#silversword plant

[geckomeleon]

Tova a Fire Flower. The spines that line her body are incredibly rigid and when she flexes the ones on her tail expand to make her more intimidating and dangerous. Tova spends alot of time traveling across the canyons breaking up any fights she deems to rough and does her best to protect those in need.

[lizardsaredinosaurs]

The most stunning example of evolution you could find — until the sheep! The sheeeeeppp!!

Ahinahina (Argyroxiphium sandwicense subsp. sandwicense) AKA Mauna Kea silversword

Mauna Kea volcano on Hawai’i island

Status: Critically Endangered

Threats: feral sheep and other introduced ungulates

[charring58]

Argyroxiphium sandwicense subsp. sandwicense, the #MaunaKea #silversword,[1] is a highly endangered flowering plant endemic to the island of Hawaiʻi (Big Island)

[mimble-sparklepudding]

14 Associations (Humble).

🐱 Animal: Bears, Oxen and (baby) Koalas.

💜 Colors: Black, Bronze and Red.

🎶 Song: Khazad-dûm from LotR or Humble by Angelou (personally I think more battle-hardened barbarian characters should be inspired by 90s Lesbian Folk Songs).

8️⃣ Number: 10 (Humble likes the number 10, as it's easy to add up and use as a scoring system).

🌑 Day or Night: Day (when he was growing up the night was considered a dangerous time for his clan, when people huddled indoors and slept).

🌺 Plants: Passion Flowers, Mountain Orchids, Silverswords.

🪔 Scents: Leather, Woodsmoke, Black Pepper.

💎 Gemstones: Amber, Obsidian, Tigers Eye.

🍂 Season: Autumn (a time of plentiful food and game in the mountains and when the leaves turn fiery red).

🌄Places: Rak'tika Greatwood, Sohm Al, Hell's Lid.

🥘 Foods: Roasted Meat, Cheese, Honey.

✨ Eorzean Deity: Azeyma, the Warden.

💧 Eorzean Elements: Earth and Fire.

🍹 Drink: Yak Milk, Ale.

Tagged by the marvellous @starrysnowdrop and the fabulous @reikatsukihana.

Tagging @bnuuywol @sasslett @cadrenebula @draculas-husband @houserosaire @kskellington @loldragoon-ffxiv @arcane-circles @miqomonkly @arinaxiv and anyone else who likes to try it.

[atiny-piratequeen]

The ahinahina (Hawaiian Silversword) is one of the rarest plants in the world, found on only two mountains in the islands (Haleakala on Maui and Mauna Kea on Hawaiʻi island). They flower only once in their life and can live up to 90 years.

Another endangered plant is the Koʻoloaʻula that typically come in red but can sometimes come out in yellow or even more: blonde

And one more is ʻolena, also just called Hawaiian turmeric. Apparently turmeric is very good for you so yeah 😊

!!! Oh the ko'oloa'ula is so pretty holy fuck

[waltwhitmansbeard]

Volcanic lowlands are disgusting with greenery. The material belched out hundreds years hence nourish plants like nothing else. Eager rivers curl down the haunches of the sleeping behemoth like sweat or tears, and with the mountain's bounty the village thrived.

It's a nice place to live, when it's not dark with glass-sharp ash.

Send me an ask with the first sentence of a fanfic and I’ll write the next five.

Volcanic lowlands are disgusting with greenery. The material belched out hundreds years hence nourish plants like nothing else. Eager rivers curl down the haunches of the sleeping behemoth like sweat or tears, and with the mountain's bounty the village thrived.

It's a nice place to live, when it's not dark with glass sharp ash. Keyleth picks her way carefully through, stopping to kneel among the silverswords and mountain orchids to pulse a little extra magic into their petals. They're just flowers—they won't feed anyone, can't be turned into shelter or furniture—but on the list of things Pyrah is in desperate need of, joy is not far down on the list. They're tenacious, these blooms, peeking up through the volcanic soil, determined to find the sun even amidst the swirling ash and smoke in the air. Their will to live, their determination to be beautiful in the face of such woe, it settles over Keyleth like a blanket, like a hug from her father.

Life needs things to live, a wise man once said, and life can do a hell of a lot worse than flowers.

