Ho'omaluhia Botanical Garden

My mom always say looking at green things is good for you, so take a break from symposium prepping and look at plants growing in Hawaii.  No guarantees about them being native though...

A couple of weeks ago, I went to Ho'omaluhia Botanical Garden with my cousins.  It was the first time this trip for me to go to the windward side, so I was excited (and bundled up.)

The garden is basically a buffer zone built by the Army Corps of Engineers to provide flood protection for the people downslope of the place.  Aww how nice.  They also have hikes there, nature talks, a bunch of little kids fishing with twigs.  I'm still convinced that volunteers are sticking fish onto their hooks when the kids aren't looking.  The lake there is disgusting.  

The visitors center had some kind of watercolor gallery that week.  My cousin enthusiastically took my camera and meticulously (well, as meticulous a 12 year old can be) took pictures of "his favorite paintings" (in other words....all of them.  I ran out of memory before we even got out the visitors center!)

Cousin likes his flowers. 

Grandma walking around confused.  Behind her is a Florida Thatch Palm.  I would never know this in real life. 

Hi, I'm a mountain, and I'm really pretty. Look at my clouds.  Tee hee.  I'll rainshadow you, leeward side!

Here's a shorter palm tree.  It's called the Arikury Palm.  It looks just like that other palm tree.   

I don't know what this is, but it's pretty!

That's a mountain.  

This is called Panama-Hat Plant.  I'm just going to hazard a guess and say that their leaves are used to make hats...in Panama.  The little sign says it's from South Mexico, but eh, same thing. They're right next to each other anyways...right?  (How did I get into a Geography program??)  

This one I actually know.  Sealing wax palm, or lipstick palm.  It's an ornamental  brought in from Malaysia.  It doesn't make lipstick, or wax.  Boo. 

I think this is the poisonous bulb plant...or something like that.  One thing I learned in Tropical Ecology - don't eat anything you didn't see someone else eat first.  Plants make some crazy stuff.

...Or maybe it's just guava.  Let's just say I should never be a guide in the wild.  Or anywhere. 

"walk to your doom!!"

Those giant things are Imperial Bromeliads.   They're from the mountains of Brazil, and will make a giant stalk when it's 20.  And they're AWESOME looking.  And probably host hoards of mosquitoes. 

This is the fruit of the lipstick plant, which actually makes lipstick.  Or the red dye, at least.  I don't really know what goes into lipstick.  Pig fat?  


Pig fat. Wikipedia confirms.  

The rubber tree.  Fun fact - the ball in that one Disney movie about the Aztecs is made from rubber from that tree.  The one movie where those two friends have a ship and are looking for gold...


Anyways, here's a cool website where you can adopt a rubber tree. Super cute.

Here's a cocao tree. MMM.  Too bad there are signs everywhere telling us not to pick one (or touch one!  My hand's there for...scale.)  Not that I'd have any idea how to process it.  Apparently the leaves are poisonous, so stay away from that. -___-  According to wikipedia, cocao beans were used as currency as late as the 1840's.  Love it. 

I just love how big the plants are here.  Hi giant leaf!  My cousin cut out his brother.  I lack basic photo cropping skills.

This is the needle flower tree.  They say they're looking for the AIDS vaccine in it's bark, but I even tried google scholaring it and couldn't come up with anything.  For reference, the scientific name is Posoqueria latifolia.  Weird.

Here's a plant. I don't know what this is. 

This has got to be my favorite tree: the cannonball tree.  When the fruits matures, they falls to the ground, making a super loud noise, and then 'exploding.'  Then they sit around smelling bad.  

They're EVERYWHERE!

That's it for now.  For the people presenting, ROCK IT.  It's going to be awesome.