple syrup tapping and go snowshoeing. In the fall, they learned about the leaves and the animals. Molly described how her parents would also take her hiking, so she has always felt a deep connection to the natural world.

Molly’s mother is from Minnesota and her father is from Maui. She always enjoyed her time in Minnesota, but didn’t feel that she knew her full identity growing up there. This inspired her decision to study Natural Resources and Environmental Management at the University of Hawai’i, where her parents had met years prior. While immersing herself in Hawaiian culture and learning her heritage, Molly realized there was such a strong connection between genealogy and having that kinship with the sea and natural surroundings. She felt that to understand her identity, she must also understand the relationship she has with the land she is indigenous to and that is what motivates her to fully commit to conservation and learn as much as she can.

Molly mentioned that the most rewarding part of being involved with MM is being in the water, pulling the limu, and talking story. Talking story is what she loves the most because she meets many different people. Some of them are very connected to the ocean, while others rarely spend time in the ocean. Some volunteers have grown up in Maunalua and have memories of what it used to look like. Others do not live in the area and are just stopping by for the day. She said that regardless of their story, she loves that through volunteering, we are tying them back to a sense of place and a sense of purpose.

“Even if you are volunteering at Maunaula Bay for one day, we all have a home that we can go back to and take care of. If volunteering at Maunaula Bay inspires you to go back home and commit to caring for another place, then that is the greatest gift that volunteers can give to Mālama Maunalua – taking with them their experience here and continuing to give back.” -Molly

Volunteer Information!

Sign up here to volunteer: https://www.kanuhawaii.org/needs/