Diana Hansen-Young - an artist we knew in Hawaii

Diana Hansen-Young

 I was browsing the net and bumped into dianahansenyoung.com.  We knew this rather intriguing lady, Diana Hansen-Young, and her two young children, when we lived in Hawaii.  They lived in our neighborhood and attended our church.  She was a fairly well known artist and had her own distinctive style of Hawaiian art that had a lot of local appeal.  Click on "Paintings" at her website to see a sampling of her style of painting, as illustrated by the painting below.  She is of Swedish stock and definitely doesn't look Hawaiian.  I don't know how she came to live in Hawaii, or the circumstances behind her marrying a fellow of Chinese descent (Mr. Young).  Her two children by her Chinese husband are named Heidi and Thekla.  She divorced Mr. Young. Discovering her website, and filling in some of the blanks up to the present time was fascinating for me, because she was such a compelling lady.  It doesn't surprise me that she is now living in Paris, and has continued to pursue the arts, both art and music.  She appears to have recently married another rather interesting fellow.  Her children, now grown, are obviously gifted.  I note that Thekla has become an attorney...even spending a brief time in New Orleans.  Apparently, Thekla moved down here two days before Katrina happened.  What a bummer.  It's too bad we weren't aware that she briefly moved down here.  I'm sure she would have remembered us, and our children who would have been about the same age range as herself.

HC&S plantation on Maui gets a one-year reprieve

The one remaining sugarcane plantation in Hawaii, HC&S on Maui, has avoided getting the plug pulled on them for at least one more year, so they will continue planting sugarcane for at least another full year. My guess is that the decision to extend their life was hotly debated, the debate being driven by several factors.

Firstly, profitability or the lack thereof. HC&S reported losses of $13 million in 2008 and an estimated $30 million in 2009, primarily due to lowered yields resulting from a 3-year drought, and imposed water restrictions. The drought and water restrictions have caused sugar cane production at HC&S to fall from 200,000 tons six years ago to 127,000 tons in 2009. More favorable prices for sugar and an expected improvement in the long-term weather situation undoubtedly weighed into the final decision to extend the life of the plantation.

Secondly, the parent company, Alexander & Baldwin, recognizes that HC&S is positioned as well as any company could possibly be, not only in Hawaii but anywhere in the U.S., to produce renewable energy from a short-rotation crop. After all, who else in the U.S. is capable of producing well over 100 tons of fresh weight biomass and 13 tons sugar every two years per acre of land, and do it by harvesting incrementally throughout almost the entire year. HC&S has the advantages that other biomass producers in the U.S. can only dream about having. Even Brazil's sugarcane yields, as much as they have improved over the past 20 years, fall short of the yield potential that HC&S has demonstrated in the past as an energy crop plantation.

Lastly, the State Commission on Water Resource Management has yet to rule on a dispute between HC&S and environmental activists, Native Hawaiians, and farmers over water the sugar mill diverts from 19 East Maui streams, and the Commission may not rule in the plantation's favor. An unfavorable ruling would pretty much spell the end of the plantation.

Hawaiian sugar industry reduced to one plantation

Somehow, I missed the announcement two months ago that Gay and Robinson, Inc. (Island of Kauai) was leaving the sugar business after 119 years. This leaves Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Co. (Island of Maui) as the one remaining sugar producer in the State. How long HC&S will survive remains to be seen. I have heard rumors that HC&S's per acre sugar yields will be dismal this year, and not likely much better in the near-term future. They used to boast yields in the order of 13 tons sugar per harvested acre (2-year crop). It's been rumored that they will be substantially below this number this year, perhaps even below 10 tons, and that their yields won't likely be much better next year. If true, that certainly does not bode well for the future of the sugar industry in Hawaii.

The demise of the sugar industry in Hawaii really saddens me, in part because I am not aware of any crop anywhere else in the United States that comes close to having the energy potential that sugarcane has been demonstrated to have on a commercial scale in Hawaii. Even though Hawaii has consistently had far higher sugar yields than Brazil, and, in my mind, was the perfect proving ground in the U.S. to either prove or disprove the sustainability of ethanol production from biomass (having the nation's highest gas prices, being isolated, etc.), it could never overcome all the hurdles placed in front of it to actually launch a sugarcane-based ethanol industry. Ironically, as recently as the 1980's, sugarcane mills in Hawaii were not only energy self-sufficient, but contributed substantially to the surrounding communities, producing around 40% of the total electricity generated on three of the four major islands, with the burning of bagasse (fibrous residue).

The sugar industry had a profound effect on Hawaii's recent history, and the makeup of the ethnic groups that constitute Hawaii today. Admittedly, the history is not all glamorous. But there is a certain nostalgia associated with the fading of an important industry that even some its sharpest critics acknowledge.

