Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge

This is the reason Trish and I were sent to Maui in the first place - to see Kealia Pond. I should have put an emphasis on "see." I was not told I would be put to work pulling weeds in the hot sun in the middle of the day. Once you see the pictures of how dry it is, you might understand how dirty we got. There is no photographic evidence of the filth, because I was way too grumpy to take pictures at that point. It was not good. My jeans and tshirt are still dirt-stained, so that should give you some idea. Here's a tip: never make me wake up at 4:00 in the morning to catch a plane and then make me do yard work. That's why I got an education!

Now for the refuge. It's located on the isthmus of Maui, fairly close to the airport in Kahului. It's open for public visits so stop by and say hi sometime! There is one really big pond and several smaller ponds (all home to the four Hawaiian endangered waterbirds) but in the summer the big pond is dry.

In the winter that whole area will be covered in several feet of water. This picture is looking south toward the ocean.

We got to walk around in the main pond - it's rather dry.

But, some of the smaller ponds do have water, which allows the waterbirds to remain on the refuge.

Apparently that patch of water was home to something the stilts found especially tasty.

When the pond is full tilapia also live there and they flop around on the bottom to create the shallow holes you see above. I think these were called "reds" but I'm trying to look it up and can't find an answer, so I'm just going to call them tilapia holes.

Another cool thing they're doing at the refuge is on their land across the road from the main pond. They were able to get funding to build a boardwalk so people could see the refuge and read about the birds and plants they were seeing. Unfortunately it's still not open due to problems with contractors.

It'll be a really great thing for Maui and Kealia Pond once they're able to open it.
This is the view from the boardwalk, looking north toward the main part of the refuge.

And this (above) is looking south toward Molokini (left) and Kaho'olawe (right).