♪♪ -Rodeo was kind of, like, my everything.

-Our culture, our language -- she's the one who holds that so close.

-Nothing can replace the way I feel when I come out here and I look at this land and know that it's because of what we did.

♪♪ [ Birds chirping ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -"Understanding place means understanding its people.

We are a true reflection of our place.

This Kula grasslands built me.

These winds built me.

These hills built me.

♪♪ My parents, grandparents, and each successive generation before them built me.

♪♪ [ Cattle lowing ] My turn now as a mother to help build my children and the generations to follow.

In this sanctity of Hawaii which I call home, I shall build upon all that has built me."

[ Rooster crows ] Most don't realize that the Paniolo, the Hawaiian cowboy, have been in the Islands since the 1800s.

And for our family, it has been our lifestyle, our life ways for many generations.

♪♪ [ Indistinct conversations ] ♪♪ -Rodeo was kind of, like, my everything from a young age, I guess.

♪♪ Rodeo and when we kuni -- it's like coming together as a family just to have fun.

♪♪ -[ Speaking indistinctly ] Today is the last rodeo for our Hawaii high-school rodeo season.

I was on the first team to go to Nationals when Hawaii became a part of the National High School Rodeo Association in '88.

-[ Speaking indistinctly ] -Their last few years, we've had children just place in the top five, you know, top ten.

They put Hawaii on the map, from shooting to cutting to steer wrestling.

[ Indistinct conversations ] ♪♪ [ Thud ] [ Hip-hop music playing on radio ] -Right now we are on our way to Waimea... for my last high-school rodeo.

I just hope that I have the best last rodeo I can have -- like, that I just give out all that I have in me.

And generally I just want to have a really good day and spend time with my friends.

The best part of rodeo is all the people that come whether it be contestants or, like, people just to watch 'cause it kind of gives you that sense of, like, community and family.

Kind of sucks now that you can't really be by everybody and, like, you have to social-distance and whatever.

It's fun when there's people in the stands cheering at you because -- especially when you do good.

'Cause it's like, "Oh, my God.

There's people rooting for me."

You know?

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -[ Speaking indistinctly ] -But we'll see.

What are we doing?

Did she say anything about college?

She got accepted to Montana State University.

She's torn because she wants to go to the mainland because she knows there's different opportunities.

[Voice breaking] But she really wants to... You know, she wants our culture, our language.

...our kuleana, yeah?

She's the one who holds that so -- so close.

And then I think, for us, our culture comes first, yeah?

[ Indistinct conversations ] She's been taking college classes since the ninth grade, yeah, with her school.

So she's on her way already.

She's gotten a lot of credits.

So if she stayed home and just went to UH Hilo or HCC, you know, whatever, and just continued...

But I'm not gonna tell her that.

You know?

She got to do what she wants to do.

And I have no problem with her going to the mainland.

And horses or rodeo would be her fun.

[ Man singing in native language ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -And here we go!

All of our high-school contestants for today!

Our last rodeo of the 2021 season!

[ Cheers and applause ] -The basic definition of "kuleana" is responsibility, but I think within that lies every single value we've been taught from when we were small.

[ Speaking native language ] [ Horse whinnies ] ♪♪ -Whoo!

♪♪ -Come on, Bella!

♪♪ ♪♪ [ Indistinct shouting ] ♪♪ -Whoo!

Whoo-hoo!

-The adrenaline rush is, like, major.

It feels good to go out there and put your all into something.

Being raised how we were raised, that's what we consider like our play.

[ Indistinct shouting ] -Oh, no.

This is... -There you go.

There you go.

[ Indistinct shouting ] Come on, sister!

[ Indistinct shouting ] -You got it!

You got it!

You got it!

[ Applause ] -Get up!

[ Indistinct shouting ] [ Indistinct shouting ] -Like, you look for the signs, basically.

You have to read your animals.

So when they're looking out, they're not, like, looking all over the place.

Me, personally, the moment the cow stops moving completely and, like, in my head, everything goes quiet, that's when I'll, like, nod.

That's when I'll go.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Indistinct shouting ] -School, no school?

-Huh?

I mean, it's between staying home here and doing my Hawaiian studies or going up there and rodeoing or, um, going into a ranch management program in Montana.

