Latest news with #RapidOhiaDeath
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Rapid ohia death continues to move mauka
HILO (KHON2) — Tuesday, April 22, was Earth Day; and it is also Native Hawaiian Plant Month. One of our most important and beloved native flora is the ʻohia that continues to be threatened by Rapid Ohia Death, a fungal pathogen that has killed more than one million ohia trees on Hawaii Island. Dengue has come to Hawaiʻi: 9 things to know to protect your ʻohana 'Well, we are seeing the disease sadly progress more up the mountains,' said University of Hawaii Extension Forester JB Friday. 'Initially, we saw a lot down in Lower Puna, in Hilo, and everybody's very conscious of it because you saw trees dying. But the disease sadly has moved up, and we're seeing it more in the high watershed in places like Laupahoehoe and Kāʻū.' Rep. Tokuda shares top priorities for 2025 Scientists and land managers have begun to use fences to keep invasive animals out of native forest areas so they are less likely to spread the fungi that cause ROD. Friday said that it can even make noticeable impacts on one side of the fence from the other in the same forest. How Hawaiʻi can see a heavenly 'smiley face' in the sky tomorrow 'Fencing is a tool that we have that we can really protect our native forests from ROD. The disease is infects trees when they get injured. The fungus doesn't get through the bark. It's not doesn't seem to be taken up by healthy roots or come through the leaves. What it does get into is whenever there's an injury in the tree. And what we find is that cattle in the forest who are marking trees or pigs in the forest who are tearing up roots are causing those injuries. And we see across the landscape, forests that are protected with fencing and the animals are excluded have a lot lower levels of disease,' Merrie Monarch 2025 is this week, and Hawaiian Culture features a strong connection to ohia and its lehua blossoms. Friday said that there are ways to help mitigate the spread if people are planning on using ohia. Merrie Monarch Festival named in honor of King Kalākaua 'If you do gather ohia for lei, take good biosanitation practices when you go into the forest. Clean your boots, shoes, clean your tools. If you cut in ohia, put some sort of wound sealer on it. One of the things I do wanna get across is that Hawaii Island, there's a moratorium on moving ohia off the island as per the Department of Agriculture. So if you do purchase a lei at Merrie Monarch or you come to Hawaii Island and someone gives you an ohia lei, give it to someone else before you leave because you're not allowed to take them off back the island.' If not, the plant bottle brush has similar flowers to Ohia and has proven to be a way to replace Ohia's presence in leimaking. One of the ways that people can help ohia is to grow it in and around their homes. Friday notes that the tree is commonly thought to only grow in higher elevations, but it grows from mauka to makai. 'On Oahu and Maui, mostly you only see ohia up in the mountains, but that's just because the forest was cleared everywhere else. In ancient times, ohia, of course, came all the way down to the ocean. And here on Hawaii Island, we do see ohia coming all the way down to the ocean. So people think it can't grow in town, and it can. So go ahead and keep on planting ohia. I wanna mention that this year is the year of the community forest as per DLNR. And part of the idea is to make our native plants part of our daily life in Hawaii, so plant ohia, plant other native plants.'Another great way to help our native forests is through volunteering your time. 'There are opportunities for volunteering in the forest on all the islands,' Friday said. 'An awful lot of our native forest restoration is done by volunteers. Even if it's an agency organizing it, still, the people on the ground a lot of time are volunteers.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
29-01-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Rep. Tokuda shares top priorities for 2025
HONOLULU (KHON2) – The President, new administration, and lawmakers are wasting no time with the start of the 119th Congress and Congresswoman Jill Tokuda shared that she's celebrating the positives with a passing of one of her bills at the House.'So in the first 3 weeks of Congress, we were able to pass my Rapid Ohia Death bill which is a huge thing. It's now over at the Senate. I've received overwhelming bipartisan support. And it is a testament, I think, to the fact that all of us collectively need to work to protect our forests and to really combat invasive species, disease. So it was a great first few weeks for me, in that regard, but yes, very stressful when you take a look at all the executive orders that we have been seeing coming down.' Tokuda said the struggle is real regarding interisland flights for Molokai and Lanai residents. Mokulele aims to resume flight operations within next 48 hours 'How do you get to your health appointments? I had one veteran literally say I decided not to go with the care I needed because it was too much of a struggle to be able to get back and forth between the islands. That's absolutely unacceptable. I've been talking with the FAA, the US Dept. of Transportation, I recently spoke to Mokulele. To me, we got to have contingency plans. Real ones in place. So it never happens again. People can always promise, we'll always fly. But the bottom line is for Molokai and Lanai, those aircrafts are lifelines. And so if those planes don't fly, what's the alternative? Either to get other planes running, to get ships running as well, to get goods, people whether it's getting people to emergency care, getting medicines or food on shore. We got to have those contingency plans in place and I'm willing to take a look if Congress has to mandate for essential air service. There needs to be real contingency plans in place to make sure this doesn't leave our communities stranded should the planes not fly,' Tokuda said. Other priorities include cost of living for Hawaii residents being top of mind. 'The struggles that too many people have keeping a roof over their head and food on the table. And for so many in Hawaii, it's always been that cost of housing, the cost of living, and food prices. For myself very personally as you know I co-lead the bipartisan health caucus in Congress. How do you make sure that no matter where you live on our island, you have access to health care and the mental health services that you need. That is so critically important. These kitchen table issues. These are family issues, these are people issues. That's top priority for me and I will work with anyone in Congress on both sides of the aisle to get that down for our constituents.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
