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It is seriously itsy.  Less than 5mm long, harmless, and one of the best moms in the world.

The Hawaiian happyface spider, called nananana makakiʻi, gets its name in an obvious way: there is what seems to be a clownlike happy face on its back—technically the back of its abdomen. No one has yet agreed whether this is an adaptation that scares off larger animals that would enjoy a spider snack, or some more complex DNA shuffling happening within the population that just happens to make patterns that look like a happy face. There are thought to be nine species in the Hawaiian Islands with different “faces” or no “face” pattern at all.

But, although the happy face is certainly interesting to look at, this unusually long-legged, glassy, yellow-green jewel of an arthropod is complex in some possibly unexpected ways. For one thing, these wee Theridiidae-family spiders live on the undersides of leaves in the cool, upper-elevation native Hawaiian wet forests of Maui, Hawaiʻi Island, Molokaʻi and Oʻahu. At Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park they can sometimes be found in the deep green forest around Nāhuku (Thurston Lave Tube).

They don't build a classic web. They are found only in Hawaiʻi (so, are endemic) and spend their days quietly dozing and avoiding being seen by hungry birds or other animals, and their nights searching around nearby for something tasty to eat, using their silk in prey capture. They really like fruit flies.

Male happyface spiders also search around for mates. Some scientists say that males will offer a courtship dance on the female's leaf, which she will pay close attention to and think about before accepting him. Mating happens in the safe dark of nighttime, and the male dies soon after. Once a female spider lays her eggs on the leaf underside, she will rival the most impressive tigress in her defense of her children. When the spiderlings hatch from their little silky egg sack, she finds and brings them food for weeks. Happyface spider mothers give everything they catch to their children, they spare nothing to feed themselves, and without her they would starve. It is a long time before the tiny spiderlings can catch their own food. If a spider mom dies, the spiderlings may depart the leaf and try to find a new mother nearby. They are almost always accepted. Eventually the young spiders depart the home leaf, searching for a new leaf, fruit flies, and mates of their own.

In addition to the usual risks of being very small and edible in the forest, Hawaiian happyface spiders must avoid further pressure from invasive coqui frogs from Puerto Rico, and losing their forests to development or the damage brought by climate change. If you have fallen for this itsy bitsy spider the way we have (we love it so much we made a plush spider for our native Hawaiian animals plush collection), you may wish to know how to help protect it. Protecting the forest protects the Hawaiian happyface spider, so advocating for your national parks, supporting public lands and undeveloped forests, and learning more about how to manage the widening effects of climate change are all good ways to help keep the happyface spider, well, happy.

A fun video for kids (or the kid in you): https://study.com/academy/lesson/video/hawaiian-happy-face-spider-facts-lesson-for-kids.html

Plush finger puppet set: https://shop.hawaiipacificparks.org/products/plush-finger-puppets

Happyface spiders at Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park: https://www.nps.gov/havo/learn/nature/insects-and-arachnids.htm

Images courtesy Zack Pezzilo and Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

Wahi Pana Are Sacred Sites

Every civilization and culture reveres and respects certain areas or structures because something important to that culture’s history occurred, or is occurring, there. In Hawaiʻi, these may include burial or birth sites, war temples or places of healing, battlegrounds or water sources, the sites of legends or the homes of the legendary. In Hawaiʻi, these sacred sites are called wahi pana.

Hawaiʻi Island has three national park sites on the island’s west coast that are all, or in part, wahi pana.

Read more: What Is a Wahi Pana?

Hawaiʻi is an island state built completely of volcanoes old and new. Hot and fluid magma circulating in the planet’s mantle seeps up to and through the crust as a plume and emerges on the seafloor in the middle of the Pacific Plate, where it methodically builds up a shield volcano. The plate is moving north/northwest and subducting under Japan/Russia at a rate of about 5-10 centimeters a year. So, like a great, slow, patient conveyor belt, the plate drifts over the “hot spot” of the mantle plume and volcanoes are built, one after the other.

Eventually the drift of the plate pulls the volcano off of the hot spot that formed it, and eruptions gradually cease. At that point, erosion and settling pick up speed and, just as steadily and constantly, the volcano is worn down to sea level, and then under sea level, too. Formerly high-standing volcanoes that are now under the waves are called “seamounts”, and they stretch nearly to Japan on the northeast end of the Hawaiian chain. The line of old seamounts and young volcanoes is nearly 4,000 miles long, and at the south/southeast end you find the youngest on Hawaiʻi Island, home to Kīlauea and Mauna Loa volcanoes. Jump just one island back to Maui, and there stands Haleakalā. These three volcanoes have been very active in the recent past and all three are within national park boundaries.

When the first people arrived to the present day Main Hawaiian Islands, those islands which are the youngest and tallest above the waves, they employed their immense powers of observation to note that the chain had an older/younger, smaller/larger flow to it. Stories rose from this understanding, powerful myths and legends about Pele, the volcano deity, who travelled the islets and islands from northeast to southwest, finally settling into the great summit caldera of Kīlauea.

Read more: Building Hawaiian Volcanoes

The national park sites of Hawaiʻi offer rainforests and cloudforests, rare and delicate birds, tranquil sandy beaches, rocky lava shores, vibrant coral reefs, and winter visits by humpback whales. But many park visitors are surprised to find themselves swept away by something unexpected and unforeseen: the astonishing spangled night skies of Hawaiʻi.