Hard to choose.

I mean, I know I'm capable of a lot of things, but, like, I know my kuleana, too.

[ Indistinct shouting ] ♪♪ So me just trying to figure out how I'm going to fulfill my kuleana and, like, the person I become in doing so.

Taking it one step at a time.

[ Horse whinnies ] -This Papohaku stonewall corral is Pawaina Corral.

Dated over 200 years that this stonewall has been here.

-We're in Puuanahulu.

-Napuu.

-In these ancestral homelands.

This is where we come from.

-[ Coughs ] -This one?

-Yeah, right like that.

-I think so.

-Three.

-Three.

-Yeah.

-Over 200 years old.

[ Laughter ] -[ Moaning ] [ Laughter ] [ Laughter ] -So, if you look in our family, we have a lot of girls.

There's lots of keakealaniwahine.

And with that, we have no -- no choice, right?

I birth all girls.

My sister birth all girls.

My brother, girls.

And it seems like in every generation there might be one boy, one boy, one boy.

And so that's what I mean, that these practices do not stop or are halted because of our gender.

-Ready?

One, two...

-What?!

[ Laughter ] -Over here?

-Yeah.

-Okay.

-So we're flipping them like that.

-Okay.

Wait.

-You see -- That is the bottom.

You see here.

Right here.

You see this -- Yeah, that's the bottom.

-Okay.

-There you go.

Okay.

Come up...

Hold.

Take a break.

Come on, stone!

Okay.

-Gonna grab this one.

-That big one.

Yeah.

Alright.

-This is the bottom.

-You guys catch on what I say?

-Yeah.

-Okay.

-Like that.

-Watch.

Watch.

Okay.

Then clean that out... -Did you just see that?

-We have a relationship to these rocks, to these trees, to this dirt.

And when people of place are absent, I believe there is a suffering.

There's a suffering of the kanaka, the people.

When they no longer have access, then I think there's a suffering of the land, where the land... some people will say have no voice.

-We've been here for over 15 years with a promise of a long-term lease, and nothing's ever transpired.

That's the worry.

You know, month to month, how can you malama aina, truly malama aina, or call yourself a steward of the land on a month-to-month lease?

The uncertainty of not being able to be here... next month.

-It's gonna be a sad day when we say to our children, "No longer can you go down to the stonewall corral."

To be cut off like that is... Whew.

You're almost cutting off lifeline.

-We would love to see a future where our daughters are able to thrive here at home on our aina.

My hopes is what we've been asking for -- to have a long-term lease, to have a say in how this piece of land is managed.

That is the only way we would be able to continue to be stewards on this land and continue to be home.

-[ Speaking indistinctly ] [ Indistinct conversations ] -Come here... [ Speaking indistinctly ] [ Laughter ] -[ Speaking indistinctly ] You know what they call...?

[ Speaking indistinctly ] ♪♪ -[ Speaking indistinctly ] Bright and early.

[ Chuckles ] [ Indistinct conversation ] -What is that?

Wherever you want to put your present.

You want to leave it -- You can leave it home if you want.

♪♪ [ Indistinct conversations ] [ Laughter ] [ Indistinct conversations ] [ Dog barks ] [ Cattle lowing ] -Of course, I have your horse.

-I do have Hollywood.

I have your horse.

Yes.

Are your horses saddled and ready to go?

Okay.

Bye.

[ Indistinct conversations ] [ Laughter ] -Thank you, everybody.

[ Indistinct conversations ] When I look around, our fathers were born and raised into this.

-All of us.

-And our mamas.

So it wasn't our fathers, our mothers, or both.

Every one of us standing here has heard words from Papa.

He is our dictionary.

So it's about the language, the terms that when we don't have Dad, we got to carry that.

We have worked alongside him for, some of us, our whole life.

We become the repositories.

We become the ones that got to hold this forward.

If not us, then who?

And so we continue to continue.

Hoomau, hoomau, hoomau.

♪♪ -Hey, hey, hey!

[ Cattle lowing ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [ Cattle lowing ] Hey!

[ Indistinct shouting ] ♪♪ Hey!

♪♪ [ Indistinct shouting ] [ Indistinct shouting ] ♪♪ [ Cattle lowing ] [ Indistinct conversations ] -...laho?

