Pu’uanahulu is a small community midway between Kailua Kona and Waimea, on the upper road between those two communities. I don’t drive that highway much, except when I go to hike up Pu’u Wa’awa’a. Last time I did this, driving through Pu’uanahulu, I noticed that the jacaranda trees were in bloom alongside the road. What I hadn’t realized is just how many jacaranda trees there are in this area.
These photos are taken from the northern slopes of Pu’u Wa’awa’a. The bottom photo shows the general area with the purple jacaranda flowers of Pu’uanahulu clearly visible. The top photo shows a closer view of part of the community and the abundance of flowering jacaranda trees.
I think this is a spotted coral blenny on a head of purple cauliflower coral, and possibly a small trumpetfish.
This is a second response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge theme of ‘Waterworld.’ (See more responses here.) Yesterday, I posted about the movie Waterworld. Today, it’s a probably more expected response.
These are photos I took during my swim yesterday. Visibility in the water was patchy with some good areas and some not so good. I didn’t see anything startling, though the mackerel shads aren’t a common sight. Last time I saw such a shoal there was a great barracuda lurking on the other side. I looked around and, sure enough, there was another one looking interested as it cruised low down, too low for a decent photo.
The other oddity was in the photo at left. I saw what I think is a spotted coral blenny on this patch of cauliflower coral, and snapped a quick photo before it took off. But it was only when I processed the photos that I saw something else, to the left and slightly below the blenny. I think it’s a small trumpetfish, but it could be something else. A lot of small fish and other creatures hide in coral heads so I must pay more attention from here on.
In short, it was a fairly typical swim.
A shoal of mackerel scad on the left with yellow tang on the right.Little fish enjoy the comparative safety of the shallow water in the surge zone.On the left, a fourspot butterflyfish and a cushion star. On the right, black triggerfish are cleaned by a Hawaiian cleaner wrasse.Just before getting out I saw this small Pacific trumpetfish with goldring surgeonfishes.
This week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme is ‘Surprise.’ See more responses here.
I see a lot of fishermen when I’m out walking and they undoubtedly catch fish, but I never see them doing so. I’m as good at getting photos of that moment as I am at catching fish myself.
When I first saw this fisherman he was reeling in an empty line, as per usual. I kept walking, but moments later I heard a cry, turned to look, and saw him winding away on his line. I nipped back to take photos, fully expecting it to be a false alarm – his line was snagged in the rocks or he’d hooked some debris. So I was surprised when he hauled this fish from the water. I don’t know what kind it was, but it was a decent size and probably destined to be that evening’s supper.
The long-tailed blue butterfly (Lampides boeticus) is believed to have been accidentally introduced to Hawaii in the 1880s. Accidental or not, it wasn’t a good thing. Its common name, bean butterfly, gives a clue as to the problem. It damages a wide variety of bean and pea plants, both domestic and commercial.
These photos were taken on the Puna Coast Trail in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. The plant is Vigna marina or beach pea, an indigenous plant that grows well in the harsh, exposed coastal area that the trail passes through.
Two days ago, while driving home after my daily walk, I was thinking it must be almost a week since I actually took a photo (Never mind that when I got home I found that I’d taken a couple of photos earlier, during my walk!). Then I saw a patch of white in the grass beside the road, realized what it was, and thought that I should at least get a photo of that.
The nearest of the cows was some distance away, but this was the pasture of the local dairy and these cows are pretty mellow. I’ve seen other calves, seemingly abandoned, but actually just resting in a quiet spot while mom catches up with some grazing.
This was a marked contrast to my last cattle encounter, which was that almost-a-week-previous occasion of taking photos. I went for a hike up Pu’u Wa’awa’a. This is a public trail, but the land is also used for grazing so there can be cattle, horses, sheep, goats, and even a donkey or two sharing the area with hikers. Bear in mind that these cattle are being raised for beef so they’re big. Also, the cows among them are there to produce future beef cattle. They’re not giving milk to anyone other than their calves.
