I continued my initial exploration of the forests South of Kaumana Trail this weekend. It will take me a while to fill this in...
Bird counts in the big forest South of Kaumana Trail were usually very consistent. I'iwi were very well represented and there was an abundance of 'elepaio - I'm not sure why. Average counts for native birds were 6 'apapane, 3 i'iwi, 3 'elepaio, 3 oma'o, 1 'amakihi. I detected no rare honeycreepers. There was 1 'io on the 3rd day. Alien birds were surprisingly scarce. There were some yellow-fronted canary, house finch and Japanese white-eye on the 1855 lava along Kaumana Trail. Within the forest there were on average less than 1 Japanese white-eye per count and low numbers of very scattered kalij pheasant. Red-billed leiothrix only on the southernmost boggy areas near the edge of the younger forest, along bird survey transect 25.
Day 1 "Hunter trails and mysterious airplane wreckage"...
I started out Saturday by crossing the overgrown 1855 lava flow to the same place I entered the forest last week. I took a somewhat different route once inside the forest, taking me more directly to the most interesting areas from the previous visit. from there I proceeded West in a direction that seemed promising for rare plants by virtue of being rugged, tangled and muddy. I found a lot of places rare plants might hide, but few actual rarities. More cyrtandra, including a huge cyrtandra lysiosepala. More clermontia and cyanea. One of the most interesting finds was a small tetraplasandra sapling.
Eventually I ran into a well-flagged hunter trail. There were many colors of flags, indicating frequent use. I used the remaining daylight tracing out this trail, and found that it ran directly North-South. Following it first South I started to encounter airplane wreckage along the trail - small bits of a wing. The trail forked a couple of times and finally climbed out of the forest onto a tongue of (1855?) pahoehoe lava flow. I turned around at that point and followed the trail back North. Along the way the trail passed a fairly rare 'opuhe tree. (important the next day) By now light was fading, but as I had hoped for it exited the North side of the forest near a trail I found several days earlier across the overgrown 1855 lava field. This seems to be the primary hunter access trail into the forest. Wonderful weather.
Day 2 "the magical opuhe grove"...
Sunday I started out on the trail I found the previous day, but I quickly split off to the West of it to explore upslope. At first the understory was dense, but soon I climbed up onto a ridge, and followed the more open ridge to the South. I didn't see too many interesting plants along the ridge, so I eventually dropped down into muddy gullies below it where the foliage was much more interesting. Beautiful pala and pteris irregularis ferns, fuzzy cyrtandras and delicate cyaneas. Etc.
Eventually I came across the largest 'aiea tree I've ever seen. 'Aiea are generally uncommon, though fairly common in some wet forests, but this is the first one I've found on the Saddle. I covered a lot of ground Sunday, crossing the pahoehoe lava at the end of the trail I explored yesterday, then up a big slope, then along the top of the slope and through gullies looking here and there for interesting plants. I found another hunter trail leading to a new exit from the North edge of the forest.
The most exciting find of the day happened as I worked my way back in a loop to the main trail. I encountered more large 'opuhe trees, and then suddenly found myself in a small cluster of 'opuhe trees! There were more wild 'opuhe trees around me than I had ever seen before! I decided to call the main trail Opuhe Trail by the end of the day. To date I've found more than a dozen of them in the area.
On the way back to the trail I also encountered an small 'anini tree. I covered a lot of ground Sunday, mostly going up and down and crawling through gullies and undergrowth, but I still had only explored a tiny fraction of the forest South of Kaumana Trail.
Day 3 "finding bird survey transect 25"...
Monday I wanted to explore further South than I had been so far. I took the main trail South through the forest, skirting the eastern tips of the tongues of pahoehoe lava intrusion. In this new area the forest was younger, and the flora was less diverse. Eventually I emerged into an older boggy forest without canopy - only sparse large trees and dense shrubby understory. I explored the bogs for a little while, but the weren't very interesting. Red-billed leiothrix began to appear in these boggy habitats.
