A Monk Seal Named Lepeka
Contributed by Alberta de Jetley
Baby seal Lepeka with her mother. Photo by Robert Woodman.
Hawaiian monk seals are amongst the world’s most endangered marine mammals.
Since 1950, their population was declining, but in recent years, there has been a notable increase, and now their numbers are estimated to be about 1,500 in Hawaiian waters.
Several years ago, Expeditions Ferry was leaving from the Lahaina Harbor in the afternoon when I looked down and saw a monk seal entering the harbor. “He must be going to the Pioneer Inn for happy hour,” I laughed to myself, as I watched him glide gracefully through the water.
Monk seals have also been seen following fishing boats into Mānele Harbor. Earlier this year, two Lāna‘i moms set up a canopy tent at the small cove at Shipwreck with their beach chairs and picnic coolers. Their toddlers were already splashing and playing in shallow water when a huge monk seal swam ashore and plonked herself down less than 20 feet away from them! Totally ignoring their presence, she turned over and went to sleep!
This shallow cove is also a great spot to take photographs of the naval oil tanker, YO-21, which was intentionally scuttled on Lāna‘i’s reef in the 1950s. In early March, as I was walking around the oceanside trail with visitors, I suddenly saw the same seal but this time, she had a small, black bundle nestled against her. It was her newborn baby!
I reported the baby’s birth to Lāna‘i’s game warden, Mike Coelho, who called NOAA Fisheries. They came to Lāna‘i and put up rope barriers and signage to ensure the mom would not be disturbed and possibly abandon her baby before it was weaned.
At a meeting later, I learned monk seals will nurse their newborns for about five weeks, not eating at all. The baby will gain approximately 200 pounds during this period. When the mom is through nursing, she will molt her fur and leave the young seal to make his or her own way into the world.
Since I was the first person to report it, I was given the honor of naming it! How do you select a name for a baby monk seal? We didn’t know its sex for several weeks. When I was told it was a girl, I knew the perfect name for her, Lepeka.
Aunty Rebecca Lepeka Kaopuiki Richardson
Rebecca Lepeka Kaopuiki Richardson lived all of her life on Lāna‘i. She was born on May 20, 1914, at Kahalepalaoa on Lāna‘i’s south shoreline, and lived at Ka‘a before her family moved to Keōmuku.
The eldest daughter of Daniel Kaniulo Timothy Kaopuiki, Sr. and Hattie Holuhua Kanenaokalani, her siblings were: Daniel Jr., Jerry, then Rebecca, Lei, William (Billy), Sol, Alex, Sam, Samuel, Harriet, Johnny, and the baby of the family, Eva.
The Kaopuiki ‘ohana saw the opening and closing of the sugar plantation, cattle ranching, the start of the pineapple plantation, and the demise of Keōmuku town when everybody slowly moved away to other islands until by 1951, the last of the Keōmuku residents moved to Kō‘ele and Lāna‘i City.
Before the plantation days, the Hawaiian families along the coastline grew what they could and fished. They traded in Lahaina, bringing back the staples they needed to Lāna‘i. The women of the Kaopuiki ‘ohana were noted for the fine lauhala mats, fans and hats they wove. Many of the things they wove were shown in exhibits on Maui also.
Rebecca was 16 years old when she left Keōmuku to move to Kō‘ele to care for her brothers, cooking, cleaning and doing their laundry. She learned to sew from a Japanese woman who taught her to make kimonos and children’s clothing. She also worked at Lāna‘i Inn, now Hotel Lāna‘i.
Life was not all hard work with no fun for Rebecca. It was while going to watch basketball games with her brothers in the evening that she met her husband-to-be, Ernest Richardson.
Throughout the years, Aunty Becca and Uncle Ernest opened their hearts and home to dozens of children. They had seven children of their own, but only three survived to adulthood: Mary Ellen “Suki,” Charlotte and Clarence, who will be forever remembered as “Hoss.”
Charlotte Holsomback is their last surviving child and lives on O‘ahu. Her daughter, Michelle Holsomback, lives on Lāna‘i where she continues her career as an educator at Lāna‘i High & Elementary School, but three of Suki’s grandchildren also live on Lāna‘i.
It is my hope baby Lepeka will wear a mantle of protection around her, protected and forever watched over by our beloved hānai uncle and aunty in the heavens above us, Ernest and Rebecca Richardson.
Lāna‘i continues to evolve. Change is never ending. However, we can continue to honor and treasure the memories of all who lived and walked on this land before us.