Nēnēs and Blueberries in Hawaii

My parents and I didn’t spend all our time looking up for rare birds in Hawaii. After walking the Pu'u O'o Trail, we drove just a few miles down the road to the Kaulana Manu Nature Trail. The route through a lovely kipuka – a vegetated area in a sea of younger lava flows – was lined with plant identification signs.

With small, pointed, waxy leaves and bright berries, many of the plants reminded me of species I’d find in bogs in the Northwoods. We’d been puzzling over the plants while birding, and now a sign next to a shrub with pink berries identified it as Pūkiawe. Cross-referencing with my iNaturalist app, I discovered that it’s in the Ericaceae family, along with cranberries, blueberries, and black crowberry. No wonder it looked familiar! The interpretive sign also mentioned that the berries are eaten and dispersed by nēnē geese.

Pūkiawe, in the Ericaceae Family. Photo by Emily Stone

ʻŌhelo, read the next sign. The scientific name, Vaccinium reticulatum, told me it was a type of blueberry without even consulting my app! The berries are red to orange, though, and are sacred to the volcano goddess Pele. No berries may be eaten without tossing a few to Pele first. I’m pretty sure the nēnē geese skip that part, as the berries are a major part of their diet, and the geese are a major part of seed dispersal for the plants.

ʻŌhelo berries in Hawaii are related to our local blueberries in the Northwoods! Photo by Emily Stone.

The next plant, with tiny, pointy, evergreen leaves and shiny black berries looked just like black crowberries, but a little research informed me that they are in the coffee family. Kūkaenēnē, the Hawaiian name, translates to “nēnē dung.” The berries not only look like nēnē scat, they also show up in nēnē scat after being munched on by the birds.

Kūkaenēnē, the Hawaiian name of this black berry, translates to “nēnē dung.” The berries not only look like nēnē scat, they also show up in nēnē scat after being munched on by the birds.

After reading all these references to nēnē geese, we were anxious to see one. Besides being handsome, with buff-and black diagonally striped necks and black faces, nēnē are the state bird of Hawaii, and one of the most endangered waterfowl in the world.

Just like the ʻApapane and ʻIʻiwi I wrote about last week, the ancestors of these geese were blown off course to the Hawaiian Islands and then stayed there, although the geese only arrived about half a million years ago, vs. five million for the honeycreepers. The Canada geese-like birds radiated quickly into at least seven different species, including the nēnē-nui or great nēnē, which were nearly four feet long and weighed almost 20 pounds. Unsurprisingly for birds that big, most of the geese species became flightless or nearly so.

When Polynesians arrived on the islands with dogs, rats, crops to grow, and mouths to feed, the geese quickly diminished. By the time of European contact, only the nēnē still thrived, and only on the Big Island. With the addition of mongooses, cats, cattle, goats, and more land use changes brought by Europeans, the numbers of nēnē declined precipitously to just 30 birds in 1952.

Captive breeding, reintroductions, and protection under the Endangered Species Act brough the nēnē back from the brink. Their success requires several of their breeding strongholds in national parks to remove and exclude non-native predators. Fences can make things difficult for nēnē, though, since they are adapted to migrate between low elevation nesting areas and foraging areas higher on the volcanoes.

Descending the Saddle Road into Hilo, we kept our eyes open for nēnē. We’d read that they sometimes hang out on golf courses, not unlike their Canadian cousins. No luck. The following day we met an “Institute-on-Demand” guide from the Friends of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. Upon hearing we really wanted to see a nēnē, she took us on a quick detour through the grassy lawns of the Kilauea Military Camp within the park boundaries. No luck on geese, although my dad spotted a Snickers bar in the general store.

On our first day on Maui, we drove the almost endless switchbacks to the top of Haleakalā National Park. At the top of Puʻu ʻUlaʻula, we chuckled at the many non-native chukars who strutted around the parking lot, and we stopped to photograph nēnē crossing signs along the park road, but still no luck.