Professional interests outside sugarcane

In high school, I imagined myself someday becoming an airplane mechanic. Toward the end of HS, a shop teacher who I respect greatly, taught us how to make blueprints of what we were going to build (the classic top view, side view, and end view concept). I really fell in love with making blueprints, and enjoyed art generally even though I wasn’t all that good at it. By the time I went off to college, I was determined to be a draftsman, and took a number of relevant courses the first year. Somewhere along the way toward the end of my freshman year, I realized that being a draftsman would mean that I would be in a union, and the thought of being in a union really turned me off. I wasn’t smart enough to be an architect, so I turned to my roots, namely agriculture. Thinking back, I’m somewhat surprised that I didn’t discover landscape architecture along the way. I’m almost certain that if I had, this would have been the direction I would have gone.

Having come from a dairy farm background, my orientation was more animal science than plant science, but my coursework gradually shifted, as I really enjoyed botany and plant genetics. Not breaking entirely away from animals, I did research projects in forage legumes (sainfoin) at a B.S. level, then forage grass (reed canarygrass) at an M.S. level, and finally, barley at a Ph.D. level.

Somehow, in spite of all this, I ended up working on a sugar crop. The final choices were sugarbeets with Northrup King in North Dakota with the enticing opportunity to spend the first two years in Germany, or sugarcane in exotic Hawaii. Dr. Heinz, my future mentor at Hawaiian Sugar Planters’ Association (HSPA), picked a day when it was about –10 F at the University of Minnesota, and asked if I had made up my mind. I pretty much had anyway, but I have since wondered if he had been tracking the temperature, because the timing of his call couldn’t have been much better.

While in Hawaii, I took a side interest in turfgrass after I discovered how fast, easy, and profitable it was to grow sod on black plastic. It was an accidental discovery, not something I read out of a book. My interest in turfgrass led me to spend weekends establishing people’s lawns. Before I left HSPA in 1990 and joined Southern Turf Nurseries (STN) as their Hawaii GM, I had established close to 100 lawns. STN was in the golf course grassing business, so joining this company was definitely going from the minor league to the major league…going from 1/5 of an acre per project, to 270 acres on our first golf course grassing project, which was the Hawaii Prince Golf Club at Ewa Beach (see GoogleEarth pic above). My stay with STN only lasted a little more than 2 years, when project opportunities dried up as a result of Japan going into a depression.

While at STN, I established the largest sod farm on Oahu from the ground up, meaning that it was my job to clear the land (dozer), set up the irrigation system, create separation between beds (tractor trencher), build a fence, and purchase temporary buildings and appropriate farm equipment. To this day, the 40’ wide black plastic beds with 6” width trenches (up to 3' deep) between them can be seen on from space within the city limits of Kahuku, Hawaii (see GoogleEarth pic above). We only had about 10 acres to work with, but we could turn over sod every two months by growing sprigs sandwiched in ½ inch thick mulch on black plastic. The soilless sod was mainly used for lake banks and areas difficult to establish with sprigs on golf courses. Sprigs used directly on golf courses to establish fairways and greens were obtained on site from prior-established driving ranges or other features.

While I have returned to sugarcane research again, I still enjoy messing around with turf on the weekends. I brought a zoysiagrass variety to Houma that I bred and selected in Hawaii (from a cross between El Toro and Emerald) even before joining STN. I am extremely pleased with how it looks here, but I really can’t do any more than fool around with it as a hobby for the time being. Because it is fine leafed, it is ideal for small areas where people want something that is deep green, looks elegant, keeps weeds out, and requires very little maintenance. It actually looks better in moderate shade than in the full sun, which is a plus. When I returned to Hawaii after being away for 12 years, I was stunned and gratified at how well this zoysiagrass looked on the lawns that it was established on some 15 or more years earlier. I would say that it has stood the test of time. It was eventually given the name, Links by someone I had worked with in Hawaii…not a name I would personally selected, but nevertheless the name it has had over the past 15 years or so. Apparently, it is still being sold in Hawaii.

Sugarbeets and Sugarcane played important roles in LDS Church History

Sugarbeets and sugarcane were both surprisingly integral to the economic history of the LDS Church in Utah and Hawaii. Leonard J. Arrington, LDS Church Historian for several years, provided a brief synopsis of the beet sugar industry in Utah, in which he cited two of his own works, namely the widely acclaimed Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-day Saints, 1830-1900 (1958), and Beet Sugar in the West: A History of the Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, 1891-1966 (1966). While visiting Salt Lake City, Utah some 30 years ago, I happened to spot a hardback copy of the latter book at a Deseret Bookstore. I got the urge to buy it, because, at the time, I was doing sugar research in Hawaii, and I knew that my father had worked in the beet sugar factory that was located in Spanish Fork, Utah, and that he had much experience with sugar beets. There was a connection. My brother, John, was visiting Utah at the same time. On a whim, I convinced John to join me in visiting Dr. Arrington at his residence in Salt Lake City. It was a very pleasant visit, considering that Dr. Arrington didn’t know either of us, and he agreed to sign the book. Sorry to say, when we left Hawaii in a rush in 1993, I believe that this book was one of the many casualties that never made it back to the mainland with us.

