If you stand on the crumbly, red rim of Kaua‘i’s Waimea Canyon and gaze into the distance, below you will see ancient valleys and gorges cut deeply into the island. Much of the arid ochre-red canyon is cloaked in dark green native and mixed forests. Look closely, though, and you’ll notice patches of lighter shades of silvery green foliage that appear to flow like vegetative lava, as if spilling from the folds and spires of the island’s rugged interior.
The scenery is breathtaking but in this respect, Kaua‘i is not unique. The same silvery green trees growing in patches and rivulets are found on all the large Hawaiian Islands in forests and mountains and in great abundance in the most ordinary of human landscapes—planted in residential neighborhoods, on golf courses, and next to commercial and government buildings. This most common of trees, however, is treasured as a symbol of enlightenment, a source of illumination, and is Hawai‘i’s official state tree.
The tree, of course, is kukui. While not native to Hawai‘i, kukui or candlenut as it’s known elsewhere, naturalized and has long been an integral part of the Hawaiian landscape, a familiar form that softens its surroundings, and lends warmth wherever it grows.
Examine the newly minted Native American one dollar coin honoring highly respected Hawaiian ‘ōiwi (Native) scholar and writer Mary Kawena Pukui and you’ll notice she wears a lei of kukui. Beside her is the phrase: Nāna I Ke Kumu (“Look to the source”).
In his popular field guide Plants of the Canoe People, former NTBG ethnobotanist Arthur Whistler, described myriad uses for kukui throughout the Pacific including for making dyes for tattooing and decorating kapa (bark cloth). Kukui bark, Whistler wrote, was used for waterproofing cloth and painting canoes while other parts of the tree have uses that are medicinal, cosmetic, decorative and can be used as timber or toys, with oil-filled nuts that are edible (in small amounts), acting as a laxative (in larger doses).
It is the kernel of the nut (“technically a seed, not a nut,” Whistler wrote) for which kukui is favored. Ridged, hard, and black when polished, the walnut-sized, kukui nuts contain oil that can be burned in a variety of ways, thus it is called candlenut and seen as a symbol of enlightenment. NTBG’s senior research botanist Dr. David Lorence, agrees with Whistler, saying that the kukui nut is more of a drupe-like seed found inside a thick leather-like outer coat. Those “nuts,” when they fall, easily self-germinate and spread, indicating the presence of humans or animals.
A member of Euphorbiaceae (spurge family) native to the Indo-Malay region, kukui’s scientific name of the genus Aleurites refers to aleurone, meaning flour or meal, while the species moluccanus is a nod to the Maluku Islands between Indonesia’s Sulawesi and West Papua where early collections were made.
Candlenut also grows in Australia where Dave Lorence and herbarium curator Tim Flynn collected seeds from a tree in the rainforests near Lake Euramoo in northern Queensland in 1992. Upon their return, they planted seeds in the Lawa‘i Valley, one of which has grown into a massive tree scarcely recognizable as kukui as it towers high above the Spice of Life trail in McBryde Garden.
Shorter, more familiar Hawaiian varieties of kukui have been planted on the campus of Kaua‘i’s Island School where NTBG’s long-time education partner and Hawaiian studies kumu (teacher) Sabra Kauka appreciates watching Hawai‘i’s tree of enlightenment grow alongside her students. Sabra describes how she and her kids collect kukui leaves, tying them together into a chain-like garland called a lei hīpu‘u. She also teaches her students how to roast and light nuts like candles, burning on bamboo skewers. Kukui nuts, Sabra explains, can be baked and crushed, leaving the oil to rise for use in traditional healing and lomilomi massage.
Hiking in Waimea Canyon, Sabra is delighted to look down, deep into the valleys where, she says, the tell-tale silvery green patches of kukui are a sign of fresh water and suggest there were probably villages or habitation sights nearby.
“Kukui is so important,” says Sabra, “there are lessons in those trees.”