Chukar in Haleakala National Park

As the Sun was getting low, and daily clouds obscured the rest of Maui, we gave up and began navigating our way back down the tight switchbacks. Pulling into a trailhead to let a faster car pass us, we found a single nēnē casually ripping grass at the edge of the pavement next to a “do not feed the nēnē” sign. With enthusiasm that far surpasses any I’ve ever felt at seeing a Canada goose, we exclaimed at our good luck and began snapping photos.

In addition to having the elegantly striped neck instead of just a white chinstrap, nēnē have longer legs and shorter wings than Canada geese, as adaptations to their more terrestrial lifestyle. Since some of the terrestrial places they live are lava flows with rough surfaces, their feet have less webbing and more padding. Almost every nēnē in the park sports leg bands as well, to assist scientists with research and monitoring. We admired the handsome bird in the last rays of the setting Sun. Then the goose casually crossed the asphalt, ducked into long grass next to the outhouse, and disappeared.

A few days later, having landed in Minneapolis, I went for a sunset walk down by the Minnesota River. As a skein of Canada geese honked over my head, I felt a little flash of connection. With blueberries, basalt, and geese in common, Hawaii and home don’t feel nearly as far apart as they used to.

Canada Geese in Minnesota. They are high up, so hard to see. 

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open through mid-March. Our Winter/Spring Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

Hawaiian Honeycreepers

In an unexpected twist, cool drizzle greeted my parents and me for our first day on the Big Island of Hawaii. Once the sun finally came out days later and it felt like a steam room, we looked back on that gray day very fondly. The clouds were perfect for exploring the scrubby young forests on the Pu'u O'o Trail, which meanders over several different ages of lava flows from Mauna Loa.

My parents and editors, Larry and Margaret Stone, enjoyed cool drizzle and good birding along the Pu'u O'o Trail in Hawaii. Photo by Emily Stone.

As with most places in Hawaii, the plants along the trail were a mix of native and introduced. Hot pink knotweed flowers from Asia were strikingly beautiful against the black lava surfaces. They complemented the vibrant greens of the native polypody fern, ʻAe Lau Nui. Lichens had preceded the plants, built up soil, and facilitated seed germination, and they were still cultivating soil in many nooks and crannies.

Knotweed, related to our water smartweed. 

ʻAe Lau Nui, a polypody fern related to our Common Polypody!

The native 'Ōhi'a lehua trees didn’t wait for the lichens to put out the welcome mat. Their tiny, airborne seeds are able to blow in, find a crack, and grow. I’m pretty sure that every single tree taller than our heads was an 'Ōhi'a tree, and most plants at shrub height were, too. Many of them bore scattered flowers, each a Dr. Seussian tuft of scarlet stamens about the size of a clementine.

 'Ōhi'a lehua blossom

Movement among the flowers caught my eye, so I slipped my binoculars from beneath my rain jacket and focused through the mist. A bright red bird with black wings hopped among the flowers, probing for the 'Ōhi'a’s prolific nectar with a sharp black beak. While the bird looked a lot like the scarlet tanagers who nest in the Northwoods, I knew it was not. “ʻApapane!” I called to my parents, and guided their eyes to the bird. Less than 24 hours on Hawaii, and we’d just spotted one of our target species for the trip!

ʻApapane are the most common species in a group known as Hawaiian honeycreepers. Their striking red plumage blends well with the 'Ōhi'a flowers they feed on. Photo by MFBRP, used under Creative Commons. (Try as we might, neither my dad or I ever got a decent photo of an ʻApapane! They were always too high up, and silhouetted against the sky. 

It’s no accident that ʻApapanes’ scarlet feathers match the red of the blossoms they rely on. The camouflage makes them very hard to spot! A brush-tipped tongue perfect for sipping nectar further emphasizes their close relationship with 'Ōhi'a lehua blossoms. The fact that ʻApapane are the most abundant species of Hawaiian honeycreepers, and scientists estimate that their population is about equal to the human population on the islands, didn’t dampen my enthusiasm at seeing this endemic bird who only lives in Hawaii.

