Tag Archives: Sunday Stills

Monk seals resting

Monk Seals Resting

I’m posting this photo in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Friend’ (see more responses here), though it would be equally suitable for next week’s ‘Lazy Days.’

Monk seals are solitary animals, the main exception being the six weeks or so a mother spends with her new pup, teaching it the tricks of the trade, before leaving it to fend for itself. But for a three month period in late 2016, these two monk seals spent a lot of time together.

The top seal is I05, a male, affectionately known as Igor. He’s a Big Island seal and appears to spend his time on the Kohala and Kona coast. The other is B00, a female, affectionately known as Boo. She was born in Kauai and had previously been seen on Molokai and Maui, but now appears to spend much of her time on the Kona coast. Whereas not too much had been known about B00, I05 was regularly seen and was a notorious loner. So his ongoing liaison was quite out of character.

They seemed very relaxed and content in each other’s company, and here are resting ashore, as monk seals do, before heading back into the water to feed.

Wind turbines crank out the power

Wind turbines Hawi and Mauna Kea

This week’s Sunday Stills challenge is ‘Drunk with .…’ I thought about a photo of my liquor cabinet, but settled instead for ‘Drunk with Power,’ a reasonable choice in these turbulent times.

Hawi Wind Farm began operations in 2006 and has 16 turbines churning out 10.56 MW. This power is supplied to Hawaii Electric Light Company, which runs the power grid on the island.

My interest in the wind farm is mostly visual. I like the patterns that the turbines make, and every once in a while the telescopes of Mauna Kea can be seen in the distance.

See more Sunday Stills responses here.

Wind turbines Hawi

Bee on lantana

Bee on Lantana

Lantana is such a colorful flower – pink and purple, yellow and orange (and invasive here, but let’s not talk about that). Curiously, it doesn’t seem all that popular with bugs, at least by my observations. But at certain times I see butterflies very interested and on this occasion, several bees were going from bloom to bloom.

Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Macro-Photography of Anything.’ See more responses here.

Rampant tropical plants

Tropical foliage at Lily Lake

Tropical FoliageI live in a pretty green area of the Big Island, but I always enjoy a visit to the much wetter east side. The extra rain allows the tropical foliage to run amok. Trees and shrubs compete for space and light, and vines run everywhere – along the ground and up tree trunks. It’s a riot of many shades of green and leaves of every size, from tiny ground covers to giant bananas to the distinctive leaves of a monstera deliciosa surrounding its flower (below).

Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Plant Life.’ See more responses here.

Monstera Deliciosa flower

Is it windy here?

Kauhola Point tree

Northeast trade winds are Hawaii’s air conditioner, moderating what would otherwise be much hotter temperatures. The North Kohala coast is a spot where the winds whistle ashore. They can be very strong, but if you want to know how strong, the surest way is to ask a tree. This one is near the Kauhola Point light.

Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Wind.’ See more responses here.

Two Step

Two Step

There are seasons in Hawaii. Summer is hotter, and wetter on the dry side of the Big Island. But let’s be honest, there are many people who live through freezing winters and boiling summers, sun-free winters and sun-seared summers. They believe Hawaii has summer year-round, and not just any summer, but a pleasant summer where it’s warm and sunny but not inhospitably so.

For those people, and in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Summer,’ I give you a typical summer shot of people getting ready to go snorkeling, or just exiting the water. The photo was taken at Two Step, next door to Pu’uhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park — in February. Bwahahahahahaha.

For more information about Pu’uhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park, visit https://www.nps.gov/puho/index.htm.

See more Sunday Stills responses here.

Northern pintails

A pair of northern pintails take a dip in a puddle at Upolu Airport. Northern pintails migrate to Hawaii in the winter, in large numbers in former times, but fewer these days.

These are both drakes just starting to molt out of eclipse or juvenile plumage. Alas, they didn’t stick around the area long enough for me to see them in their splendid adult plumage.

Thanks to posters on birdforum.net for the identification and information.

Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Tourist.’ See more responses here.

King Kamehameha statues

King Kamehameha statue KapaauKing Kamehameha statue Honolulu

These two photos are of statues of King Kamehameha I, the king who first united the Hawaiian Islands under one leader. On top, draped in leis from last Monday’s Kamehameha Day celebrations, is the statue at Kapaau, here on the Big Island. Below is the statue in Honolulu. It sits in front of the Aliʻiōlani Hale, which housed the government of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi and the Republic of Hawaiʻi, and is currently home to the Hawaiʻi State Supreme Court.

Back in 1878, a statue of the King was commissioned for display in Honolulu. The commission was given to American artist Thomas Ridgeway Gould, and in 1880 his plaster model was sent to Paris to be cast, before being shipped to Hawaii. Alas, it never made it. The ship transporting the statue caught fire and sank off of the Falkland Islands.

Fortunately, the statue was insured, so a replacement was ordered. While this process was underway, the original statue turned up! Salvaged by fishermen, it was sold to a British ship captain who recognized it. He, in turn, sold it to the Hawaiian government, which now found itself in possession of identical twin statues. But the statues weren’t identical. The replacement statue was pristine and resplendent with gold detailing. The original was missing a hand and had a broken spear, and had suffered a good deal of fire damage.

The government decided to erect the replacement statue in Honolulu and the original was restored and sent to Kapaau, near Kamehameha’s birthplace. However, the original was corroded from its time in the sea so, in the early 1900s, local residents began to paint the statue, both to prevent further corrosion and to make it more lifelike.

By the end of the century, the statue was in bad shape and in 1996 conservator Glenn Wharton was hired to assess its condition. In his book, The Painted King: Art, Activism, and Authenticity in Hawaii, he recalls being startled by what he found, ‘A larger-than-life brass figure painted over in brown, black, and yellow with “white toenails and fingernails and penetrating black eyes with small white brush strokes for highlights. . . . It looked more like a piece of folk art than a nineteenth-century heroic monument.”’

For the next few years Wharton led a community discussion about how to save the statue, including the tricky question of whether it should be restored to its original bronze and gold finish or continue the painted alternative the community had grown up with. In the end the community voted to keep the painted finish and in 2001 the statue was restored in this way and rededicated.

A third statue of King Kamehameha I was commissioned after statehood in 1959, for installation in the U.S. Statuary Hall in Washington DC. However, this statue wasn’t cast from the original molds, but from molds taken of the Honolulu statue.

Posted in response to this week’s Sunday Stills challenge on the theme of ‘Twin.’ See more responses here.