Mauna Kea Oral History Appendix - Office of Mauna Kea Management

KM: And I guess with the old man Holi for a while.
RG: Holi, yes…
Group: [passing Hakalau Reserve; to end of cd # 2, begin cd # 3]
RG: …We were going to Kalai‘eha, and there was a fellow by the name of Walter Stevens, a
real good Joe, a good horse man. Best horse man I think I’ve ever seen. He and I were
good friends. I wonder if I ever told you this story.
KM: I don’t think so.
RG: We had a old power wagon, and it was loaded with dogs and Filipinos, and it was wet. I
was anxious to get out, and so were the men. Walter Stevens, he sat in the very back of
the truck. He yelled out, “Rally said more speed!” And the Filipino driver went a little
faster. Then Walter said, “Deniscio, Rally says more gas!” [chuckling] He put the gas
down [chuckling]. Hey, we were flying along and the dogs were bouncing and bouncing
in the truck, and Walter was laughing like hell!
Group: [laughing]
PM: Oh, there’s a big gorse, right there.
RG: …The first time I saw gorse or heard of it was with Buster Brown.
JG: That’s a long time ago.
RG: A hell of a long time ago. It was down on the lava flow across from Pu‘u Huluhulu. If we
had only gotten after it at that time, or they had gotten after it, it would be okay.
KM: You know what’s really interesting about that, just like you said, if you folks had gotten
after it. But you folks, the ranch actually had a program. You folks were managing and
pulling gorse pretty consistently until what around ’80 or something right
RG: Yes.
KM: It was after Richard came in and all that stuff changed. It never exploded before.
Remember, Haneberg them reported in by June of 1892 as a problem. Not as a problem
but being present on the land in 1892, it’s in his journal. They were pulling it, they had
gangs out pulling it, just like you folks for the ranch. Even when we were talking with
Hisa. Part of his job at one point, they were using some horrible poison, but it kept it
down.
RG: I know at my father’s place, when we’re not going to school, we’d have to go and pull
lantana and guava.
KM: Sure.
RG: This gorse is real healthy.
JG: It’s just green thorns.
RG: And you cannot put a horse in there. A horse won’t go.
PM: It gets a lot worse than this, the whole road is going to look like this in another ten miles.
And it’s not just going to be little patches, it’s going to be the whole road…
KM: …You haven’t seen the worse yet, it’s so thick further over.
RG: Did I understand you to say that sheep eat gorse
KM: No, that’s what I was asking you. The young gorse
RG: I have never known of sheep eating gorse. I’ve heard other people say the sheep would
eat gorse, but I have not seen them.
Mauna Kea– “Ka Piko Kaulana o ka ‘Äina”
Kumu Pono Associates LLC
A Collection of Oral History Interviews (HiMK67-050606) A:649