In Hawaii, we malama aina (“care for the land”) by protecting and preserving our landscapes and natural resources, such as our streams, mountains, forests and even our state parks and trails. We also malama kai (“care for the ocean”) by doing the same for our coastal areas and surrounding ocean waters, keeping them free of debris and taking of their bounty sustainably.

The Hawaiian culture has a long history, as old as the culture itself, of caring for the ocean and the sustenance it provides, centuries ago creating one of humankind’s most advanced aquaculture systems of its time. In fact, early Hawaiians are widely believed to be one of the first cultures to develop fish-farming systems as a means of supplementing traditional fishing methods.

First constructed between 600 and 800 years ago and called loko ia, Hawaiian for fishponds, at least a half-dozen types of these ponds were devised by early Hawaiians in a variety of sizes for trapping ocean or stream fish via sluice gates and fattening them for eating when ocean catch was low. The most common type were loko kuapa, rock wall-enclosed shallow shoreline ponds once numbering in the hundreds throughout the Islands.

Though many are now lost to time, a growing number of nonprofit groups and community organizations have formed over the past three decades with a mission of carefully restoring fishponds still in existence, largely through volunteer community workdays.