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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Friday, May 25, 2007

HAWAI'I'S GARDENS
Beautiful, useful aloe is a gift from Africa

By Heidi Bornhorst

Q. Even if I can't grow them anymore, I love to hear your mo'olelo about Hawai'i gardens. Where did aloe come from? Why do they pronounce it funnykine on the Mainland? Is it a cactus?

— B.J. Kawamoto, Kapolei

A. Aloe came to us from Africa and quickly was adopted by our hearts and gardens. It is useful — as any burned cook or sunburned whiney keiki knows. It is easy to grow and doesn't need too much of our precious wai (fresh water).

The other day I found out an interesting mo'olelo for sure. Dr. David Thomas Fleming brought aloe to Maui. (He also saved a rare high-elevation, dryaland Hawaiian forest, which his descendants are still perpetuating.) Fleming was ranch manager of Baldwin Packers, which later became Maui Land and Pineapple, and an aloe advocate. In 1940 and 1941, Fleming had 28 acres of Baldwin Packers land planted with aloe. The five fields were in Mahinahina, 'Alaeloa and Kapalua. You still can find remnants of aloe along the drive to Makaoioi, the area of Cook pines now known as Pineapple Hill, where fields of aloe were grown.

Fleming hired a scientist to work with him to create an aloe medicine, which he believed was a "cure-all." Fleming gave the aloe medicine to friends, family and acquaintances to try, according to his granddaughter Martha Vockrodt Moran. Many people on the Lahaina side had a jar of the white paste in their medicine cabinets, using it for burns, bug bites and stings.

In Hawai'i, we pronounce it the "right" way, sounding out all the vowels just as we do for the Hawaiian language. On the Mainland all those vowels throw them off so they pronounce it so it rhymes with "toe." Actually with Latin or scientific names, which aloe is, you can pronounce them any way you like, just make sure the spelling is correct.

The full Latin name is Aloe vera. There are lots of other kinds of aloe in Hawai'i now. Cactus and succulent gardeners love them. People looking for garden flowers in cold harsh December also like aloe (that's when they often send up an amazing flower stalk of red or orange to delight winter dreary eyes and senses).

Aloe is actually a lily, in the Liliaceae family. The flowers tell us that. Some have thorns, something like a cactus, and they are succulent and filled with that burn- and cut-healing juice, which has lots of other medicinal uses. These attributes are more about surviving the rages of grazing animals and hot, dry conditions in aloe's native Africa.

Fleming also popularized the Haden mango, which is why on Maui kama'aina sometimes call that onolicious mango the Fleming variety.

Fleming helped save 'Ulupalakua Ranch from pamakani, a nasty cattle-unfriendly weed in the daisy family that was brought under control by akamai biological controls. In gratitude the ranch gave him nearby land at Pu'u Mahoe.

In 1945, Fleming had a plan to protect Hawaiian trees. In his day, he was most concerned with the devastation of our forests and watershed areas by goats, pigs and cattle. He planted Pu'u Mahoe to protect the threatened species of the Auwahi Forest from feral animals and invasive kikuya grass. Also from Africa, this grass was imported for cattle pastures. It grows thickly at high elevations, choking out native seedlings.

One of Fleming's greatest gifts was the perpetuation of Hawaiian trees. His green gifts flourish all over Maui, and in particular at the D.T. Fleming Arboretum at Pu'u Mahoe, created to protect trees, not entertainment and tour-company profit. Mahoe is a super rare Hawaiian tree.

Fleming's daughter Euphence Fleming Vockrodt and her late husband, Jack Vockrodt, cared for the arboretum for 45 years. Their daughter, Martha Vockrodt-Moran, continues the tree and plant work today as president of the nonprofit Friends of the Arboretum at Pu'u Mahoe. Many of the best, dedicated akamai native Hawaiian plant people on Maui volunteer and give their kokua at this place of cherished and rare plants. The group received a Kaulunani grant from the state Division of Forestry and Wildlife to plant more rare plants and make informational signage to help perpetuate these Hawaiian planet-cooling gems.

Moran wants people to know that all Hawai'i residents and visitors are welcome at the arboretum. There is a free tour the last weekend of every month. Pu'u Mahoe is so rich in history, culture and native species yet untouched by the effects of tourism.

The arboretum has also pioneered the conservation of 'alani, or Melicope knudsenii, a fragrant leaved tree in the orange family, related to the mokihana of Kaua'i.

Heidi Bornhorst is a sustainable-landscape consultant. Send your questions to: Island Life, The Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802; or islandlife@honoluluadvertiser.com. Letters may be published or distributed in print, electronic or other forms.