Ka‘ū News Briefs, Sunday, May 9, 2021

This stamp design with images of mouflon sheep was created by artist Michael Bailey. The stamp will be used for 2021-2022 hunting licenses in Hawai`i, issued by the state Department of Land & Natural Resources.

HAWAI`I WILDLIFE CONSERVATION AND GAME BIRD STAMPS have been unveiled for the 2020-2021 hunting seasons by the state Department of Land & Natural Resources. The conservation stamp is required on the Hawai‘i State hunting license. The game bird hunting stamp is additionally required for those intending to hunt game birds. Funds from sales of these stamps go into the State Wildlife Revolving Fund to support wildlife populations and habitat management, and to manage hunting programs in Hawai‘i. Both stamps will be available on July 1 to wildlife stamp collectors by calling (808) 587-0166.    
    Wildlife artists submitted entries for this year’s contest and a committee chose the images for both stamps.
    The Game Bird Stamp art is from Timothy Turenne, winner of 22 art stamp contests since becoming a full-time wildlife artist in 2006. Many of his conservation stamp prints are available for viewing through Artbarbarians.com. Turenne’s winning submission features the Kalij pheasant, a popular game bird from southern Asia. The Kalij pheasant was brought to Hawaiʻi in 1962 and it native to forests and thickets, especially the Himalayan foothills, from Pakistan to western Thailand. Visually the male is larger, at approximately 33 inches long, and are black with a gray belly, while the females are mottled brown. They have a distinct red skin patch around their eyes, and a crest of feathers atop their heads. Their habitat is primarily in the uplands. They are readily found on Hawaiʻi Island, most noticeably within the Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

This game bird stamp by Timothy Turrene won the DLNR competition and will be issued to those hunting game birds in 2021-2022 in Hawai`i.

   The Conservation Stamp art is from Michael Bailey. Residing in Los Angeles, he is a wildlife painter, comic book artist, and children’s book illustrator. A majority of his work is painted in oils, ink and watercolors. Bailey was born and raised in the Midwestern parts of the Great Lakes region and is a lover 
of fly rod fishing. His winning submission features the mouflon-feral hybrid sheep.
    Mouflon sheep were introduced to Hawai‘i Island in 1957. where biologists from the state Division of Fish & Game crossbred pure mouflon rams with feral ewes at Pu'u La'au on Mauna Kea. The hybrid and purebred mouflon sheep were released on Mauna Kea from 1962-1967. Most, if not all, of the sheep on Mauna Kea are hybrid mouflon. "These animals live in the high elevation slopes of the Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa volcanoes, in what is considered some of the most beautiful upland forests of Hawaiʻi," says a statement from DLNR.

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A SPECIES OF THE DAMSELFLY, one of Hawai‘i's most endangered insects, is being given a population boost by releasing more into the wild. The state Department of Land 
& Natural Resources released a statement on Friday about a test run on O‘ahu, which could be the beginning of future releases elsewhere, perhaps in Kaʻū where it has been found historically at Ninole, Whittington and Hilea. Here is the DLNR story:
    A small platoon of biologists and technicians walk across muddy ground, amidst, shoulder-high grass to reach the point of deployment. They will be releasing an air force of orange-black Hawaiian damselflies in the bed of a small, spring-fed stream, not far from Dillingham field. On O‘ahu currently there is only one wild population of the two-inch-long, native damselfly, tucked in among the buildings of the Tripler Army Medical Center’s vast campus. Not exactly the ideal place to improve the lot of this species.

This black red damselfly is being released on O‘ahu to boost the endangered species' chances of survival, as a test for releasing in more areas. Photo from DLNR

    “It’s not a super stable place for orange-black damselflies,” explained Kapua Kawelo, the U.S. Army’s Natural Resources Program Manager on O‘ahu. In the early 1990’s the Army teamed up with the University of Hawai‘i to try and establish a second population of the insect at Dillingham by moving damselflies from Tripler, but that effort was not successful. More recently, the DLNR Division of Forestry and Wildlife invertebrate program joined with the Army to raise the endangered damselfly in a breeding facility for introduction at Dillingham. With the development of new captive rearing techniques for the species, they can release much higher numbers.
    “So far we’ve released about 4,000 damselflies reared in captivity,” said Dr. William Haines of the State’s invertebrate program. “We’re seeing the first evidence of wild reproduction at one of our release sites.”
    How do they know? All the released damselflies have a small number marked on their wings. Haines added, “We’re starting to see individuals emerging from the stream that are not marked, which means they are wild born. That’s really encouraging to see they’re completing their entire life cycles in the wild.”
    Next month, after a full year of weekly releases, the team will stop releasing damselflies and continue monitoring the success of the program, hoping for a sustainable population at Dillingham. Both Kawelo and Haines are optimistic. “The final test will be when we pull the plug on continual introductions from the lab,” Kawelo commented.

Damselflies are in distress but growing them in a lab and releasing them to the wild may help them survive.  Photo from UH

   The orange-black damselfly is a vulnerable population at the risk of extinction. It’s one of about 25 species of endemic damselflies found only in Hawai‘i…but several species have already gone extinct. The reason is another story in which a species was imported to the islands to control an invasive species, but it ended up backfiring.