Taro Pond Field
by James Temple
Title
Taro Pond Field
Artist
James Temple
Medium
Photograph - Photography
Description
The life of Kanaka Maoli, the indigenous Hawai`i people, is linked closely with kalo, also known as the taro plant. Kalo is believed to have the greatest life force of all foods. Taro came to Hawai`i with the earliest Polynesian settlers in their canoes and has been cultivated as a staple and staff of life from ancient times in the tropical and subtropical latitudinal band around the earth. Taro grows in tropical Africa, the West Indies, the Pacific nations and in countries bordering the Indian Ocean in South Asia. In Hawai`i, where cultivation has been the most intense, in the early days there were more than 300 varieties of taro. Approximately 87 of these varieties are still recognized today. Depending on the variety, all parts of this sturdy and vital plant are eaten. The leaves are cooked as greens, similar to spinach. The tubers are eaten baked, boiled or steamed, or cooked and mashed with water to make poi. The fibrous flesh of the tubers is tough and spongy, ranging in color from white, yellow, lilac-purple and pink to reddish. Most important is the starchy root with enough glutinosity to make quality poi. The stiffest poi is called locally "one finger" and the most liquid "three finger". "Two finger" poi is considered the best by some. The planters know which kind of taro makes the best poi, which variety has the most tender leaves and which has the necessary medicinal properties. In the kalo and poi-based agricultural society, the people of ancient Hawai`i were dependent on wetland taro. Great skills were needed to terrace, cultivate and irrigate the land along streams, as well as the social and political skills to maintain it. The planters of wetland taro were practicing engineers, building walls of earth reinforced with stone to enclose the lo`i (pond field). Dryland taro was grown in the lower forests where the soil was rich and the rainfall sufficient. Stone borders surrounded these gardens and can still be found on a forest hike here on Moloka'i.
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May 9th, 2010
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