Capturing the Moment

  You never know what might be hiding in your backyard. Here on Maui there have always been tales of people finding Jackson's chameleons in their bushes. The trick is to travel a few thousand feet up Haleakala volcano to Makawao, Pukalani and Kula towns where the temperature is a little cooler and it is a bit wetter, perfect conditions for chameleons.   There are no native reptiles on Hawaii. These beautiful chameleons were released or escaped from the pet trade. Luckily they have not become invasive like many other introduced species, however they have increased in population and seem to be doing quite well in the higher elevation areas. Heidi and I went on a search the other day at our friend's house in Kula and were shocked to find a dozen different chameleons in her side yard hedge. They were mostly at eye level, and were curled up asleep for the night. We found them easily enough with flashlights since they seem to sleep near the outer edge of the hedge at night. ...

   Well, our small Jackson's chameleon, Nola, is still pretty small. However after three weeks away Heidi was able to notice that Nola is indeed growing. She has a voracious appetite and it seems like no amount of pinhead crickets is enough, but we'll take that as a good sign. She didn't know quite what to make of her outside photo shoot. Distressed is the word I might use to describe it. And I've never seen her move so fast as when it was time to go back in the cage. Nola almost leaped from my finger back to her favorite perching spot.

No visit from mom is complete without a trip to some gardens. Keeping with our theme of exploring new places we ventured upcountry to the small town of Kula, nestled 4000ft up the side of Haleakala volcano.   Here we found the lavender farms where you can find over forty kinds of lavender as well as many other flowers. The views from here are amazing. You overlook the entire valley below from Ma'alaea bay across to Kahului harbor. After walking through the gardens we stopped at the gift shop to try some of their famous lavender tea and lavender scones. I could eat about a million and a half of those scones. But at $3.50 apiece I settled on splitting one with mom. Jackson's chameleon strolling  Our next spot was the botanical gardens. I was hoping to spot a wild Jackson's chameleon and was lucky enough to find one ambling across the top of this wooden fence. This one had three big horns identifying it as a male. These chameleons were introduced here in Maui by a...