This QR page introduces the concept of a mini botany lesson that will be developed for selected plant tags to enhance the user's knowledge about that plant. This first lesson considers just what the term "native" actually means when applied to a plant. Why is Na Pohaku o Hauwahine considered a "Native Planting Site"?

Botanists recognize several classes of plant status related to the plant's origin; most basic are native and non-native. A native plant is one that is from or of the place. A non-native plant is a plant that was brought to that place—introduced—by human action. Native plants in Hawai‘i reached these shores either by some natural action (seeds attached to a seabird's feather) or evolved from an ancient ancestor. An island chain has existed in the central North Pacific for some 70 million years.

Non-native plants include ornamentals that people plant for landscaping. If an ornamental or any other introduction finds Hawai‘i a great place to start a population, the plant can escape and become a naturalized species growing in the wild. The majority of plant species growing in the Kailua area are naturalized species. Indeed the majority of plants you see anywhere on O‘ahu are non-native, naturalized species (or ornamentals in developed areas). In our plant tags these are indicated by [NoN] or [ORN].

By "native" is meant a plant species that evolved in Hawai‘i or arrived here by some natural means (seeds blown on the wind, floated across the sea, etc.). Botanists define two types: indigenous and endemic. Endemic plants [END] are native (found naturally) only to the Hawaiian Islands and nowhere else. Indigenous [IND] plants are native to Hawai‘i and to other places.

Hawaiian botanists recognize a special class of introduced plants that are called "canoe-plants" or early Polynesian introductions [POL]. These are plants brought to Hawai‘i by the Polynesian voyagers and include mostly plants of great value to the migrant population but also some weeds that tagged along. Any plant newly arrived after 1778 when Capt. James Cook "discovered" the Hawaiian Archipelago for the Europeans is considered an introduced (non-native) species.