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Wiliwili Trees at Puu Waawaa

Posted: May 11, 2008

When I was on the Big Island last month I explored a grove of wiliwili trees at Puu Waawaa, the prominent cinder cone on the northern flank of Hualalai on the Kona-Kohala Coast. 

Puu Waawaa is in the rain shadow of the Kohala Mountains and Mauna Kea, and receives less than 40 inches of rain per year.  The dry forests at Puu Waawaa are home to many endemic species found only in Hawaii.  Unfortunately, these forests have been seriously degraded due to browsing and trampling by cattle.  Only a few areas of native forests are still somewhat intact. 

This small grove of wiliwili trees consists of a dozen or so large trees growing in a grassy pasture along Highway 190.  In this panoramic shot with the grove of trees in the fore- and mid- ground to the left, Kawaihae Harbor is far off in the distance along the curve of along the Kohala Coast.

Wiliwili trees (Erythrina sandwichensis) are endemic to the Hawaiian Islands.  Unfortunately, an invasive wasp has been killing trees so they are increasingly difficult to find in the wild.  Wiliwili trees also grow at Ulupalakua on the slopes of Haleakala on Maui and a handful of other dry forests in Hawaii.  

Wiliwili trees have a distinctive shape, look, and color.  They have stout trunks with a orange-yellow wrinkled leathery bark that looks like it could be the hide of a pachyderm.  They also short thick branches which give the trees a distinctive artistic shape. 

This wiliwili grove is remarkable because one of the trees was hit by lightening which ripped the tree asunder.  A torn lifeless limb lies at the foot of the tree testifying to the violence of the lightening strike. 

Despite the strike to its very core, this wiliwili tree had the will and fortitude to survive the assault. What a amazing sight to see this tree withstand the test of time. Long live the wiliwili trees at Puu Waawaa.