HPPA's Mary Cockett, who manages our three visitor center park stores at our partner Haleakalā National Park on Maui, filed this report from the Museum Store Association Trade Show held recently in  Baltimore, Maryland. She says:

This was not just an industry event; it's a gathering of minds passionate about art, culture, and creativity. The air buzzed with anticipation, promising an array of innovative products and insights.

Read more: Exploring Innovation and Inspiration: Highlights from the 2024 Museum Store Association Trade Show

Stand in the Hawaiian cloudforest and close your eyes. The whirrr whirrr whirr of ʻapapane wings above you is a signature sound of the native forest. These striking red, black, and white birds (Himatione sanguinea) are constantly on the move, seeking the nectar of ʻōhiʻa lehua flowers. Small flocks work the canopy, restless and determined. A side development of this continual travel among the blossoms is that this is one of the most important pollinators of the native forest. ʻApapane chatter fills the trees all day, although the hour before sunset seems to swell the chorus. In the Hawaiian creation chant, The Kumulipo, the ʻapapane was one of the first beings born into the world.

The mosquito, capable of carrying deadly diseases between birds, arrived as larvae in the water barrels of whalers stopping over in Hawaiʻi in the early 1800s. Its arrival coincided with the introduction of birds (and their diseases) from all over the world by the new, primarily Western, arrivals to the islands, and once established contributed to a perfect storm of Hawaiian bird extinctions. To experience our forest birds now, you must climb the slopes of the volcanoes to pass through the bellies of the lowest clouds at about 4,000 to 5,000 feet above sea level. There, you may be treated to the sights and sounds of some of these most precious residents of the Hawaiian archipelago. 

Read more: Whirr vs. Whine, Hawaiʻi Birds and the Catastrophic Arrival of the Mosquito

Hi, my name is Kiry Galapir. I joined HPPA at Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park in 2007, just before an eruption of Kīlauea Volcano!

I began as a sales staff member, and dedicated 10 years to assisting visitors and promoting park-related products. I now hold the position of E-commerce Specialist and Wholesale Representative for HPPA. I manage sales and customer service activities “behind the scenes”, focusing on e-commerce operations and wholesale partnerships. When you place an online order, I am the one who makes sure you get your package.

Here’s a walk-through of the order fulfillment process at the HPPA online warehouse:

Read more: This Is Where The Packing Happens

Kathy English and Margot Griffith served as both regular employees and as Hawaii Natural History Association (HNHA)/Hawaiʻi Pacific Park Association (HPPA) executive directors from 1976  to 2021. HNHA rebranded to HPPA in 2011. This interview was conducted jointly with them during the yearlong celebration of HPPA’s 90th anniversary. HPPA administrative headquarters are located inside Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park (HAVO).

The Beginning

Kathy: I started in March of 1976 and had previously been working at Volcano Art Center on their board and part time in the gallery as bookkeeper/treasurer. I was initially hired by HNHA to take care of the Hawaiʻi Volcanoes park library. In 1977 I opted to stick with just HNHA; I went from an administrative assistant to a business manager, and some years later to the executive director. I was the first to have that title.

Margot: January 15, 1987, was my first day—the day before the expanded Jaggar Museum and HNHA park store was dedicated at Hawaiʻi Volcanoes. I had been working at Volcano Art Center, a kid out of college with an English degree. I was hired as frontline part time at Jaggar, the second person to be hired at there, and I was also Kathyʻs assistant. The opening of the Jaggar Museum store really changed things for HNHA and that may have been the association’s first million dollar (grossing) year.

Read more: From HNHA To HPPA With Kathy English and Margot Griffith

Some backstory:

Congress authorized Hawai’i National Park on August 1, 1916, as the twelfth U.S. National Park. Also, that year, the National Park Service was established to manage the growing list of federal national parks.

By 1920, it became apparent that the newly minted park rangers could not furnish all the help and information needed and wanted by the ever-increasing numbers of the visiting public. People wanted trail maps and bird guides. They wanted walking sticks and backpacks. They wanted to know about the park they were in, to really understand it. That year the Yosemite Museum Association was founded to develop a museum and visitor contact station in Yosemite National Park.

Read more: What Is This 90 For 90 All About?

There they were! I’d spotted the dark shapes of the flying foxes hanging by their feet in the ironwood trees by Pago Pago Bay. I’m always amazed and thrilled to see these large native fruit bats (peʻa) when I visit the Samoan Islands. Later that day I saw them soaring overhead with their three-foot wingspan exceeding that of the white-tailed tropic birds gliding alongside.

I’d come to the islands for three weeks to visit both American Samoa and (Western) Samoa. In 2007-08 I served in the Peace Corps in a small village on ʻUpolu Island. I had an amazing adventure and became part of my Samoan family. In the spring of 2023, I was finally able to visit for the first time since the islands’ borders were closed for more than two years due to the worldwide pandemic. The half hour flight from Apia to American Samoa was highlighted by stunning views of the coral reefs and aqua seas below.

Read more: Three Weeks In Samoa, by guest blogger Donna Barr