Botanical Dimensions is a nonprofit organization that was founded by Kathleen Harrison and Terence McKenna in 1985. Our first project as a nonprofit was to purchase the forested acreage next to our own small Hawaiian forest-farm, before a developer bulldozed it – as was commonly done to nearby forested parcels on the Big Island (Hawaii Island) in those days.
Since 1986, BD has owned and stewarded eight acres of land on the western shoulder of Mauna Loa, the most massive mountain in the world, and still a living volcano. At 2000-2200’ elevation, the sloped land was native upland forest. In 1979, we built a small house on the neighboring five acres (still owned by Kathleen Harrison), along with a shade-house for plant propagation. This property remains entirely off the grid (rainwater catchment and solar electricity).
OUR HISTORY
In the early 1980s, we enlarged a natural clearing on our land, to make room for fruit trees and the beginning of a botanical sanctuary. We had worked in the Peruvian Amazon in the 1970s, and had seen the potential for destruction of the forest and the loss of traditional plant knowledge in the disrupted human populations. This threat, along with the wisdom and ‘advice’ of the plants themselves, gave us impetus to further collect Amazonian ethno-medical and shamanic plant species. We worked with indigenous Amazonians and others to gather and bring specimens to the Big Island for the purpose of protecting their genetic heritage, along with the ethnographic data that was collected about their traditional use and mythology. This became our family’s mandate. Together with our young children we lived on this land, in a hand-built house, for much of the early 1980s.
In 1985, a novel concept dawned on Kat: to create a non-profit organization to help support ethnobotanical investigation of interesting plant species; to collect, protect and propagate some of those species for ex-situ gardens in Hawaii (and to create in-situ gardens in the Amazon); and to be a gatherer-sharer of the folklore and traditions that attend many plant species. Botanical Dimensions was created at that time, gathered financial support, and in 1986 BD’s first act was to buy the Hawaii land that was for sale, just below our family homestead.
We created a wide, winding trail from our clearing down the mountain, through the forested land of BD, for the purpose of planting maturing specimens of rare medicinal plants alongside it, just as they often grow trailside in their native habitat. Until the mid 1990s, authorized plant collectors sent or carried living plant specimens to this land, from Peru, Ecuador, Mexico, Costa Rica, Belize, Kenya and Thailand. When possible, traditional lore and folk names were collected along with the plants. Some collectors were indigenous or mestizo Latin Americans; other collectors were American and Canadian university graduate students doing fieldwork. We successfully solicited financial support for collection, transport, planting, and maintenance of the forest-garden.
In 1991, when Kat and Terence separated, Kat took over management of Botanical Dimensions and the BD land. Terence created his own home and managed a five-acre forest adjacent to BD’s land on the downhill, western edge. A lower portion of the BD trail and easement still runs across that parcel, which is now owned by a naturopathy professor who is sympathetic to these causes.
TODAY
Today the BD land, Kat’s land, and our shared forest-garden function as a private reserve. Access is by invitation only, and contributions to support the garden are requested when visiting. When she is on the Big Island, Kat occasionally gives guided walks on the land. She taught university classes on ethnobotany there from 2001-2014, using her home and shade-house as the hub, but ranging over the reserve. Students and visitors have helped harvest plants, make various medicines, and manage trails.
We have always tried to preserve and document the native Hawaiian dry-mesic and wet-mesic forest species that grow naturally there, but now we also work to propagate species that are particularly important to Hawaiian ethnobotany, such as Hawaiian sandalwood, native ‘ohi’a trees, mamaki, and many more. We can provide lists of all three categories of plants on the land:
1. Native Hawaiian plant species
2. Introduced, useful plant species from other parts of the world (including medicine, food, shamanism, symbolism, and spiritual purposes)
3. Invasive, problematic, exotic species that negatively affect the forest or clearings
We also have developed a prototype Filemaker Pro database of the plants on the land, with photos, their provenance, their folk and Latin names, their uses, etc.