A little farther down the trail, we spotted more movement in the trees. Another red bird masqueraded as a flower, but while the red body and black wings looked just like an ʻApapane to me, the beak was bright orange and strongly curved. Having studied our field guides, I knew that this was an ʻIʻiwi (pronounced ee-EE-vee).

ʻIʻiwi look very similar to ʻApapane, but have a bright orange, curved bill. This one is feeding on 'Ōhi'a flowers at high elevation – where malaria-carrying mosquitoes can’t survive. Photo by Emily Stone.  (Ha! Gotcha! I'm pretty proud of this 'I'iwi photo, taken in Haleakala National Park on a sunny day.)

These two red birds share more than a love of ‘Ohi’a nectar. They both descended from the same flock of rosefinches from Asia who got blown off course roughly five million years ago, and found refuge on the young island of Kaua’i. Finding pleasant weather, lots of food, and few predators, the birds survived, eventually expanding to the other islands as those volcanoes rose above the ocean.

In order to avail themselves of the many different habitats and food sources on the islands, the birds began to specialize. Just like with Darwin’s finches on the Galapagos Islands, some adapted to cracking seeds, others to sipping nectar, some even figured out how to act like woodpeckers. This is called “adaptive radiation,” where one species becomes many, so that they can take advantage of different resources and living conditions. Collectively, we call these birds Hawaiian honeycreepers.

Wikipedia lists 60 species of Hawaiian honeycreepers, but only 15 are still alive today. While the Endangered Species Act that tries to protect these birds is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, it’s an uphill battle. Eight Hawaiian birds were declared extinct just this past October.

Theirs is a common plight on Hawaii, a hotbed of extinctions. The few plants and critters who arrived on their own lived for eons with no ground predators, no parasites, no mosquitoes, and no grazing animals. Once humans – first the Polynesians and then the Europeans – brought habitat destruction, pigs, cats, rats, mongooses, diseases, and invasive plants, the original inhabitants suffered.

Perhaps it won’t surprise you that mosquitoes are some of the worst villains on Hawaii, at least in relation to the native birds. The mosquitoes picked up avian malaria from some infected transplanted bird, and now spread it among the endemic birds, causing widespread death. ʻIʻiwis are one species at high risk. They have no disease resistance, and only hold on by staying at higher elevations that are too cold for mosquitoes – just like our cool, high Pu'u O'o Trail. As the climate warms, their safe habitat will shrink. 

(Check out this plan to help them by introducing mosquitoes with a different strain of bacteria!) 

Happily, the beautiful ʻApapane have developed some genetic resistance to the disease, and are doing relatively well. They serenaded us on many forest walks. An ʻApapane’s song may contain more than 400 different syllables, so listening to this single species warble through the forest canopy made it feel like there was still a lovely chorus. They are a bright spot in a landscape of loss.

Three 'I'iwis landed for just a split second in this dead pine in Hosmer Grove, Haleakala National Park.

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open through mid-March. Our Winter/Spring Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

A bright red bird with black wings hopped among the flowers, probing for the 'Ōhi'a’s prolific nectar with a sharp black beak. While the bird looked a lot like the scarlet tanagers who nest in the Northwoods, I knew it was not. ʻApapanes’ scarlet feathers match the red of the blossoms they rely on.

A little farther down the trail, we spotted more movement in the trees. Another red bird masqueraded as a flower, but while the red body and black wings looked just like an ʻApapane to me, the beak was bright orange and strongly curved. Having studied our field guides, I knew that this was an ʻIʻiwi (pronounced ee-EE-vee).

These two endemic birds who live only in Hawaii birds share more than a love of ‘Ohi’a nectar. They both descended from the same flock of rosefinches from Asia who got blown off course roughly five million years ago, and found refuge on the young island of Kaua’i. That refuge is shrinking.

Lava in Hawaii and at Home

Cerulean waves crashed along the jagged black shoreline. The white foam matched happy little clouds in a blue sky. On the Big Island of Hawaii, my parents and I had been greeted by rain and flood warnings. Now, on Maui, there were blustery winds and high surf warnings. The ocean was impressive, especially where it pounded against the headlands of Ho'okipa Beach Park, on the way to the Road to Hana. Naturally, I scrambled down to get closer, remembering to never turn my back to the ocean.

