“O Tannenbaum - Hawaiian Christmas Tree Story"

There are many stories about when the “Christmas Tree” and the celebration tradition of the seasonal holiday came to Hawaii. Here's NKOs!

Reading “The Peopling of Hawaii” by Eleanor C. Nordyke” we know plantations brought German immigrants to the islands to support th sugar mills in the late 19th Century. They brought with them their culture and traditions which include celebrating with Yule trees. 

The German people are credited with introduction of the “Christmas Tree” tradition that has been adopted by cultures around the world and eulogized in the seasonal mele “O Tannenbaum (Christmas Tree) O Tannenbaum” … Your branches green delight us!” School children learn about the nature of the “Christmas Tree” through the lyrics “In beauty green will always grow. Through summer sun and winter snow.”

The Black Forest and Alps Region of Europe of are native to all kinds of fir and pine trees and naturally would be a source of decoration for the villages in Deutschland (Germany). Many of the fine holiday tree ornaments sold in department stores like Neiman Marcus are still handmade in Germany. 

According to Gary A. Warner, Travel Writer, “on December 25, 1786 the British ship Queen Charlotte was anchored off present-day Waimea, on the west side Kauai. This was eight years after Capt. James Cook had come into Waimea Bay and "discovered" what he would call the Sandwich Islands, after the Earl of Sandwich, the Lord of the Admiralty.” Warner says the sailors sent trinkets ashore to the native women and children on Kauai and were in return gifted with fruits and pig from native Hawaiians…celebrating the first Kauai Christmas.

In 1846, the popular British royals, Queen Victoria and her German Prince, Albert, were sketched in the Illustrated London News standing with their children around a Christmas tree. Undoubtedly Prince Albert, a Dutchman, brought his Yule traditions to the British Court. This image was circulated around the world. Victoria was very popular with her subjects, and what was done at court immediately became fashionable not only in Britain but in the new America. The Christmas tree had arrived as a holiday tradition.

In 1856, King Kamehameha IV moved the official national day of Thanksgiving to Dec. 25, more than coincidentally coinciding with Christmas. A large Christmas party was held on the Royal Residence grounds in 1858, including what is believed to be the first Christmas tree. A few years earlier we know that the Australia's Norfolk Island fir, the Norfolk pine was introduced to Hawaii.

Kauai has a close connection with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. A view of the famous English monarch, in profile, was fashioned by nature along the distinctive green Ha'upu Mountain Range that graces Kauai’s south side. It is a delight for visitors and locals to find this unique natural sculpture and ponder its very creation! Hawaii’s own royal Prince Albert Edward Kamehameha, the only child of King Kamehameha IV and Queen Emma Kaleleonalani Naʻea, was the Godson of the Queen and given the royal family name in honor of the dear relationship between Queen Victoria and Queen Emma.

In a 2006 Honolulu Advertiser Duane Choy wrote “ The first Norfolk pine seedlings were brought to Hawai'i from the Sydney Botanic Garden in 1852 in a cargo addressed to the "King of the Sandwich Islands." This large pine grows to 130 feet tall and is native to Norfolk Island, which is near the east coast of Australia. It is known botanically as Araucaria columnaris, and is sometimes called the Cook Island pine. 

Once cut down, Norfolks will stay green, healthy and gorgeous for more than a month making them a perfect choice for a Island “Christmas Tree.” Norfolk pines do not need much water so they are sustainable. Before mainland fir tree importers and as late as the 1970 Norfolks were the only live trees available for Hawaii families for the season. With its near perfect branches it makes a graceful traditional Yule tree. Today in Hawaii a few nurseries specialize in growing the Norfolks for folks who want a live tree and for those who care about keeping foreign invasive species from being unleashed into our island environment, which is a risk with mainland trees.

Come to NKO nursery and see Flora in the garden for a perfect Yule gift of a live plant for someone special on you list!

Showers of Flowers on the Road to Poipu.

When driving South along Ala Kinoki Way (the Koloa By Pass Rd), look carefully on the right side just past the Koloa junction (Weli Weli Rd) you will see a small "plaque" dedicating the planting of the gorgeous Rainbow Shower Trees that line the road on the way to Poipu. The humble "plaque" states that in 1996 The Koloa Community Association (KCA) donated the Rainbow Shower Trees to the “community.”

No Ka Oi Landscape Services (then No Ka Oi Plants) was asked to support the original 1996 tree planting. It was at the suggestion of Abby Santos, NKO CFO and Licensed Landscape Contractor, that KCA choose the Rainbow Shower Tree for this beautification project.

The vision for Ala Kinoki Way is to be lined with a colorful canopy of tropical trees that would bring beauty, a sense of place and offer a shaded welcoming green-way to locals and visitors driving to and from Poipu. The Koloa bypass road is very windy, hot and dry making the selection of the type of tree that would be sustainable without irrigation and could withstand the microclimate of the area critical to the project’s success. The Rainbow Shower Tree was a perfect selection.