[czi-mor]

you joke but in biology "alliance" is an informal way to describe a collection of species or genera that you want to group outside of strictly taxonomic terms

I learned this in a community ecology class when my professor dropped the term "silversword alliance" with no warning and I got blasted out of the classroom and into a fantasy world where a chivalric order of highly-specialized plant knights roam the countryside

turkey-grouse alliance

[indoorverticalfarmingnews]

Study Reveals New Insights for Habitat Restoration in a Changing Climate

Key Takeaways: Experimental Approach to Habitat Suitability: A novel method using experimental introductions provides more accurate habitat suitability estimates. Study on Haleakalā Silversword: Focused on this native Hawaiian plant, the study reveals varied survival rates across different climatic conditions. Contrast with Standard Models: Empirical results challenge common assumptions in…

[nmgsuper]

Hump, hump,hump came NMG Foxman across the lands she was a single hand band who eat pecans. She was the greatest war Valkire who was hurt in the heart oh so deep. At war her wife was blown my bombs and the blood was found to the mountains to swamps. After this she fell from paradise without her woman she turned cold as ice. She moved down from hiyda her beasttribe up cold to see her friend izitha silversword. She could split mountains with a HUBOSIIi cry and a skull breaker who claws are like nifes. So now she on her way hump hump hump hump to the mountains of dwarvern.

NMG FOXMAN: 

INTRO: 

The beloved skull crusher of the Nmg beastman. Foxman the blood bringer, the  dominance of the mountain mover. Nmg foxman is her name! She splits mountains in two, her roars echo off thousands of miles away and make her enimies bleed, when she thuderclaps the skys storm and channel her rage and make people go blind, when she stomps earth quakes shiver at her feet. Nmg foxman is best discribed as a anraged wild beast who won’t give any are about getting dirty or were the fight takes place. She is a high rank Valkyrie who is the most iconic worrier in the planet, the reason is how brutal and fierce she is. Her enimes tremble and her allys smile but in the end everyone is scared because she has no side in her wars, most people pay her to join wars that have nothing to do with her country the Nmg beastmen, she doesn’t complain about wepons and will use her bare hands to get the job done. She absolutely loves war and is all she lived for until…… 

BACKSTORY: 

Foxman was fighting in the war between NORTHSRAM and bomb goblins. Foxman was crushing skulls with her feet and throwing cliffs at the bomb goblins. Foxmans side was winning. A smile was on foxmans face as her wife was fighting right beside her but it would all be faded away once the bomb goblins unleashed there illegal bomb on the enimie. They planted huge bombs underground and they were already ban. The exsplosion hit everyone and a blinding light was as far as the eye could see, foxman tried being a shield to her wife but it was useless….. every northernram and foxmans wife died…. Nmg was rushed to the hospital and made a full recovery but the death of her wife gave her pdsd and depression. She blames it on herself because her wife joined war because foxman asked her to. Nmg quit war and hides in the shadows so on one will recognize her and ask is she going to war again. Different nations are hunting her down to invite her to go to war and fight on there side but due to the pain of the past she rejectes them and hides. She is ashamed of herself and sees her as a fallen Valkyrie who is a mistake as a worrier. Her close friends Izitha, YIMBUR, and the wolven brothers are helping her get though her troubles and know she needs a break from fighting. 

HOBBYS / PASSION: 

Foxman loves adventure and exploring. She is passionate about wilderness. Foxman collects animal or beast heads. There trophy’s from battles she won. She loves carving stachues of beasts and making beast pelts out there fur. She is a mushroom hunter and loves being out in wilderness. She LOOVES fights and war… she was army posters and figures from her wars. She loves collecting armor from her battles and If it’s cracked she fixes it and polishes it. 

OTHER INFO: 

Foxman is from the same clan and village as YIMBUR. Hiyda. YIMBUR is foxmans bestie and she loves him and wants the best for him. The Who do everything together from showering to snuggling to eating and adventure. 

Foxman is a great potion maker and can breath fire from yabala mountains to the dwarvern kings peaks. Nmg is a north girl who loves the cold. Like Nmg foxman eyes are there own being and argue with eachother. They hate fire and scream If it’s them. The blue eye is calm and wize and the pink one is angery and brave.

TRAIT: 

 Mountain splitter: immune to stun and mega stun.

NORTHERN GIRL: immune to freeze and mega freeze.

BEAST MAN: 

If ally or enimie uses beast boost foxman still gets the boost.

MOVESET: 

THE BLOOD BRINGER: deals massive damage to one enime. Applys bleed to one enime for 2 turns. 