Ho'okipa Beach Park

I’m a big fan of basalt bedrock shorelines. Basalt is the type of dark, igneous rock that forms when lava oozes out of volcanoes and cools quickly near the surface. Hawaii is mostly built from basalt, but then, so is the North Shore of Lake Superior.

Prof. Tom Fitz teaches about basalt on the North Shore of Lake Superior.

Our North Shore basalts formed 1.1 billion years ago, as the Mid-Continent Rift began to stretch and thin and tear North America apart. Before the Adirondacks slammed into the proto-East Coast and stopped the rifting, we were on our way to becoming oceanfront property! The rift lasted long enough for lava flows to accumulate an impressive amount of new rocks. Those rocks are now exposed along the North Shore of Lake Superior, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and at waterfalls in Northern Wisconsin.

Gooseberry Falls flows over basalt.

Hawaii is a different story. The lava there doesn’t erupt from a diverging rift zone. It forms because of a hotspot, where heated rock from the Earth’s core-mantle boundary rises up, melts the rocks above it, and then lava erupts in the middle of nowhere. Over time, the undersea volcanoes have built enough bedrock to rise above the ocean surface and become islands…islands who are still growing!

While the hotspot stays in one place, the ocean crust on top of it slides along, and so the volcanoes have built a chain of islands with the oldest ones to the north, and the youngest ones (Maui and the Big Island) to the south. Mauna Loa, which makes up most of the Big Island, rises 9 km above the seafloor, and is the tallest volcano on Earth. To find a bigger one, you’d have to go to Mars.

I’ve known the basic story of Hawaii since seventh grade, when I crafted a moving model using a shoebox, playdough, and a baking soda/vinegar hotspot. [Mr. Crandall made sure we understood that plate tectonics was NEW information! He hadn't learned about it in his own seventh grade geology class!] And I’ve spent a lot of time playing on, teaching, and learning about Mid-Continent Rift basalt since college. But by the time we’d driven all the way to Hana on the northeast corner of Maui, I was starting to have questions. The black sand beach, craggy headlands, and piles of boulders were so much blacker than the basalt around home. Why?

Ho'okipa Beach Park

At Waiʻānapanapa State Park near Hana, Hawaii, the basalt on the beach and shoreline is very dark black and contains lots of air bubbles called vesicles. Photo by Emily Stone. 

Black sand beach at Waiʻānapanapa State Park!!!

Black sand beach at Waiʻānapanapa State Park.

From the few clues still preserved in North Shore rift basalts, we can guess that those lava flows were mostly the pāhoehoe type. These hot, slow-moving lava flows tend to have ropy surfaces. The root of the word come from the Hawaiian word “to paddle,” and probably refers to the ripples your paddle makes in the water.

Pāhoehoe lava in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park

There are pāhoehoe lava flows on Hawaii, too, but ‘a‘ā lava flows are more plentiful. These masses of lava flow so quickly that the surface shatters into jagged chunks that would make you say “Ah! Ah!” to walk across. ‘A‘ā surfaces are much less common in the Mid-continent Rift.

‘A‘ā lava from the 1801 lava flow north of Kailua-Kona, Maui.

Pāhoehoe and ‘a‘ā encroaching over top in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. This is where I really started to understand the different! Pāhoehoe can look a lot more jagged than the wave-washed and glaciated basalt I'm used to on the North Shore...but the ‘a‘ā is REALLY rough!

This didn’t seem like the full story, though, so I called up Tom Fitz, geology professor at Northland College, and learned that it has a lot to do with agates. Lake Superior Agates contain beautiful concentric bands of quartz, often stained red with iron. People hunt for them on the pebble beaches of Lake Superior, as well as in gravel pits and other glacial deposits in the area. These beautiful rocks formed within the rift basalts.

Carla Peterson proudly holds the agate she found north of Grand Marais, MN!

