Finding Common Ground

Here at Regenerations Botanical Garden in Kilauea what once was a guava plantation is transforming into a variety of small farms serving the local community. Paul Massey is testing various crop growing methods, opening up plots for the community, helping businesses adopt school gardens, training students to be farmers and educating the public on a weekly radio show. Soon they will have a shadehouse for plant propagation, growing, and food washing.

At SOS Farms, Kelly and Yuichi Sato (a wife-husband team) have a one acre organic farm with vegetables and free-range chickens. They provide an "eat local" service, in which customers order a basket of goodies online each week. They can provide other locally grown products in the basket such as honey, mushrooms, and bread. Their business is so popular, they have a waiting list of customers!

Just down the road apiece is Kaua'i Fresh Farms with an amazing complex of air conditioned shadehouses for cucumbers, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and lettuce. Marcel Peerson explained how their facility operates with computerized settings. While it is not a 100% organic farm, they use organic pest control methods as much as possible. Kaua`i Fresh Farms sells to restaurants, hotels, farmers' markets and grocery stores like Foodland and Big Save. Soon the 100 KW photovoltaic system will be up, helping them save energy and lowering operational costs.

Finally, we ended our day and trip with a visit to Common Ground, a non-profit organization, that facilitates growing/living sustainably. The Garden, a restaurant at Common Ground, serves delicious and beautifully presented food straight from the farms and ocean around us. The menu is built around the crops and changes seasonally (a farm-to-table menu). We heard from legendary Jack Gushiken who knows more about water systems in the area than anyone else.  And before going home, we practiced facilitation and recording techniques.  It was an exhilarating 4 days on nani Kaua`i!

Ahupua`a management in North Shore Kaua'i

The north shore of Kaua`i holds many lessons particularly in ahupua`a management, from mountain to sea. We visited the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Hanalei Refuge to catch a glimpse of endangered waterbirds living in natural and cultivated habitat, including lo'i kalo (taro patches). Then at Limahuli Gardens, managed by the National Tropical Botanical Gardens, ALP alumnus Kawika Winter described their perspectives on community engagement in conservation. Then at Waipa, Stacy Sproat helped us see the big picture of ahupua'a management intertwined with education. Totally inspirational!

Farming at 22 North

22 North is a restaurant in Kilohana that uses locally grown ingredients, some grown on a 5 acre farm a few minutes from the restaurant. Bryna Storch is the farmer who uses smart techniques to farm the land, including using a wild pig to till it! Her chickens are busy eating the restaurant scraps. Bryna is not biting off more than she can chew, gradually growing her farm in phases and in so doing, restoring the soil while nourishing our bellies.

Good grinds and drink at Kaua'i Coffee

The good people at Kaua'i Coffee hosted the alumni potluck dinner and also a behind-the-scenes tour of coffee production. The dinner was "over-the-top" with 'ono grinds thanks to alumni and the Kaua'i Farm Bureau. Mahalo nui to Laurie Ho of Garden Island RC&D and Mike Shimatsu of Kaua'i Coffee for taking  lead roles in organizing the dinner.  Thanks also to Tim Martin for the very informative tour of the production facilities. It was good to know that coffee production is done sustainably, as Kaua'i Coffee uses energy from hydroelectric plants, composts, and re-uses water. And turns out the coffee is darn good!

Enjoying Nature's Beauty at Koke'e

We were blessed by beautiful weather and a superb guide on our hike in Koke'e. We learned about the native forest's role in providing water that is used for domestic, business and agricultural use. We also saw unique plants found only on Kaua'i.  The mikinalo (native sundew), a carnivorous plant, was especially intriguing. Good thing for us it was only a couple of inches tall!  Mahalo nui to Steve Perlman for giving us this memorable experience.

the Power of Pigs

Val Kaneshiro, one of the hardest workers at M&H Kaneshiro Farm, delighted us with an eye-opening tour of the family's pig farm at Oma'o. There were about 100 HUGE sows when we visited, reduced from 250, and many hundreds of piglets. It's normal for a sow to have 16 piglets!  The family also has a slaughterhouse in Kalaheo, which is run twice a week. The farm's goats eat grass by the effluent waste pond. Val, and ALP alumnus is working with current ALP class member, Palo Luckett, to find better ways to manage the pig waste and generate energy from it.

Kaua`i West to North - First stop, Pioneer!

For Seminar 3, we escaped to beautiful Kaua`i!  Our first stop was to Pioneer's research facility in Waimea. Sarah Styan gave us a very informative presentation on plant biotechnology, which brought back memories of science class.  A market-driven company, Pioneer responds to the needs of farmers. We learned that Pionneer sells genetically modifed as well as non-genetically modified seeds. Sarah gave us a quick tour of the research facilities where we saw how they carefully sort corn seeds. It's a very detail-oriented job! We also peeked into the molecular marker lab. The seed industry in Hawai`i is growing, valued at $222 million in 2010. A new factoid: seed industry is one of the biggest users of Fedex and UPS in the state!