NTBG Is Back

By Léo Azambuja

Left to right, Lei Wann, director of Limahuli Garden and Preserve, and staff Saori Umetsu and Lahela Chandler. Photo by Léo Azambuja

The National Tropical Botanical Garden has reopened its Kaua‘i’s gardens to the public, after being closed since March because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The reopening is bringing a few changes designed to draw more local residents to the gardens while keeping them safe. These changes include new attractions and a significant reduction in membership fees.

“We really feel it’s important to get the community in here,” NTBG CEO and Director Janet Mayfield said. She added this reopening is an opportunity for the nonprofit organization to reconnect with the community in a way that can provide local residents with safe places for healing during these stressful times.

NTBG has five gardens under its umbrella. Three are on Kaua‘i; Limahuli Garden and Preserve in Hā‘ena, and McBryde and Allerton gardens in Lāwaʻi Valley. They also have Kahanu Garden on Maui and The Kampong in Florida.

“We’ve opened our doors because we feel it’s important that the community has a space to be healthy, … to learn about our culture and our history,” said Lei Wann, director of Limahuli, a 17-acre garden at the bottom of a nearly 1,000-acre preserve encrusted in a valley crowded with rare and endangered plants on the North Shore.

Jackie Nielsen, Visitor Program Manager of the South Shore Gardens, is bringing some of the McBryde and Allerton gardens to the South Shore Visitor Center. Photo by Léo Azambuja

“That’s what our focus is now, our community,” said Jackie Nielsen, Visitor Program Manager of the South Shore Gardens, McBryde and Allerton.

Limahuli was the first of the gardens to reopen, allowing visitors since June 16. Allerton and McBryde gardens reopened July 1.

At the South Shore Visitor Center, the portal to Allerton and McBryde, quite a few changes were made. Nielsen said some of the restraints of the community coming to Allerton are time and money. The tour is a beautiful experience, she said, but it’s two-and-a-half-hour long, plus the bus ride in and out the garden.

“So, what we’re doing is we’re going to bring some of Allerton and McBryde up here to the Visitor Center,” Nielsen said. The center’s grounds were redesigned to accommodate many botanical features that were previously only available at McBryde and Allerton.

Allerton, at the bottom of Lāwaʻi Valley, has an exquisite collection of tropical plants. But the garden is mostly known for its architectural design, its statues throghout the property, Queen Emma’s cottage by the beach, and as a set location for many movies, including Jurassic Park. McBryde in the upper valley has the world’s largest collection of native Hawaiian flora, and is a critical site for scientific research, plant conservation and cultural learning.

The fishpond at the South Shore Visitor Center. Photo by Léo Azambuja

The entrance to the South Shore Visitor Center is on Lāwaʻi Road, across from the Spouting Horn. The center is on a 10-acre property — nearly the size of Florida’s The Kampong garden — and it’s a pristine property full of tropical and native Hawaiian plants. The admission fee is $3 for local residents, and NTBG members get in for free. A daily guided 45-minute walking tour is included in the admission, but visitors can also do a self-guided tour. The longer tour at Allerton, accessible by a bus from the Visitor Center, is offered at discounted rates for residents and NTBG members.

Nielsen said the tour at the visitor center can help people to decide whether to take the longer tour at Allerton, which is offered daily at 10:30 a.m. Sanitizing and hand-washing stations have been strategically placed around the property, as well as signs reminding visitors of social distance guidelines and other safety recommendations, all in accordance with local, state and federal authorities.

An exciting new attraction at the visitor center is a free daily Ho‘ike circle, which means sharing your knowledge, according to Nielsen. There will be different topics each day.

Signage at Limahuli. Photo by Léo Azambuja

“We’ve got our team of scientists, curators and havaiana giving a daily talk or presentation on something related to our mission,” said Nielsen, adding it could be a cultural piece, a scientific presentation or even how drone technology is helping to preserve endangered plants.

On the North Shore, Limahuli Garden and Preserve is looking better than ever. While some of the staff was working from home during the closure, a few of them, five or six, kept working on the grounds.

