State plans to expand Maui captive bird facility to cost $5M

The state is looking to expand its captive bird facility on Maui in a move to support a federally funded campaign to save critically endangered Hawaiian forest birds.

The state Board of Land and Natural Resources earlier this month approved a plan to seek competitive bids for a construction project that will cost up to $5 million and allow for the accommodation of 80 additional birds, plus supporting facilities.

The proposed expansion of the Olinda Endangered Species Facility is expected to provide additional capacity for housing forest birds while a landscape-level mosquito control program is developed and implemented on the island.

Scientists say several federally endangered Hawaiian honeycreepers on Kauai and Maui have declined rapidly in the past two decades and have reached perilously low numbers.

Four Hawaiian honeycreepers — akikiki (Kauai honeycreeper), akekee (Hawaiian honeycreeper), akohekohe (crested honeycreeper) and kiwikiu (Maui parrotbill) — are in danger of going extinct within the next 10 years, officials said, and nine other bird species are also at risk.

The U.S. Department of the Interior on Dec. 15 announced a multi-agency strategy that aims to prevent the “imminent extinction of Hawaiian forest birds imperiled by mosquito-borne avian malaria.”

The strategy — developed by a coalition of public and private partners in Hawaii known as Birds, Not Mosquitoes — will be deployed with the help of more than $14 million in funding from President Joe Biden’s infrastructure law and other appropriations.

Most of the funding will underwrite a project that aims to release scores of incompatible, lab-raised male mosquitoes into the wild to reduce the reproductive potential of wild mosquitoes.

The proposed project area includes lands that are in East Maui within Haleakala National Park, nearby state lands and private conservation lands managed independently by The Nature Conservancy.

The Olinda facility will help support the effort.

Officials with the state Division of Forestry and Wildlife turned down a request for an interview to describe the project further, saying an active request for proposal was out on the project.

According to a document describing the request for proposals, the newly constructed aviaries must be mosquito-proof and of suitable design for propagating Hawaiian honeycreepers.

In an effort to stretch their dollars, state officials are also asking for the winning bidder to match a minimum of 11% of the government funding, of which one-fourth must be cash to purchase items necessary for the completion of the work, and the remainder can be in-kind such as staff salary.

Proposals are due Jan. 17, and the contract is expected to start Feb. 1.