THE ROARING MOUNTAINSPLITTER: deals modern damage to all enimes. Applys stun and and 50 chance of applying quicksand to all. Reqires cooldown. 

THE DAUGHTER OF BEASTERN RAGE: applys triple damage boost to all allys for 4 turns.. Can only use once per fight.

THE SKULLCRUSHER FATHER: deal massive damage to one enime. Applys burning and ignition for  2 turns. 

MEGA MOVE: 

AN BLOOD LUST UKNOWN: 

Deals INSANE Damage to all enimes. Applys burning, bleeding, stun, TOTAL DAMAGE REDUCTION for 4 turns. 

SEX: female

RACE: Nmg clone ( beastman. Clan: north village hiyda.

WIELDER OF: magic and fire.

AGE: 34 

MADE: may 2022

[matthew-hunt]

Mauna Kea silversword This endangered plant is protected in an enclosure next to the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Center at Hale Pohaku. It is really strikingly silver in person.

[totallynotsilversora]

There’s a decent number of you that like this post of Hina so FUN FACTS:

She’s just like me fr: Asian and Native Hawaiian!

She’s also a lil plant fairy who’s tied to silverswords and all their subspecies found throughout Hawaii (I suggest looking into the Silversword alliance some time! There’s a LOT of em!).

Historically speaking there isn’t a Hawaiian equivalent to the fae afaik (kahuna, menehune, and mo’o don’t count they’re all entirely different from the fae and each other) but she does like taking on the appearance of one whenever people interact with her!

Going back to silverswords: she has a wide array of sword/sword like weapons for each species of silversword.

And a cute lil outfit to match each one! ☺️☺️ I love designing her fits and her weapons so stay tuned for those!

Her name Hina is also a reference to the plant (the silverswords plant is generally called ʻāhinahina in Hawaiian meaning “very gray” and Hina by itself means “silver/gray”)

She has decent control over other plants as well but it’s mostly silverswords species

She’s my current OC-sona bc I had to repurpose the other one for a personal comic project of mine! ;7;

Anyways I’m just giddy that a good chunk of people like her posts (more than I thought tbh lol) so look forward to seeing more of her in the future!!

More Hina :3c

[drrockclub]

When geology stops, life takes over...

Haleakala Silversword growing inside the barren Haleakala volcano crater.

Argyroxiphium sandwicense subsp. macrocephalum

[fresherbrine]

Haleakalā silversword, Maui, Hawaii

[ecowitchy]

[earthstory]

Haleakala Crater Massive and majestic, the world’s largest dormant volcano towers above the Hawaiian Island of Maui. So immense is the Haleakala Crater on the Hawaiian island of Maui that the American writer Mark Twain wrote: “If it had a level bottom it would make a fine site for a city like London.” The crater of Vesuvius, he said, was a ‘modest pit’ by comparison (http://bit.ly/1IT554R).

Haleakala’s vast bowl is 21 miles (34km) round and more than ½ mile (800m) deep, large enough, in fact, to accommodate the New York island of Manhattan. Within lies a stark landscape of tumbled rocks, multi-coloured cinder cones and bizarre lava formations resembling grotesque statues. But on a mountain 10,023ft (3055m) high, the crater is often cloaked in cloud. Mark Twain, after watching from the rim as the sun rose over the cloud-filled crater, wrote: “I feel like the Last Man… left pinnacled in mid-heaven, a forgotten relic of a vanished world.” (http://bit.ly/1L7FVzG). It was, he said, the most sublime spectacle that he had ever witnessed. Today, visitors can join organised trips to view the Haleakala sunrise, when the pink and purple shadows and filmy clouds are slowly suffused with bars of burning yellow and gold. The name Haleakala means ‘House of the Sun’. According to Hawaiian legend, the demi-god Maui crept to the summit before sunrise and roped the rays of the sun one by one as they appeared over the rim. The volcano’s huge, barren crater is not entirely the result of volcanic action. It has been carved out over thousands of years by erosion wind, rain and down-cutting streams such as Kaupo and Keanae have all played a part. But the multi-coloured cinder cones, such as Pu’u o Maui (Hill of Maui), almost 1000ft (300m) high, result from volcanic action 800-1000 years ago, long after Haleakala had pushed its peak high above the sea. Sulphur and iron spewed out with the burning lava account for their predominant yellow and red streaks. The cones include Bottomless Pit and Pele’s Paint Pot - named after the goddess Pele - said to have created the volcanoes. Strewn across the crater floor are volcanic ‘bombs’, which range from fist-sized to car-sized. They are fragments of molten lava that cooled before striking ground. There is some greenery amid the ash and cinders within the crater - bracken fields carpet parts of the southern slopes. But the most remarkable plants are the gleaming grey silverswords. Their succulent leaves are covered with a mat of fibreglass-like hairs that act as mirrors to reflect the scorching sun, and they grow in a spikey rosette that protects the plant’s roots from the sun by day and from freezing by night. ~ JM Image Credit: Haleakala Crater at sunrise. (Photograph by Jeremie Schatz, My Shot). Sourced from http://bit.ly/1Mo43wK More Info: Roughing It by Mark Twain: http://bit.ly/1L7FVzG Haleakala National Park: https://www.nps.gov/hale/index.htm East Maui volcano (Haleakala): http://on.doi.gov/1HmZn6S

