The community is coming together to preserve the beautiful Ka Iwi mauka lands, 182 acres between the golf course and Makapuu.

We must band together to keep open this wild eastern end of Oahu and protect it from the poor planning and overdevelopment that has plagued the rest of the island.

Wild, open, undeveloped land is something we all need, where nature and open views to the ocean are visible and accessible.

For more than 40 years, the community has battled to keep this area free of development. Every time we thought that we had “won,” some new money would come in and people would try to develop the aina for profit.

Now finally we have a victory. The Trust for Public Land and the Livable Hawaii Kai Hui will jointly manage the lands and will help sew up all the details of caring for and managing the aina here.

When we were first learning about native Hawaiian plants, this was a great introduction. One of my favorites, which used to grow in the area in abundance, is mao, or Hawaiian cotton, Gossypium tomentosum.

We used to see the silvery leaved shrubs, with cheerful yellow flowers, driving by. If you got out and hiked, you could see them up close and admire the gorgeous, almost fakely perfect when freshly opened, flowers.

Some of us from Honolulu Botanical Gardens would then collect the fuzzy, copper-colored seeds so we could grow plants and perpetuate the mao.

Mao was used in old Hawaii to make a unique green kapa dye named omaomao. Kapa artists today have recovered the lost technique of making this nice shade of green. Use of our native plants for dyes is one of the reasons that Hawaiian kapa is the most amazing and artful bark cloth in the world.

Development and wildfires threaten mao and other Hawaiian plants. One cigarette butt out the window and the mao is pau. In turn, the mao seedlings are quickly overwhelmed and overgrown by alien grasses and weedy, fire-prone brush. Native Hawaiian plants are not fire-adapted.

Other Hawaiian plants found naturally in the Ka Iwi area include wiliwili, naio, ilima, pau o hiiaka, naupaka kahakai and many more.

My sister Mimi and many of my friends went on the run/walk during which Kalanianaole Highway is closed and people can enjoy the scenery. Walking lets you see the plants close up, see the scenery slowly and visualize how we can restore this area with native Hawaiian plants. Then people can enhance instead of encroach on the scenic and natural Hawaii beauty.

Heidi Bornhorst is a sustainable-landscape consultant specializing in native, xeric and edible gardens. Reach her at heidibornhorst@gmail.com.