NATIVE AND NON-NATIVE SPECIES
We are fortunate to host some endangered species on this land. Generations of mated pairs of ‘Io, the Hawaiian hawk (Buteo solitarius), have nested in an ‘ohi’a lehua tree near BD’s NW corner, where they annually rear their young. As a U.S. endangered species, this site has been noted and listed by the National Resource Conservation Service. Forest degradation is the key cause for loss in these populations. Fewer than a thousand members of this hawk species are thought to survive now, all living on the upland slopes of Mauna Loa.
Also present on the land, apparently nesting there, is the Hawaiian Hoary Bat, also an endangered species. The Hawaiian name is ʻōpeʻapeʻa (Aeorestes semotus). This presence too has been noted by the NRCS. This bat is the only native terrestrial mammal in Hawaii.
As is well known, the state of Hawaii attracts non-native plant and animal species from around the globe. Rates of extinction of native Hawaiian plant and animal species are very high. Forests are particularly vulnerable. Many foreign tropical trees, shrubs, grasses, birds and mammals have invaded the islands since the era of European colonialism began in the 1700s. Recently, with climate change, periodic drought has also become a concern in Hawaii, and can be a stress on the native forest.
Budget and staff considerations over the past fifteen years, along with increased arrival and populations of invasive plants and animals, have made it a real challenge to protect the forest from these invasive species that plague the entire Hawaiian Island chain. Invasive plant and wild pig management has been the biggest maintenance concern for us in recent years. With supervision, volunteers sometimes help with invasive species management.
Non-native wild pigs are major forest inhabitants. We have encouraged hunting of wild pigs by inviting Native Hawaiians and others, which they appreciate, but the numbers taken are tiny compared to the burgeoning populations. Pigs eat some of the starchy plants, but more often they turn the soil, deeply disrupting the roots and making it impossible to cultivate anything new. Their numbers have increased vastly in recent years. It is an island-wide environmental problem, but there are no policies or budgets in place for island agencies to deal with what many of us land-stewards see as a crisis for forest management. Increasingly, concerned island landowners are hiring experts who “pig-fence,” meaning to safely enclose a parcel of land with a 4-ft. tall fence of metal wire that is hammered into the rocky soil and wired to the ground. Pigs are thereby unable to burrow underneath, and they cannot jump over. We have tentative estimates on what peripheral pig-exclusion fencing would cost to protect this land.
We are seeking to sell the BD land, in order to transfer ownership of this land to someone who appreciates its beauty and complexity. We would love to have someone who is willing to put resources toward appropriate forest management, pig-fencing, increased cultivation of significant specimen plants or stands of native Hawaiian plants. We are in the process of surveying, mapping, and appraising this unique, world-class collection of plants in this very special place. Part of what we can offer is advice in assessing the forest-garden, in restorative planting of recommended species, and – if all parties are in accord – with use of the existing shade-house and other facilities on our family land which borders this property.
LEGAL DETAILS
The BD land is 8.2 acres, fee-simple, and zoned Ag-5, which means a parcel cannot be subdivided smaller than 5 acres. Hawaii County will permit one primary dwelling and one smaller ohana building (for extended family or workers) per parcel. A driveway may be built off the existing, paved flagpole road that runs along the south boundary of the land. It is situated in the region of South Kona that is known as Opihihale. That is the ancient Hawaiian name for this ahupua’a, which is a wedge of land that begins at the sea and extends up the mountain to through agricultural areas and several types of forest. We first owned these two parcels as part of a collective that began in 1977 and subdivided in 2007. That collective became Opihihale Inc., an owners’ association, of which this parcel’s owner is a member. Together we all paid for the substantial road system and, with an annual assessment, we maintain the gate that you pass through on Ohia Aina Place, which runs between Mamalahoa Hwy. and our subdivision. The eleven parcels range from 5 to 10 acres. Some easements exist for access and are documented with the county. Our neighbor to the north is a very large parcel owned by a Native Hawaiian clan. Above our ahupua’a, so just uphill from Kat’s house and driveway, begins the South Kona Forest Reserve, which extends up to about 4000 ft. elevation. There is no public access to this region of the SKFR, but we are free to hike there. We do make an annual trek to the old ahu stone that marks the top of the ancient ahupua’a, and we respectfully leave an offering there, as is Hawaiian tradition.