The rift area stayed volcanically active for roughly 23 million years, and in that time, rift basalts were deeply buried by more lava flows and eventually thick layers of sandstone. Hot water flowed through the buried rock, dissolving minerals and carrying them along. When the mineral-rich water encountered a cavity, it precipitated a layer of quartz. Flush after flush of liquid with slightly different trace minerals resulted in beautiful, banded agates. When eons of erosion exposed the basalt, the agates popped out into the hands of persistent rockhounds.

Along the Temperance River near Tofte, Minn., Carla Peterson is looking at an agate still held within the vesicle where it formed. The mineral-rich water that precipitated the agate also lightened the color of the basalt. Photo by Emily Stone.

The cavities where agates form originated as gas bubbles in the molten lava, which are called vesicles. Hawaiian basalts have of LOTS of vesicles! Everywhere I went the rocks looked dimpled or spongy, or like a super fluffy chocolate cake with lots of airspace. 

All the surface area in vesicular, ‘a‘ā  basalt makes it easier for lichens to establish a foothold there. That impacts the speed of forest development on new flows. 

Mid-Continent Rift basalts had vesicles, too, at least until they were filled with amygdules of agates, copper, and other minerals. They were also darker in color until that hot water moved through, rusted the iron minerals, and turned the basalts dark brown. In fact, in the few locations where you find rift basalts that have unfilled vesicles, the rocks are much blacker and more similar to Hawaiian basalts.

A sample of amygdaloidal basalt (with the vesicles filled) from the Northwoods Geology ROCKS! exhibit. 

The volcanoes of Hawaii were fun to visit, but I have to admit, I prefer my basalt super old with the possibility of agates.

Hunting for agates north of Grand Marais, MN

Found one!

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open through mid-March. Our Winter/Spring Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.

Riding Wings to Hawaii

Bright blue waves crashed on a white sand beach that drew me in like a magnet. I left my parents napping in the truck. They were worn out after a week of adventures in Hawaii. Standing on the edge of the Pacific Ocean, I was surprised by how much the lush green hills of Maui’s north shore reminded me of summer in the Sawtooth Mountains along the North Shore of Lake Superior.

I was so busy looking at the frigatebird, I forgot to take a photo looking west toward the hills that reminded me of Minnesota. Here's a view to the east -- white sand instead of basalt bedrock, but you can see the resemblance, right?
Or maybe I was just homesick at that point ;-) Photo by Emily Stone.

View of the Sawtooth Mountains  from Artist's Point in Grand Marais, MN. Photo by Emily Stone

The silhouette of a soaring bird caught my eye. At home they would have been an eagle. Here, the forked tail identified the bird as an ‘Iwa, or Great Frigatebird. Wings are one of the main ways that life gets to Hawaii, and boy do frigatebirds have wings! Their seven-foot wingspan is the largest of any seabird commonly found in Hawaii. Weighing only 3 pounds, they have the lowest wing loading of any bird on Earth! That’s in stark contrast to our Common Loons, who have the highest mass-to-wing-area ratio of any bird who can still fly.

‘Iwa, or Great Frigatebirds have seven-foot wingspans for soaring, and forked tails for maneuverability. They had no trouble flying to Hawaii. Photo by Emily Stone.

While our loons make impressive migrations to the ocean each winter, frigatebirds make regular trips across thousands of miles of open sea, returning to Hawaii or other islands to breed. This makes them indigenous to Hawaii: they are native here, but not only here. Of all the wings bringing life to Hawaii, these seemed the most effortless and natural. Flying long distances across open water is what they are built for. Even the airplanes coming and going constantly expend much more energy in flight. Other winged arrivals probably required a bit more luck.

At a different beach, in the Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge, we spotted another amazing, flighted arrival. Kōlea, or Pacific Golden Plovers, live up to their names, even during the non-breeding season. As we walked the boardwalk at sunset, the light illuminated the golden shades in the mottled feathers of these small shorebirds. Like us, they come to Hawaii to escape cold weather elsewhere. In the lovely warmth, they feast on insects to fatten up. Starting in late April, they begin an incredible 8,000 mile migration back to their breeding grounds in Western Alaska. While most return to winter in Hawaii, some head to New Zealand, Australia, Southeast Asia, and the Horn of Africa.

