Wednesday the 4th we had no rain. Thursday morning 8mm, and it is still coming down this morning for a while. Whoo-hooo!

Wednesday Lorinda went to Honolulu to take an exam so I was Dad for the day and Lichen and I had a lot fun cruising around the island, hitting playgrounds and beaches and farmers markets and making contacts for the project.

We found some kangkong (ipomea aquatica) a plant that will go off here, and provide abundant fodder for chickens, ducks, pigs, fish and humans, from a Chinese lady who gardens in Haiku. Also, we met Corey Channel, and he talked my ear off about possibilities for growing gourmet mushrooms in the food forest. He remembered Brad fondly and was still a little skeptical about the idea, although I think mainly because he thinks in terms of big production. When I reminded him that we were thinking in terms of supplementing the diet of a few people that lived here, he thought that it would be worth a little bit of initial trouble to get the cultures going. Personally I think that it could be enormously successful...
Then we met a another Haiku local called Billy ... who brings in dwarf citrus and avocado, and I talked to him a while. Just yesterday, Lorinda and I were shooting sight lines and came to the conclusion that fruit trees in front of the barn can't go much taller than about 10 feet without interferring with ocean view. These grafted dwarf varieties aren't cheap, at $50 each, but I did ask him i we could get a discount if we bought a lot of them, and he said yeah, although wouldn't specify how big of a discount he'd do for how many trees etc.
We also SAW catfish and tilapia in the canals in Kahului and we are amped up to net some and introduce them into the botttom pond...
And we met a red heeler at the pound and applied for her to be our family dog, farm security officer.