Kanaloa kahoolawensis
species of plant
Kanaloa kahoolawensis, the Ka palupalu o Kanaloa or kohe malama malama o kanaloa, is a species of flowering plant in the legume family, Fabaceae and is endemic to Hawaii. Kanaloa is a monotypic genus with the single species Kanaloa kahoolawensis.
History
Kanaloa was discovered in 1992 by the botanists Ken Wood and Steve Perlman of the National Tropical Botanical Garden on Kahoʻolawe, a small island that was formerly used as a bombing range. Kahoʻolawe was a penal colony for the Hawaiian monarchy from 1826 to 1853, after which it was leased for ranching. Dry weather and ranching have devastated the island's vegetation. Only two wild plants of Kanaloa kahoolawensis have been observed growing on the island. The genus and species were formally named by Lorence and Wood in 1994. The genus name honors the Hawaiian deity Kanaloa, who according to legend used the island to rest and regain his energies. Scholars and native Hawaiian activists both agree that Kanaloa is from the original name "Kohemālamalama o Kanaloa", which translates as the place or womb for the resuscitation of Kanaloa. According to Lorence & Wood (1994), Kanaloa means, "secure, firm, immovable, established, unconquerable...Such attributes are certainly essential for this plant to have survived in spite of the severe degradation of the island".
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Kanaloa kahoolawensis” is species of plant. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Kanaloa, kahoolawensis and species, not as a finished interpretation.
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Stable identifiers, scientific names and standards terminology offer the best bridge between this overview and specialist evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1243107. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1992, 1826, 1853 and 1994.
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This entry incorporates text from “Kanaloa kahoolawensis” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.