Continuing South on the main hunter trail, it soon intersected an East-West trail of blue flags. I was immediately hopeful that this was one of the bird survey transects, and indeed I quickly arrived at station 10 of bird survey transect 25. The bird survey flagging is several years old, so I stayed with the well-flagged hunter trail at first, which took me South out of the bogs and into an increasingly dense and difficult 'ohi'a scrub and 'uluhe area. However the hunter trail soon gave up on trying to penetrate this area and turned back North. When it re-crossed the bird survey transect again I left it and followed the bird transect through the bog down to station 11.
After station 11 I decided I didn't have time to continue in that direction. I headed first Northeast and then North. I was out of the bogs quickly and the forest I crossed on the way North was very sparse scattered large 'ohi'a and naio trees and a tangled tree-fern dominated understory. Mostly it wasn't very notable, but there is a lot of this to explore in the future. I checked a lot of clermontia, but all were common c. montis-loa, and I eventually found a large pawale vine along the way back.
Finally I dropped down into an area of muddy pits and bogs on an old weathered pahoehoe surface. At one point the huge ancient 'a'a lava flow I had just been walking on had flowed over this even more ancient pahoehoe, and the steep slope I decended from one to the other was the edge of the tall 'a'a flow, where it had stopped. (The age of these flows is indicated by the large amount of mud/soil that has accumulated on them over millenia of forest growth, covering the bare lava) The first mud pit had a bit of water in it, and was a bit dramatic. Following the muddy bogs downhill to a low spot I found Slime Lake, which was far larger than the first pool. I called it Slime Lake because the water was completely choked with algae, like a big pit of pea soup.
This was a long day that covered a lot of ground, so I'm skipping a lot of stuff - indeed, most of it. After Slime Lake I headed back to the good plant diversity area I found on Thursday...to look for the lens cap that I had dropped. No luck finding it. Eventually darkness forced me to head out ASAP. I found some interesting plants along the way, and fought my way through the undergrowth and over/under fallen trees to get back to the main hunter trail before dark. I exited the forest at sunset, and got back to the car just before dark.
One of the most notable things about the weekend's adventures is that I encountered very few weeds. There was a single patch of tibouchina, scattered thimbleberry, and some juncus in the bogs. Otherwise this forest is nearly weed-free, despite the huge amount of pig damage.
Bird counts in the big forest South of Kaumana Trail were usually very consistent. I'iwi were very well represented and there was an abundance of 'elepaio - I'm not sure why. Average counts for native birds were 6 'apapane, 3 i'iwi, 3 'elepaio, 3 oma'o, 1 'amakihi. I detected no rare honeycreepers. There was 1 'io on the 3rd day. Alien birds were surprisingly scarce. There were some yellow-fronted canary, house finch and Japanese white-eye on the 1855 lava along Kaumana Trail. Within the forest there were on average less than 1 Japanese white-eye per count and low numbers of very scattered kalij pheasant. Red-billed leiothrix only on the southernmost boggy areas near the edge of the younger forest, along bird survey transect 25.
Day 1 "Hunter trails and mysterious airplane wreckage"...
I started out Saturday by crossing the overgrown 1855 lava flow to the same place I entered the forest last week. I took a somewhat different route once inside the forest, taking me more directly to the most interesting areas from the previous visit. from there I proceeded West in a direction that seemed promising for rare plants by virtue of being rugged, tangled and muddy. I found a lot of places rare plants might hide, but few actual rarities. More cyrtandra, including a huge cyrtandra lysiosepala. More clermontia and cyanea. One of the most interesting finds was a small tetraplasandra sapling.
Eventually I ran into a well-flagged hunter trail. There were many colors of flags, indicating frequent use. I used the remaining daylight tracing out this trail, and found that it ran directly North-South. Following it first South I started to encounter airplane wreckage along the trail - small bits of a wing. The trail forked a couple of times and finally climbed out of the forest onto a tongue of (1855?) pahoehoe lava flow. I turned around at that point and followed the trail back North. Along the way the trail passed a fairly rare 'opuhe tree. (important the next day) By now light was fading, but as I had hoped for it exited the North side of the forest near a trail I found several days earlier across the overgrown 1855 lava field. This seems to be the primary hunter access trail into the forest. Wonderful weather.
Day 2 "the magical opuhe grove"...
