By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Columnist

Gertrude, the most glamorous kolea at National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, was still here when I wrote this. Last year, her name was Lucille — but Lenny, the security guard at Punchbowl, decided to rename her after his aunt.

This is a sample of the scientific discoveries made as the birds depart for Alaska. The big news is that there seem to be more boy kolea than girl kolea spending the winter in Our Honolulu by a ratio of 60-40. Boys wear black-and-white tuxedos; girls dress in speckled brown.

You might think the shortage of girls would become cause for warfare when the birds reach Alaska, where Pacific golden plover go to mate. However, Doctor Wally Johnson, a world-renowned kolea expert, goes to Alaska to study them every year and hasn't observed any lonely plover bachelors up there.

What's going on? Do the lady kolea prefer to be alone in Tahiti or Asia as the men head for Hawai'i? In any case, students all over the island counted kolea this year and report more boys than girls.

I would recommend especially the careful scientific research done by students at Lincoln Elementary under the direction of fourth-grade teacher Maureen Hiura with the assistance of technology teacher Lois Ota. They've been studying kolea since the first one of the season arrived on their campus on Aug. 9.

A gold mine of kolea information is Mary Roney, senior environmental educator at the Hawai'i Nature Center, who works with Wally Johnson. She reports progress on solving one of nature's most baffling mysteries: Where the heck do kolea congregate before they fly off to Alaska?

Roney said that it helps to have so many Advertiser readers counting kolea. They call the Nature Center. When more than 30 plover gathered at Paiko Lagoon in Kuli'ou'ou, calls flooded in.

"We're pretty sure Pu'ohala Marsh and Kualoa Park are other staging areas," said Roney. "We counted up to 150 at Pu'ohala on April 22. On April 23, there were only 26. We're pretty certain they were staging, then took off."

John Sullivan of Hawai'i Kai called me to report that he saw 20 kolea at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday in the Kamiloiki Park area where he'd never seen more than two before. Maybe that's a substation.

Johnson has hooked up 15 kolea to radio transmitters this year. Some of them have sponsors who pay $135 to name their bird. As a result, we have plover in Our Honolulu named Billy, Makamae, Ikaika, Rover, Kawaiokalani and Annette's Adventures.

Johnson said as of the 24th, five of the transmitting birds were missing from their Hawai'i territories. He has bush pilots in Alaska checking the kolea frequencies to determine when they arrive.

My own count in Ala Wai Park between McCully Street and Manoa Stream indicates that the kolea are leaving a few days later than they did last year and that there were more of them. Researcher Gus Bodner on the Big Island said forest birds there began nesting four months early this year and are still going strong.

Reach Bob Krauss at 525-0873.