On this day, the first part of the trail, an old road, was littered with cattle of one kind or another, including several small calves. I grew up on a dairy farm and I’ve walked through many a field of cows and the occasional bull. I’m used to them, so this array of cattle didn’t bother me. As I walked up the trail, the herd thinned out. Soon all I saw in front of me were a couple of younger animals. These looked bigger and older than the calves lower down, perhaps yearlings. As I got closer I noticed a couple of full-grown animals grazing in a ditch on the other side of the road. They were mostly obscured by grass so I couldn’t see if they were cows or bulls. It seemed to make no difference as they appeared to ignore me as I passed.
I marched on up the road, and as I got closer to the two yearlings, I realized that one of the full-grown cattle (the large, black one in the photos below) had moved in my direction. This didn’t bother me. Often times cattle run towards me as I pass. Then they pull up and just look, or even turn and run away. I kept going. So did the large animal. I still couldn’t see whether it was male or female, but as it started snorting at me, I began to think female. I looked ahead to the two yearlings, then at the cow. She came closer, still snorting. I stopped. For the first time in my life, I thought I was probably going to get charged by a cow. This might seem silly, but people get killed by cows every year. A cow will charge, especially if someone comes between her and her calf.
By this time the cow was about 10 feet away. I decided this wasn’t the time to get a photo of a charging cow and instead clutched my metal water bottle with a view to swinging it at her snout. But the cow didn’t charge. Instead, she snorted one last time, glared at me as she stomped past, and headed up the road to what was clearly her calf. She was followed by the other large, brown cow.
Once the four were reunited, they just stood in the old roadway. I thought they might amble off, as cows will often do, but they stayed put. I didn’t feel like threading my way through them in case the two big ones were still riled up, so I marched into the scrubland to the side of the road and worked my way around them. The footing was uneven, but it wasn’t hard going and I soon came out on the other side. They’d watched my passage with more typically bovine expressions and once I regained the road surface they lost interest and meandered into the trees on the opposite side of the road.
I watched them go and figured I’d have a drink of water before continuing up the trail. I reached for my water bottle and pulled it out with a bloodstained hand … bloodstained hand? I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Both hands were smeared with blood. My shorts had a giant patch of blood on one side. Just above my wrist, a small scratch continued to gush. Somewhere in my short trek through the underbrush I’d encountered something sharp without noticing, which is fairly typical for me.
I washed the blood off my hands and held a tissue to the cut. It quickly stopped flowing, so I carried on up the trail having rediscovered the wisdom of not getting between a mother and her offspring.
The top photo was my last of April and is posted in response to Bushboy’s Last on the Card photo challenge. See more responses here. Also posted in response to this week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme of ‘Covid Discoveries.’ See more responses here.
And if those four cattle ever get together and release a record, perhaps Music To Moooove To, I think the bottom photo would make a great album cover for them.
This week’s Friendly Friday challenge theme is ‘Working Together.’ See more responses here.
The Ironman World Championship race is held here every year in October. Last year, there were nearly 2,500 competitors so it’s a huge event. An army of volunteers helps make the race happen, involved in everything from setting up the course to numerous activities on race day to cleaning up afterwards.
This photo was taken at the turnaround in Hawi, roughly halfway into the 112 mile cycling course. It’s the top of the bike course with it being mostly downhill back to Kailua Kona. Of course, this being cycling, there’s a good chance the wind, which can be fierce here, will be in the cyclists’ faces on the way up and on the way back down.
At this turnaround, volunteers hand out water and food to the competitors. It’s a tricky business making the handoff since the cyclists keep moving and there’s a steady stream of them. In this photo, I like the movement of the volunteer handing off the water as well as the echo of the action in the strong shadows.
Also posted in response to Becky’s April Squares challenge theme of ‘Top.’ See more responses here.
Graham's Island 