The Koloa Rainbow Shower Trees have beautiful flower clusters that start blooming in late Spring with rice paper like blossoms ranging in hue from deep pink, to soft yellow, to a snowy white. A sterile hybrid that originated in Hawaii from the cross pollination of its Asian ancestors - Golden Shower Tree and Pink Shower Tree-the Rainbow Shower Tree is bright, beautiful and elegant.

Rainbow Shower Trees are drought tolerant. They grow best in full sun, hot, and dry conditions. Perfect for Koloa/Poipu! The mature height of this hybrid is 30–40 ft, and the colorful canopy can cover up to 35ft. Rainbow Shower Trees grow well in sandy to clay soils.

There are several different cultivars of the Hawaii hybrid Rainbow Shower Trees (Cassia x nealia), each having various colors of flowers, often maturing from one color to another. The Wilhelmina Tenney variety has red, yellow, and white blossoms in each cluster and the designation of being the official tree of Honolulu! The Queen’s Hospital White’s first bloom with yellow-­orange flowers that become a creamy white with maturity. The Lunalilo Yellow starts with rich golden blossoms that soften to a light yellow over time and the Nii Gold blossoms are rich golden yellow.

Because the Rainbow Shower Tree is a sterile hybrid, the trees do not produce seed pods. Another plus is the root system is non-aggressive. Annual pruning aids in shaping and flower production. This low maintenance makes it ideal for planting in Hawaii’s parks, along roadways and in resort and commercial landscapes.

The shower of flowers makes us lucky we live Hawai'i Nei!

Earth Day Birthday!

April 22, 1970 was the 1st Earth Day and a movement was born!

Every year on April 22 the world celebrates Earth Day. Small business, community groups, corporations and government agencies around the world join together finding common ground in cultivating projects that support a healthy Planet Earth.

April 22, Earth Day, is birthday of the modern environmental movement - the beginning of awareness that we, the inhabitants of Planet Earth, need to care for our environment, use natural resources responsibly, control pollution and volunteer to improve the Planet through socially responsibility economic development and government policies that support sustainability and a healthy natural environment to live, work and play in for generations.

In the 1970s scant attention was paid to the “environment.” Protests were part of American culture for movements on Civil Right, Women’s Rights and the Viet Nam War – but protecting Planet Earth was not yet part of the collective consciousness. Most people took Plant Earth for granted thinking that natural resources were unlimited.

There was no economic or social awareness of what the world would be experiencing in the mid 20th Century modernization in America, nor the impacts of the rapid growth of developing countries or realities of global population explosions. All were silently taking a toll on Planet Earth - the beginning of a tipping point for the Environment that was compromised and unsustainable.

American cars were gas guzzlers, utility companies and factories belched out polluted smoke, sludge waste went into our rivers and no one was talking about renewable energy or oil dependency. “Environment” was a spelling bee word not a news headline.

So what changed? Inspiration and education came thru the pen of Rachel Carson, a established natural history writer, who’s 1962 book Silent Spring, a New York Times bestseller and Book of The Month Club selection, was serialized in The New Yorker magazine. Carson’s writings brought awareness to how the modern chemical industry was having a detrimental effect on environment and the lack of any independent oversight in protecting the public interest from these effects.

Carson raised public awareness and concern for living organisms, the environment and public health. Her writing is considered to have launched the “environmental movement” whose first victory was the ban of pesticide DDT in 1972. Silent Spring is #5 on the Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Nonfiction and is named one of the 25 greatest science books of all time by the editors of Discover Magazine.

The idea of Earth Day began in 1970 with Senator Gaylord Nelson who, along with a conservative Congressman Peter McCloskey, established a public event that was to be a “national teach-in on the environment.” This event capitalized on the emerging consciousness of caring for the world we live in and channeled the energy of the war protest movement and putting environmental concerns front and center.

April 22 1970 was the 1st Earth Day and a movement was born. Two million Americans took to the streets, public parks, and auditoriums to educate, learn and demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment. The broadcast media had coverage on the evening news and in print the headline Earth Day became part of our national dialog.
Massive rallies were held coast to coast with support across political parties, city and country folk, all economic levels and labor and industry coming together in a collective raising of environmental conscientious.

On college and universities campuses protests brought attention to the deterioration of the environment. Groups who had had been fighting against oil spills, polluting factories and power plants, raw sewage, toxic dumps, pesticides, freeways, the loss of wilderness, and the extinction of wildlife came together in a unified voice brining attention and action to the “environmental movement.”

The attention and awareness created on April 22, 1970, the first Earth Day, led to the establishment of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species Acts.

Earth Day went global in 1990 when over 200 million people in 141 countries celebrated and raised awareness around the planet lifting the “environmental movement” to the world stage promoting the economics of recycling. In Earth Day 2000 the focus was on global warming and clean energy solutions with more countries and people celebrating Earth Day.

In 2011 the US EPA and environmental laws are being challenged by some and championed by many for creating public policy that supports responsible and sustainable stewardship of the environment. Recent energy industry accidents like the BP oil spill into the Gulf of Mexico and the Japanese nuclear reactor disaster brings attention to how we live and the need to find environmentally sound solutions to building a sustainable world.