In Hawaii, the early Latter-day Saints settled in Laie, where they established a sugar plantation. It was later absorbed by the Kahuku plantation a few miles further northwest of Laie, which remained active until 1975, just two years shy of when Judy and I arrived in Hawaii. The history of sugarcane in Laie is woven into the outlined history of the town online. The most compelling picture at this website, related to sugarcane was taken around 1928 (see above), where one can easily see that the LDS Hawaii Temple grounds are practically surrounded by sugarcane. We lived on the windward side of Oahu in the town of Kahaluu, about 20 miles (30 minutes) from Laie. There was (and as far as I know still is) some abandoned sugarcane that can be observed from the road between Punaluu and Laie.

While sugarcane and sugarbeets played a significant role in the history of the Church, the role has long since diminished into insignificance…just nostalgic memories now.

Being a Sugarcane Breeder on the Bayou

There aren't that many sugarcane breeders in the country, so when the opportunity was given to me to return to my profession, this time in southern Louisiana, I was very grateful. Having been underemployed for several years has given me a whole different perspective, and a healthy appreciation for how fortunate I am to even have a professional position. I think everyone ought to have the experience of being underemployed for a few years.

Sugarcane culture in Louisiana is so completely different than in Hawaii, that we might as well be talking about two completely different crops. When I first moved to Hawaii, the crop was grown anywhere from 2 to 4 years before it was harvested. The crop consisted of a mass of stalks that formed a mat usually about waist deep that would be almost impossible to walk through. The older stalks, if carefully untangled from the mat, would often be in the range of 30 feet in length. The crop was harvested with a so-called push rake, which is a large bulldozer with tines on the front. The cane was pushed into windrows and lifted with a crane into massive cane haul trucks with rows of chains on the bottom to hold the cane in place (and allow the dirt clumps and rocks to fall through) while the load was taken to the mill. The crop in Hawaii is essentially a year-around crop, so planting and harvesting is continually going on, and the crop age is variable as is easily seen from the air.

By contrast, the cane crop in Louisiana doesn't really start growing much until early April, and yet, less than 6 months later is being harvested. The harvest season is generally from late Sep to Dec 31, basically making it a 6 to 9 month crop. Harvesting is done with a chopper harvester, the cane being cut into billets less than 1 ft long. To achieve flowering in Louisiana, the desired parents must undergo a photoperiod treatment, being moved in and out of dark chambers, following a precise day-night regime for a 3-month period that changes by 1 min per day to simulate what would occur in a more tropical environment. In such a limited space to accomodate breeding canes, individual tassels are more highly prized in Louisiana than in Hawaii. When I first moved to Louisiana, I couldn't even relate to the concept of tassel-use-efficiency. Now I understand.

Selection traits not so important in Hawaii that are much more important on the bayou, include the following: stalk erectness until late into the season, rapid sucrose accumulation, stubbling ability (to get several seasons of growth with one planting), stalk freeze tolerance, below-ground winter survival, and early spring vigor. As stated before, it's almost like working with two entirely different crops.

Being a Sugarcane Breeder in Hawaii

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to become a sugarcane breeder when I graduated from a Midwestern university. But Judy was from northern Idaho, and really wanted to be close to mountains. Major agronomic crops and mountains are pretty much incompatible. I promised her I would look on the "open positions board," and tell her every job that was remotely close to mountains. I came home one evening and told her in a not very serious tone, "There is a job in Hawaii, and Hawaii has mountains." She said, "What about checking it out?" I said, "Judy, Hawaii is a place where you go on vacation, not a place where you work." To make a long story short, the more I looked into it, the more interesting the job sounded. Sugarcane was at that time, by far the most important crop in Hawaii. As it turned out, the next 16 years were the most idyllic of my life. As I look back, I can't believe how grossly I under-appreciated how nice the job was that I had in Hawaii. While she was on vacation in Hawaii, I took my older sister, Carolyn, to our breeding station in the Maunawili Valley on the windward side of Oahu, which is recognized as possibly the most free-flowering location on the planet for making sugarcane crosses.

When she finished her vacation, she told me that this location was her favorite, of all the places we took her. Having worked there for several years, I had reached the point of having taken it for granted. Being a sugarcane breeder has its challenges, not the least of which is to get different varieties to flower...and flower at the same time, so that genetic crosses can be made. But the development of just one new variety 10% higher yielding than the mainstay variety, was worth tens of millions of dollars to the industry annually, so the industry was getting a good return on its $6 million /year investment into research (1977 dollars), much of which was directed at the breeding program. Today, with only two sugar plantations remaining in Hawaii, much has changed. I left sugarcane research in 1990, installed turfgrass on new golf courses until 1993, then left Hawaii altogether with many fond memories.