Sunday I started out on the trail I found the previous day, but I quickly split off to the West of it to explore upslope. At first the understory was dense, but soon I climbed up onto a ridge, and followed the more open ridge to the South. I didn't see too many interesting plants along the ridge, so I eventually dropped down into muddy gullies below it where the foliage was much more interesting. Beautiful pala and pteris irregularis ferns, fuzzy cyrtandras and delicate cyaneas. Etc.
Eventually I came across the largest 'aiea tree I've ever seen. 'Aiea are generally uncommon, though fairly common in some wet forests, but this is the first one I've found on the Saddle. I covered a lot of ground Sunday, crossing the pahoehoe lava at the end of the trail I explored yesterday, then up a big slope, then along the top of the slope and through gullies looking here and there for interesting plants. I found another hunter trail leading to a new exit from the North edge of the forest.
The most exciting find of the day happened as I worked my way back in a loop to the main trail. I encountered more large 'opuhe trees, and then suddenly found myself in a small cluster of 'opuhe trees! There were more wild 'opuhe trees around me than I had ever seen before! I decided to call the main trail Opuhe Trail by the end of the day. To date I've found more than a dozen of them in the area.
On the way back to the trail I also encountered an small 'anini tree. I covered a lot of ground Sunday, mostly going up and down and crawling through gullies and undergrowth, but I still had only explored a tiny fraction of the forest South of Kaumana Trail.
Day 3 "finding bird survey transect 25"...
Monday I wanted to explore further South than I had been so far. I took the main trail South through the forest, skirting the eastern tips of the tongues of pahoehoe lava intrusion. In this new area the forest was younger, and the flora was less diverse. Eventually I emerged into an older boggy forest without canopy - only sparse large trees and dense shrubby understory. I explored the bogs for a little while, but the weren't very interesting. Red-billed leiothrix began to appear in these boggy habitats.
Continuing South on the main hunter trail, it soon intersected an East-West trail of blue flags. I was immediately hopeful that this was one of the bird survey transects, and indeed I quickly arrived at station 10 of bird survey transect 25. The bird survey flagging is several years old, so I stayed with the well-flagged hunter trail at first, which took me South out of the bogs and into an increasingly dense and difficult 'ohi'a scrub and 'uluhe area. However the hunter trail soon gave up on trying to penetrate this area and turned back North. When it re-crossed the bird survey transect again I left it and followed the bird transect through the bog down to station 11.
After station 11 I decided I didn't have time to continue in that direction. I headed first Northeast and then North. I was out of the bogs quickly and the forest I crossed on the way North was very sparse scattered large 'ohi'a and naio trees and a tangled tree-fern dominated understory. Mostly it wasn't very notable, but there is a lot of this to explore in the future. I checked a lot of clermontia, but all were common c. montis-loa, and I eventually found a large pawale vine along the way back.
Finally I dropped down into an area of muddy pits and bogs on an old weathered pahoehoe surface. At one point the huge ancient 'a'a lava flow I had just been walking on had flowed over this even more ancient pahoehoe, and the steep slope I decended from one to the other was the edge of the tall 'a'a flow, where it had stopped. (The age of these flows is indicated by the large amount of mud/soil that has accumulated on them over millenia of forest growth, covering the bare lava) The first mud pit had a bit of water in it, and was a bit dramatic. Following the muddy bogs downhill to a low spot I found Slime Lake, which was far larger than the first pool. I called it Slime Lake because the water was completely choked with algae, like a big pit of pea soup.
This was a long day that covered a lot of ground, so I'm skipping a lot of stuff - indeed, most of it. After Slime Lake I headed back to the good plant diversity area I found on Thursday...to look for the lens cap that I had dropped. No luck finding it. Eventually darkness forced me to head out ASAP. I found some interesting plants along the way, and fought my way through the undergrowth and over/under fallen trees to get back to the main hunter trail before dark. I exited the forest at sunset, and got back to the car just before dark.
One of the most notable things about the weekend's adventures is that I encountered very few weeds. There was a single patch of tibouchina, scattered thimbleberry, and some juncus in the bogs. Otherwise this forest is nearly weed-free, despite the huge amount of pig damage.