[anonsally]

Day 2 of Maui vacation

I meant to post more [at all] about how the vacation is going. However, traveling with Wife is a very busy and active affair without much downtime for that. But I’ll try to post belatedly. So, here’s what happened on Day 2:

Birdwatching tour!

(below the cut, more detail than anyone besides @lies​ wants about the birds we saw and also what happened with the broken fridge in the condo)

There are only about 50 species one is likely to see on Maui, and we saw 29 of them, including some forest birds which I had particularly hoped to see.

Our guide picked us up around 7:30am. It turned out it was just us and the guide, even though we hadn’t paid for a private tour. Apparently everyone else who wanted to birdwatch last week had wanted to go on Tuesday, so we lucked out. 

We started at Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge, which used to be a fish farm. We saw 15 bird species there, including a huge number of Hawaiian black-necked stilts, lots of Hawaiian coots, some hybrids of mallards with Hawaiian ducks, both of the doves we’d been seeing around town (spotted and zebra),  a couple of wandering tattlers, a family of black-crowned night-herons, and a Java sparrow which was adorable and looked a little like a tiny puffin. On our way out we passed a gray francolin, which was introduced here for hunting.

On our drive up to Haleakala National Park, we saw lots of common mynas (they’re everywhere in Hawaii), as well as a Pacific golden-plover and 2 Eurasian skylarks, a pair of ring-necked pheasants, and a few chukars. I hadn’t realised how many kinds of game birds had been introduced here for hunting!

We went up to the summit (about 10,000ft (3055m)), but it was completely clouded in, so we couldn’t see the views of the crater or the ocean. But we did see some fascinating lava rocks and interesting plants (silversword), and the observatory buildings.

Then we drove down to about 7000ft and had lunch (luckily there was a shelter with a picnic table under it, as it was still a bit drizzly there) before walking a short foresty trail with a few points overlooking a gulch. Two nenes (the Hawaiian goose) flew past while we were eating. On the walk we heard, but didn’t see, a Chinese Hwamei and a Maui Alauahio (though we may have had a glimpse of the latter), and we saw a bunch of `apapanes and even more `i`iwis as well as the Hawaii amakihi (Maui subspecies). The `i`iwis kept chasing the `apapanes away--both are fairly spectacular red birds (endemic to Hawaii) that like to feed on red flowers. I was particularly excited to see the `i`iwi since it is on the cover of my Hawaii bird book!

The drive down the mountain was treacherous at first, but atmospheric--we were literally inside a cloud with very poor visibility! The final site was a golf course. We birdwatched from the van, driving slowly along the road and stopping whenever we saw anything interesting. The most exciting birds there were the Java sparrows (so many tiny puffins!), scaly-breasted munias, chestnut munias, and red-crested cardinals. We also saw a mongoose, which is worrying--they eat the nene eggs and chicks. Then the guide dropped us off at about 4pm. A long day!

Since then (just to include most of the birdwatching content in one post), I’ve also seen rosy-faced lovebirds (released/escaped pet parrots) and warbling white-eyes from the balcony of the condo we were staying in.

Disappointingly, the broken refrigerator in the condo didn’t get replaced because the old one couldn’t be removed due to being blocked in by the newish washer and dryer. The owners gave us a partial refund (less than 10%) in compensation but it was a real shame because the kitchen was otherwise very nice and we would’ve liked to cook our own meals some of the time. That night we ate out at a nice restaurant instead.