Palila / This is a story about us, and about the palila, a yellow bird with a gray back that lives only in Big Island forests of mamane and naio–plants that are also native and provide the food that it needs. The species once was widespread, but is now found only on the upper slopes of Mauna Kea, an area that represents just 5 percent of its original range.

It’s not the showiest of Hawai’i’s birds, and although endangered, it’s not the most rare. But it is certainly among the most famous, largely because it was the first–and so far, only–animal to ever have a legal suit brought successfully in its name. The case, filed by Earthjustice, ended in a 1979 court order requiring the state to protect the birds’ remaining habitat by removing the sheep that were destroying it.

That never fully happened. And now, even with all the protection that such legalities are intended to provide, even with the wealth of information known about the species and what it needs to survive, palila are edging toward the edge. Scientists, citing recent significant drops in the population–now estimated at 2,640–say that if the trend continues, palila could be extinct within five years.

“We’ve known for 30 years or longer what to do about palila,” said Paul Banko, a Big Island-based federal wildlife biologist who co-authored the May 2008 Audubon Society article, “Elepaio,” that sounded the five-year alarm. “The courts confirmed what the scientists said and court orders laid it all out. “That should be the note of optimism. We know what to do. Now it just comes down to doing it. The main issue to recovery seems to be political.”

Now the state is facing an Oct. 1 Earthjustice deadline requiring it to lay out specific plans for finally removing all the sheep, or return to court.

And so it is with most of the pressing environmental issues of our time. The palila’s story is our story, too. Its plight, it seems, is but a microcosm of the larger question facing us all: Will we find the political will to do what is needed before it’s “too late?”

Protecting palila

Palila feed primarily on mamane seeds and caterpillars that frequent trees on those forests. They naturally follow the mamane as it blooms, which means they need a large range that extends over gradients in elevation.

Additionally, Banko said, because the forest has been so badly degraded by roaming grazers, and the birds condensed to such a small area, palila are now more susceptible to naturally occurring threats, such as drought, which likely is a major factor in the most recent decline.

To reverse that downward trend, he said, it’s important to expand their range, increase their numbers and create new subpopulations. This can be done by translocating wild birds elsewhere on the mountain and releasing captive-raised Palila from the Keauhou Bird Conservation Center.

Some 21 captive-raised birds were released over three years, ending in 2006, said Alan Lieberman, conservation program manager for the Zoological Society of San Diego, which runs the Keauhou Bird Conservation Center. Another eight are scheduled for release on the north side of Mauna Kea next March, if the winter is wet enough, he said.

Moving the birds across Mauna Kea represents a major shift from the long-running effort to save palila by working inside their current and rapidly dwindling habitat. That push was shaped by a 1936 move aimed at protecting not palila, but Mauna Kea itself.

Land managers have known for more than a century that many of the four-legged animals introduced to Hawai’i from the West wreak havoc on the native forest. This, in turn, harms the watershed–a vital concern first to sugar interests and now to municipalities.

More than seventy years ago, undertaking aimed at protecting the vast Mauna Kea Forest Reserve watershed, Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) crews erected a perimeter fence the length of which is variously pegged at 52–58 miles. It took them 18 months, during which time they also built roads and cabins to service the fence, then drove out 47,000 sheep, along with wild cattle, pigs, goats and horses.

Since about 1938, Banko said, some 87,000 sheep have been removed from the mountain, where they forage on trees and seedlings, stalling the forest’s natural regeneration and hampering reforestation efforts.

But even that level of culling has failed to control the animals. As the palila continued to decline and lose range to grazers–both domestic cattle and wild goats and sheep–Earthjustice brought suit to protect the birds’ unique habitat.

That action, in which the palila became the first animal in the nation to be a plaintiff in a lawsuit, resulted in a 1979 court order directing the state Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) to “completely and permanently” remove feral sheep and goats from the palila’s critical habitat. The order was amended in 1987 to include mouflon sheep. Eleven years later, Earthjustice returned to court, contending the state had stopped eradication and instead was maintaining a small herd of mouflon for public hunting.

