Join BirdNote tomorrow, November 30th!
Illustrator David Sibley and actor H. Jon Benjamin will face off in the bird illustration battle of the century during BirdNote's Year-end Celebration and Auction!
David Shepard and the ‘Alala
Hawai‘i's native crow once played a key ecological role
© David Shepard
Artist David Shepard designs aloha shirts with illustrations of Hawai‘i's native flora and fauna. David actually trained as a botanist, and one of his shirt designs was inspired by his experience working on the Kalaupapa peninsula with the hō‘awa plant. That species needs lots of help from conservationists in part because it was a favorite food of the ‘alala, or Hawaiian Crow, which is now extinct in the wild.
BirdNote®
David Shepard and the ‘Alala
Written by Mark Bramhill
Mark Bramhill: This is BirdNote.
Artist David Shepard designs aloha shirts with illustrations of Hawai‘i's native flora and fauna. David actually trained as a botanist, and one of his shirt designs was inspired by his experience working on the Kalaupapa peninsula with the hō‘awa plant .
David Shepard: It's very rare — so rare that we only had two populations of it on the peninsula, and unfortunately the flowers tend to be either male or female. Not both on the same branch.
Mark Bramhill: And, in a stroke of bad luck, the populations were on opposite ends of the peninsula.
David Shepard: So here I was hand pollinating it with a brush, and then going over to the other side and hand pollinating them too. And then when the fruit would ultimately appear, we had to wrap it in aluminum foil to prevent the rats from eating it. It was this whole drawn out process, and then, it takes eight months for these seeds to germinate, and you also have to have some mesh on it so the rats don't pull those things up.
So as you can see, the plant has a lot of things stacked against it.
Mark Bramhill: David learned that one of the reasons the plant needs such involved help from conservationists is because it was a favorite food of the ‘alala, or Hawaiian Crow, which is now extinct in the wild.
David Shepard: And when they would eat the seeds, they'd just pass right through their digestive tract, and they germinate great!
Mark Bramhill: There are continuing efforts to keep the species alive in captivity, and maybe one day return them to the wild. But at least in David's artwork, the ‘alala flock among the hō‘awa fruits once again.
[‘Alala (Hawaiian Crow) call]
You can see pictures of David's work on our website, BirdNote.org. I'm Mark Bramhill.
###
Producer: Mark Bramhill
Managing Editor: Jazzi Johnson
Managing Producer: Conor Gearin
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. ‘Alala (Hawaiian Crow) ML234871 recorded by Tim Burr.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2024 BirdNote July 2024
Narrator: Mark Bramhill
ID# ShepardD-02-2024-07-05 ShepardD-02
Reference:
Re: the Hō‘awa as a favorite fruit of the ‘alala and it being impacted by their absence
https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1890/11-1613.1
