Project abstract summary- kick-start habitat restoration for resiliency through seedcollectionaccording to a 2023 report by the national academies of sciences, engineering, and medicine, the…

The University of Hawaii has been awarded a $1,220,321 cooperative agreement from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (CFDA 15.657 Endangered Species Recovery Implementation) to systematically collect native plant seeds in Hawaii. This project aims to establish a native plant materials supply chain to support habitat restoration and increase resiliency on Army installations on Oahu and adjacent lands. The funding will support the hiring of two full-time seed collection technicians over a 5-year period to collect seeds from locally-adapted "workhorse" native plant species. The collected seeds will be used to augment on-installation plant populations and populations on adjacent lands, with the goal of enhancing ecosystem health, resiliency, and suitability for federal trust species. This project represents a critical first step in developing a robust native plant materials supply chain in Hawaii to address barriers to ecological restoration identified in a recent National Academies report.

Project abstract summary- kick-start habitat restoration for resiliency through seedcollectionaccording to a 2023 report by the national academies of sciences, engineering, and medicine, the insufficient supply of seeds from native plants is a major barrier to ecological restorationand other revegetation projects across the US. Similarly, the native plant materials supply chainin hawaii is underdeveloped with limited supply of native seed to support habitat restoration, whether post-fire or in response to invasive species. A strong and collaborative native plantmaterials supply chain is essential for providing an adequate supply of plants and seeds forhabitat restoration. To make habitats on army installations on oahu and adjacent lands moreresilient to climate change, systematic collections of common native plant species are necessaryto initiate the native plant supply chain and native plant material develop to provide theworkhorse species necessary to increase ecosystem health and resiliency and provide suitablehabitat for implementation of recovery actions for federal trust species, such as augmentations, reintroductions, and translocations. The purpose of this project is to support the armys ability to build resiliency in habitats toclimate change and invasive species by restoring degraded habitats. When initiating a nativeplant supply chain, the first step is to collect enough seeds from the right species in the rightlocations to create a source for augmenting on-installation populations and population onadjacent lands to increase health and resiliency. This project will systematically collect seedsfrom workhorse species, locally adapted native plant species that have broad ecologicalamplitude, are abundant, propagate easily, and survive well, from identified locations by hiringtwo full-time seed collection technicians for five years. These technicians will work with theus army natural resource program on oahu, which manages a seed bank and nurseries tosupport seed storage and propagation. The wild seed collections made through this project willserve as the building blocks to initiate seed production efforts in partnership with the office ofhawaiian affairs (OHA) and the hawaii agriculture research center (HARC) to increase seedsupplies to meet restoration needs. The project will be coordinated with multiple partners including the USFWS pacific island fishand wildlife office, usag hawaii, and the office of the vice president for research andinnovation, university of hawaii. This project will establish multiple seed bank collections representing populations from diversegeographic locations in both the waianae and koolau mountains for 10-15 workhorse species tosupport ecosystem and habitat restoration efforts on army installations on oahu and adjacentpartner lands. Project staff will collect field data on plant phenology and reproduction for 10-15WORKHORSE species to inform and increase the efficiency of future seed collection. Moreover, project staff will develop propagation protocols for those target species that lack this informationto inform future use in plant material development and restoration. This project will also initiatethe first step in the native plant materials supply chain and seed collections will support seed production efforts in partnership with the US army, OHA, and HARC to develop bulk seedproducts, and other ongoing statewide efforts. To ensure the systematic collection of native seedsbeyond the duration of this project, this project will initiate communications with the nationalseeds of success program (SOS) to determine the feasibility of establishing SOS in hawaii andan SOS crew on oahu.