[Pū Conch shell fades into inspiring music]
Caves or lava tubes, which in Hawai'i are pretty much the same thing.
Were really important features culturally.
Lava tubes played an important role in Hawaiian history
from burial sites to shelter.
Today, we'll be looking at the value of wai (freshwater)
and lava tubes as a resource for collecting it.
We'll be sharing with you folks.
Traditions of collecting wai.
And while such a precious resource for Kanaka maoli.
Welina mai, I am Bobby Camara.
I'm Ho'ola'i Miday. And join us as we dive
deep into the darkness and find the value that they hold.
Welina mai, Iʻm Bobby Camara
I was born and raised in Honokaʻa,
on the north-east coast of the Island of Hawaiʻi.
I currently live in Volcano,
and worked at this park Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park
off and on for about thirty years,
and I retired almost ten years ago.
Among my jobs, while I worked at the park,
I took care of cave resources.
I was in charge of mapping caves, locating them, doing a lot of
research, and understanding their function and locations.
Lava tubes are essentially tunnels in the ground
formed during an eruption.
A lava flow will crust over, and the interior keeps flowing,
or perhaps a lava channel or a river of lava forms,
and very slowly a roof grows over it,
Finally, when the eruption ends up ma uka,
all of the molten material inside the tube will drain out
leaving a hollow space.
Water was life in the old days, just as it is today.
Caves were really, really important water collection features.
As the water percolated through the pāhoehoe,
it ended up dripping into spaces underground
and so lava tubes are really important for collecting water.
Dripping ceilings were noted,
but no matter what time of year, you could always find
water dripping from the ceilings of caves.
The water was collected in ipu or gourds
and then placed them on the floor of the cave to collect water.
Very typically because, the bottom of the ipu was round,
three pebbles were placed in a tripod on the floor of the cave
as a balance for the round-bottomed ipu,
and the dripping of water is not entirely random.
There are big drips and little drips, and so with careful observation,
the people who used the caves would see where
the bigger drip areas were,
and place their ipu under those.
You ask the elementals responsible for the water,
and you honor them because they ultimately are the ones
that are providing you the water which allows you to live.
But, understanding how people lived in these arid lands
helps inform our understanding of how they
must have co-operated and shared these resources.
Caves are managed today for a number of different reasons.
Cultural practice maybe not so much, because I do not know
anyone who actually goes into caves to collect water.
Although certainly some people might for ritual practice,
but if they do that itʻs a really private thing between them,
and their deities or akua,
and its really mahaʻoi or rude to go ask people about that,
unless they are willing to share it voluntarily.
Cave resources include more things than water.
There are many cave-adapted invertebrates
that live in lava tubes in Hawaiʻi.
Their primary subsistence are the
roots of ʻōhiʻa trees that dangle from the ceilings,
and those roots also provide conduits for the dripping water.
So we are not necessarily protecting the cave resources;
we also need to protect the forest growing on top of the cave.
Itʻs one of those things that we constantly need
to conduct research.
The Hawaiian newspapers which were published from the
the early 1800s to the mid 1900s, are a trove of information
and unfortunately, much of it has not yet been translated but,
Iʻve seen many, many, many, stories about
all sorts of things recorded in those newspapers.
Itʻs entirely possible that somebody, some day soon perhaps
will find information in those articles relating to caves.
Just like they found information
about other important resources here.
My name is Summer Roper Todd. I’m a supervisory archaeologist
here at Hawaiʻi Volcanos National Park,
and I worked in the park for 21 years.
Lava tubes are really special important places.
They house really fragile irreplaceable resources.
They contain archaeological sites many times,
fragile paleontological resources
such as fragile bird bones or sometimes extinct bird bones.
They also have geological resources.
A lot of caves have really cool geological formations
that are really fragile like
stalactites and stalagmites and other really cool features,
and they also house fragile biological resources
and each cave is really its own living breathing ecosystem.
with roots from trees, insects,
moss in the cave entrances
plants and minerals on the walls
and yes, all these resources are fragile and special
and that's what makes them so important.
Itʻs important to remember always that caves
in Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park, as they are
in all national parks are protected resources.
Entry can be obtained by permit, to scientists conducting research
or to cultural practitioners who have a need
to enter specific caves that may be closed,
but because the resources in them are so incredibly fragile,
its really really important to observe them from afar.
So people can gain an appreciation of and understanding for
some of the cave resources of
Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.