In a settlement of that suit, the state Divison of Forestry and Wildlife (DFW) agreed to comply with the earlier court orders and remove the animals. The state also agreed to make its best effort to keep animals from wandering into palila habitat by maintaining the perimeter fence built by the CCC. Yet 10 years later, the fence is still in disrepair and sheep remain on the mountain.

“That’s one of the frustrating things,” said Earthjustice attorney Koalani Kaulukukui. “We have three court orders and it’s the exact same situation as it was in 1979.”

Except that now palila numbers are estimated to be one-third lower than they were in 1980, Kaulukukui noted in a July 31 letter to DLNR Director Laura Thielen. The letter also said that the state must work with Earthjustice to set “specific benchmarks, including concrete deadlines,” for removing the animals. If these goals aren’t set by Oct. 1, the letter warned, Earthjustice will go back to court for an enforcement order.

The original order did include specific deadlines, Kaulukukui said, “but those came and went. Since the ’80s, there’s been no clear direction or specific goals or benchmarks.”

Conservationists and scientists attribute the state’s foot-dragging to its inherent conflict between maintaining hunting programs and protecting the native species that introduced game animals so frequently harm.

“I think a lot of it has to do with social issues,” Kaulukukui said. “I think there’s a lot of miscommunication, misunderstanding, with the community. I’m actually from the Big Island and I understand where they’re coming from. The hunting community does not agree with what we’re doing and they have a lot of political pull over there. That’s made the state leery of complete eradication.”

Paul Conry, administrator of the state DFW, which manages public lands and endangered species, flatly denies that pressure from hunters has influenced management decisions on Mauna Kea.

“We’re not trying to maintain a sheep hunting program on the mountain,” he said. “We’re under a court order and we’re committed to carrying it out. But you can’t just snap your fingers and it’s going to happen.”

Conry did acknowledge that the eradication program isn’t popular with hunters. “I don’t think that they’re happy with us having to go up and control sheep numbers. They think that’s a waste, but it’s part of the court order, so we do it.”

Kaulukukui has two uncles who hunt, and grew up eating the meat they brought home. “I’m sympathetic to hunters,” she said, but not when it comes to allowing animals in palila habitat. “Sheep do live elsewhere. The palila have no place else to go.”

For the past five years, Conry said, the state has been conducting aerial hunts about every six months, killing from 90 to 400 animals at a time. It also allows public hunting year-round, except during game bird season. Last year, the state killed 647 sheep, while hunters took another 389. Hunters previously objected to the aerial shoots, complaining that the meat went to waste, so the state responded by giving the meat away. “That’s worked,” Conry said. “If we can, we allow the public to salvage.”

Still, the animals remain and their numbers appear to be growing.

Observed Banko: “There’s no indication from [DFW's] actions that if they are committed to eradicating sheep, they have been effective.”

On the fence

Conry said the apparent recent increase in sheep–DFW has no clear idea how many animals are on the mountain–has prompted the state to schedule a third aerial hunt this year. While two annual hunts “seem to keep the numbers suppressed,” he said, the state will go up to four if needed to get the numbers down. “We don’t get every one when we go out,” Conry acknowledged. “That’s a reality.”

Cattle and sheep also wander in from adjacent lands, particularly those controlled by the Army at Phakuloa, through numerous holes and breaks in the fence. And ironically, the state’s efforts to enhance palila habitat by controlling alien weeds, preventing fires and reforesting with native plants has made the Forest Reserve more attractive to roaming grazers, too.

“As the habitat has improved, it’s improved conditions for sheep,” Banko said. “It’s like a runaway train in a sense. You’ve got to derail it by very, very vigorous removal of animals.”

Scientists and conservationists support repairing or replacing the perimeter fence; the latter would cost an estimated $6 million. They say a strong fence would serve the dual purpose of keeping animals out, while also expanding the range of the palila, which Banko and other wildlife biologists see as critical to its survival.