“Right now, it’s looking in top shape,” Wann said of Limahuli. “We’ve even took on a few new projects that needed to be done, and we used the quiet time without visitors to accomplish some projects that can’t necessarily be done when visitors are here.”

Limahuli is not offering guided tours at the moment, but visitors can go on a self-guided tour, which is quite an experience. A three-quarter-mile trail meanders through the property, going through ancient stone structures, native plants and a pristine stream. There is so much to see that visitors usually take about two hours to walk the entire path. The admission fee is $5 for local residents, but just like in any NTBG site, members get in for free.

Jackie Nielsen explains the pili grass’ role in pre-contact Hawai‘i. Photo by Léo Azambuja

Once a thriving ahupua’a, the entire Limahuli Valley, nearly 1,000 acres, is considered an important cultural, conservation and scientific site. The valley is home to almost 250 taxa of native plants and birds, with about 50 of them on the brink of extinction, according to NTBG. Important archaeological features dating back hundreds of years can be found there.

When Wann took the job as the garden’s director in January, it had a special meaning for her — her family comes from the once-inhabited Limahuli Valley.

“For me, working here is actually coming home, coming home to my roots, where my ancestors come from. I’m told they built a lot of these walls here,” she said. “My ancestors were fishermen, kalo famers in this area. We come from this place. So when I say I’m coming home, it’s really a coming-home.”

Just like the South Shore Visitor Center, Limahuli has also adapted to offer a safe environment to visitors. At the parking lot, stalls have been enlarged to ensure there is enough distance between visitors. Signage throughout the property reminds visitors to practice social distancing. Additionally, there are sanitizing and bio-security stations on the property.

There are about 2,500 botanical gardens spread across the world, cultivating some six million plants of about 80,000 taxa — about one-quarter of the estimated number of vascular plant species, according to an article published in the Plant Diversity journal in August 2018. These gardens play an important role in preserving plant species that would otherwise go extinct.

Among all these gardens, NTBG is arguably one of the most critically important ones. About 90 percent of the approximately 1,400 plant taxa native to Hawai‘i are endemic; they are found nowhere else in the world. More than 100 plant taxa in Hawai‘i have already gone extinct, and more than 200 are considered to have less than 50 individuals remaining in the wild. There are more than 360 plants listed as threatened or endangered, and another 50 or so are proposed to be listed as endangered, according to the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. Although Hawaiian lands represent less than one percent of the land in the U.S., roughly 44 percent of all endangered plant species in the country are here in Hawai‘i.

Limahuli Horticulturist Specialist Randy Umetsu. Photo by Léo Azambuja

All this contributes to Hawai‘i being often referred to as the endangered species capital of the world, highlighting the importance of NTBG’s work of preserving Hawai‘i’s native flora.

Mayfield said NTBG is primarily a scientific research and conservation organization in the form of its five botanical gardens. One of the ways they support their mission is by having visitors come to their botanical gardens.

“We have the opportunity to educate them and to share with them our mission,” said Mayfield, adding she hopes this also helps them to become members. Memberships, she said, are the lifeblood of the organization, and every dollar given to NTBG goes toward supporting their mission.

Until the end of July, NTBG is offering 50 percent off from its annual memberships. Currently, individual memberships are $35, dual memberships are $50, and family memberships are $75. Memberships can be purchased online or at any of the gardens.

Limahuli Garden and Preserve. Photo by Léo Azambuja

“I do think it’s an opportunity to slow down a little bit and look at what we can do for our community and how we can help each other,” Mayfield said. “I think it’s a really reciprocal relationship with the community that is going to get us through this.”

The South Shore Visitor Center is at 4425 Lāwaʻi Rd., and can be reached at (808) 742-2623. Limahuli Garden and Preserve is at 5-8291 Kūhīo Hwy., and can be reached at (808) 826-1053. Both places are open Tuesday to Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Visit www.ntbg.org for more information, including tours, upcoming events and updated hours of operation.