Native birds
Koa forest shelters 30 of Hawaiʻi's 35 surviving native forest birds — the ʻiʻiwi, ʻamakihi, and ʻelepaio among them.
A koa restoration atlas · Hawaiʻi
Koa could grow
here again.
Hawaiʻi's largest native tree once spanned every high island. See where it stood, what's left, and where it could return.
01 — Belonging
Endemic. The largest tree in the forest.
Koa (Acacia koa) grows nowhere on Earth but Hawaiʻi. It is the islands' biggest native tree and the backbone of the upland forest — the wood of waʻa and royalty, woven through Hawaiian life for as long as there have been people here.
Modeled natural range recorded occurrences
02 — Loss
Then most of it disappeared.
Koa once ran from the coast to roughly 7,000 feet across every large island. Two centuries of clearing for cattle and cane reduced it to a fraction of that. Today more than 90% of what remains is on Hawaiʻi Island alone.
Mapped in 1989 still forest today
Why a forest of koa matters
Water & soil
A nitrogen fixer that builds soil and feeds the watershed, recharging the aquifers the islands drink from.
Breaks the fire cycle
A koa canopy shades out the flammable invasive grasses that drive Hawaiʻi's worsening wildfires.
Cultural keystone
E ola koa — "live like a koa": long, strong, upright. The tree of the canoe and of the aliʻi.
03 — Opportunity
Much of what was lost is now open pasture.
The land koa once held is largely cattle pasture and fallow plantation now — and roughly 40% of koa's potential range is already state land, with another 9% federal. The map below for the first time puts the old range and the open ground side by side.
Pasture & fallow opportunity land within koa's natural range
04 — Grow koa
It grows fast. Seedlings are cheap. Restoration is already underway.
Koa is one of the easiest natives to propagate. Seedlings cost a few dollars at state nurseries, landowners can claim 50% cost-share, and roughly 30,000 replanted acres would meet the state's forest-carbon goal. Knowing where to plant is the first step.