“The question now is how do we stop the range from shrinking and expand it back to its original range, or at least a part of it,” Banko said.

“The long-term solution is you’ve got to fix the fence,” said Marjorie Ziegler, executive director of the Conservation Council for Hawai’i. “Otherwise, the state will have to continue aerial shooting by helicopter.”

While the fencing project is expensive, she said, conservation groups are willing to help lobby the Legislature to raise money and awareness–something the state so far has not done specifically for palila over the past 30 years.

“It’s like saving a million dollars,” Ziegler said. “You can’t do it all in one paycheck. You have to start putting some away. And with recovery of endangered species, it’s forever.”

Conry has a different perspective. “It seems this entire issue is focused on ungulates [hooved animals] and fencing, but that’s only part of it. That’s not going to solve the problem. You’ve got to be able to control fire, control predators, have a captive propagation program and methods to establish new populations.”

Scientists and conservationists concur, but say fixing the fence and controlling animals is still the top priority. “It’s the one threat that if you don’t manage it, you can’t have recovery of palila,” Banko said. “None of the other threats are so singly critical.”

Added Kaulukukui: “In conversations with scientists, it seems they [palila] need more [mamane] trees and in order to get more trees, we need to get rid of more sheep. There are other threats…but without the trees, there will be no palila. So that’s the first step.”

Lieberman, at the conservation center, also points to the fence. “The state absolutely has to monitor and remove ungulates and repair the fence,” Lieberman said. “The forest is starting to recover, but if it’s not protected, we will never get ahead. The goal is to keep these birds alive long enough to start breeding.”

Banko agreed. “You want to be restoring habitat elsewhere and getting them into that habitat. You want to resist the urge to build the fortifications around the last remnant population.”

For now, Conroy said, the fence is the best option available.

“Our first priority is to fence and protect where the core population is,” Conry said. “As resources become available, we’ll repair or replace the perimeter fence. In areas where there’s hardly any sheep or palila, it doesn’t make sense to be spending a lot of money that won’t necessarily benefit the palila.”

The realignment of the Saddle Road, which goes through critical palila habitat, also has generated some funding that will be used to fence and reforest land where birds will be introduced to create a second population, Conry said.

A new approach?

Ziegler said it’s time for a new approach to controlling ungulates. “We’ve got to change the paradigm of animals everywhere unless you fence them out,” she said. “We’ve got to start talking about game management and setting aside big areas and fencing them [animals] in, where they can be hunted in a sustained yield.”

While Conry isn’t quite ready to adopt that strategy, he said the state “has been making real progress in the past 10–20 years with taking a landscape approach to conservation. The foundation is there for recovering our endangered species.”

Still, he said, there’s much more to be done, and palila isn’t the only imperiled species on his list. “There are 318 endangered species that I have responsibility for managing in the state. I have to balance the resources that we do have to manage all of our resources. It’s basically the results of 100 years of impacts.”

Conry estimated it will take $30 million over 10 years to manage the predator and habitat threats to palila and establish a second population in a secure place. He said funding could come through watershed protection programs, which would benefit other endangered species, too, as well as legislation that has been proposed for federal funds “to support management needs related to climate change.”

The public can assist recovery efforts by urging state and federal lawmakers to allocate funding for endangered species and also volunteering for habitat reforestation and native planting projects throughout Hawai’i, as well as by hunting ungulates, Conry said.

He said he feels hopeful that the state’s management plans will prove successful in recovering palila. But if DFW is required to put all its resources into one area, such as fixing the perimeter fence, he said, “we won’t get there. We’ve got an idea of what to do to recover palila. Hopefully it will work.”

Banko said the situation with palila “has deteriorated to the point where you don’t have the luxury of just concentrating on the long-term solution. You really have to address both the long- and short-term solutions. Now we have the classic dilemma because for decades they haven’t addressed the main problem appropriately. They can be saved, but it will take more effective management than has been done.”