No Hawaiian, No Aloha

Our biologist friend Dan gave us a couple of lovely native (endemic) plants when we moved into our new apartment. The Ihi plant only grows in the wild on Molokini, a bird sanctuary and snorkeling spot off the Maui coast. The Alula plant is critically endangered: I did a little online research, so I am not sure how reliable these statistics are, but some count less than 20 of these in the wild. The Alula is commonly known as the "cabbage on a baseball bat". Can you guess why?

The Ihi was extremely healthy when we received it: so much so that it was constantly producing offspring. They were appearing in the soil of the Ihi itself, as well as coming up in all the nearby plants. I sprouted several of the cuties and gave them away to anyone who was willing to take one. I even kept a single baby for myself.

One lesson that I have learned regarding personal relationships is that often times, those things that the other person requires are completely different than what you yourself enjoy. I need to take this lesson and apply it to my plants!! I'd imagine that if I were a plant, I would like lots of sun, a big pot, and plenty of water. So I gave both the Ihi and the Alula daily water and upgraded them to large pots full of soil. And they both now teeter on the brink of death.

These plants apparently thrive more when they are in rocky soil, as they live (or die) it the wild hanging from cliff faces in dry parts of the island. As of last week, the Aulua leaves had turned from green to yellow. They have now completely fallen off, and so did the first crop of flowers. Now I just have a baseball bat with three mite-infested flowers hanging on by a thread. I am hoping for a miracle: we hand-pollinated the flowers, and hopefully some seeds will appear. Perhaps if I dehydrate the plant and put more rocks in the pot it can come back to life, but maybe the second generation will be the one to carry the torch.