Kōlea, or Pacific Golden Plovers, migrate 8,000 miles across open ocean to Alaska to breed, and then back to Hawaii for the winter. Photo by Emily Stone.

Throughout our journey, I photographed several more species of little shorebirds who also breed in the Arctic. ‘Akekeke, or Ruddy Turnstones; Hunakai, or sanderlings; and ‘Ulili, or Wandering Tattlers. All of these continue to make impressive flights every year, and so they are generally considered to be part of global populations who share genetics.

‘Akekeke, or Ruddy Turnstone

Hunakai, or sanderling

‘Ulili, or Wandering Tattler

A few other waterbirds arrived on Hawaii, probably accidentally blown in on a storm, and stayed. Ae‘o, or Hawaiian Stilts, have been isolated on the islands long enough to have become their own subspecies, distinct from the ones who live in North America. This subspecies is endemic to Hawaii, which means they are native here, and only here. We sought them out near the headquarters of the National Wildlife Refuge. The whole place smelled of rotting fish, and tilapia carcasses dotted the drought-dried edges of the ponds.

Ae‘o, or Hawaiian Stilts, don’t migrate. They arrived on Hawaii once, and have now become their own subspecies. They have the second-longest leg-to-body ratio of any bird! Photo by Emily Stone.

Ae‘o may be the most elegant birds I’ve ever seen. Standing 16 inches tall, with natty, tuxedo-like, black-and-white plumage, they wade through muck on long, graceful pink legs. The contrast between their snazzy plumage and the mudflats where they use their slender black bills to forage for worms, fish, and crabs is comical. The fishponds and flooded fields where Native Hawaiians grew their traditional food, called kalo, used to be great habitat, but changes in the economy have destroyed that for everyone.

Also in this wetland, we spotted ‘Alae Ke‘oke‘o or Hawaiian coots, and Hawaii’s native duck, the Koloa Maoli, which looks a lot like a Mallard. The ancestors of both of these waterfowl arrived so long ago that they are now considered new species, endemic to Hawaii. To my eyes, they still look like home.

‘Alae Ke‘oke‘o or Hawaiian coots

Hawaii’s native duck, the Koloa Maoli

Arriving to Hawaii on relatively large wings feels impressive, but not impossible. Enter, dragonflies! Throughout Kealia Ponds, we spotted their much smaller wings everywhere! Not all dragonflies and damselflies in Hawaii are native. Some arrived with humans. But the ancestors of the endemic ones are older than the islands themselves. The insects got their start on early islands who have since eroded away into mere pinnacles of rock. With all that time, they’ve evolved into 26 species and subspecies found only in Hawaii. A cousin to our Green Darner dragonfly has a record wingspan of 6 inches!

Wandering Glider Dragonfly (identified using iNaturalist)
Wikipedia says:
It is considered to be the most widespread dragonfly on the planet with good population on every continent except Antarctica although rare in Europe. Globe skimmers make an annual multigenerational journey of some 18,000 km (about 11,200 miles); to complete the migration, individual globe skimmers fly more than 6,000 km (3,730 miles)—one of the farthest known migrations of all insect species.

The big wings of an ‘Iwa, the migratory wings of Kōlea, the small wings of Ae‘o, and even the metal wings of an airplane, are all impressive ways to arrive in Hawaii. But my favorite story of winged arrivals begins with a flock of rosy finches from Asia who get blown way off course and land in a tropical paradise. In a version of Darwin’s finches on the Galapagos Islands, they evolved into a rainbow of species. I can’t wait to tell you more!

Emily’s award-winning second book, Natural Connections: Dreaming of an Elfin Skimmer, is available to purchase at www.cablemuseum.org/books and at your local independent bookstore, too.

For more than 50 years, the Cable Natural History Museum has served to connect you to the Northwoods. Our exhibit: “The Northwoods ROCKS!” is open through mid-March. Our Winter/Spring Calendar of Events is ready for registration! Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and cablemuseum.org to see what we are up to.