-Yeah.

-Okay.

[ Indistinct conversations ] -Watch what Papa do.

Here.

One at a time.

Take your time.

First time.

-Right here?

-Let it go one.

There.

Go ahead.

Hold.

Okay.

[ Cattle lowing ] -Dad, can I drag?

-Yeah.

[ Indistinct conversations ] -Whoo!

[ Smooching ] [ Indistinct shouting ] [ Cattle lowing ] ♪♪ [ Man singing in native language ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ What is the Hawaiian word for "Hawaiian"?

Anybody here know?

♪♪ -I really feel those that can identify who you are and where you come from and what your kuleana is, it's a little bit easier.

♪♪ Because you have that identity, and your culture becomes our kuleana.

-Here is the cows!

♪♪ -There's nothing like coming home to continue in the footsteps of those before you.

Those are huge footsteps to fill.

That's our intent, is to continue that legacy.

♪♪ [ Laughter ] -I love how you can see, like... -Yeah.

♪♪ -When it comes to our papa... -We're the favorites, obviously.

-I know.

Honestly, like, we do everything for him, but I don't know.

-He's probably our biggest influence.

-I think everything that we do, in a way, is gonna be for him throughout our entire life.

-Like, he's our only grandparent that is with us right now -- with us every day -- that teaches us.

So it's more so to just make him proud.

And everything is for him.

-Yeah.

I love him the way I love this aina.

-Yeah.

-Exactly like that.

I would do anything for this aina.

I know I would do anything for him.

-This aina is where we're from.

It's where we've been raised.

It's what shaped us.

[ Speaking native language ] Right?

The aina is always above us, and we're the stewards of the land.

We take care.

[ Speaking native language ] -We have a big kuleana down here to our aina, to our people, to our lahui.

And I think one of our main kuleana as, like, the paniolo community is consistently giving back, giving back to our aina, giving back to our community.

-I decided to stay home for school and not go to the mainland.

With what I want to do with my life and with the kuleana that I feel I have and being raised the way I was, it's more important for me to stay than it would be to leave.

And I think I would have a really hard time without my family and without aina especially.

Without this aina.

You know, Puuanahulu...

It would be hard not to be able to come here whenever I want for whatever reason I wanted.

You feel free.

Like, sometimes time just stops, you know?

Especially when you're with your family.

Like... [ Speaking native language ] Like, the memories that we make, it's... -Irreplaceable.

-Irreplaceable.

Definitely.

And it feels like when we're here together, spending time, making these memories, doing all of these different kinds of things, perpetuating our culture, it just feels like we can finally be ourselves and we're just us.

I think when we look at it, when we look at, like, this, we see our history.

We see our kupuna.

We see our aina.

-Our aina aloha.

Aina momona.

[ Laughter ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Nothing can replace the way I feel when I come out here and I look at this land and know that it's because of what we did.

♪♪ I'm highly motivated by taking something that's not producing anything, that nobody else wants, and turning it into something that's beautiful to look at and producing something.

Makes my heart just skip.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ My name is Lani Petrie.

I'm a cattle rancher on the southeast side of the Big Island.

Ranching has been my whole life.

♪♪ ♪♪ My husband, Bill, will fly.

Right when the sun comes up, he'll go check water.

♪♪ It takes him a half an hour to check 50 square miles.

♪♪ ♪♪ Come!

Come!

Come!

Come!

Come!

[ Cattle lowing ] Come!

They calve in the winter.

These calve in the spring and early summer.

So we have calves at different times of the year to sell.

[ Engine starts ] So these are the ones that we'll wean on Wednesday.

[ Shouts ] [ Shouts ] Yeah.

Come on.

Would you guys get in?

You got to work tomorrow.

Get in the truck.

Get in!

♪♪ ♪♪ [ Whistling ] ♪♪ [ Cattle lowing ] Definitely needing magnesium today.

When animals, including humans, don't have enough mag, they get nervous.

A lot of nervousness.

You see how their ears -- See how their ears are up?

♪♪ Those of us downwind of the volcano -- the volcano has just changed the land, the soils, the vegetation.

The pH changes, and some plants can't take it.

The volcano emits thousands of tons of sulfur a day.

In the 2018 event, which fortunately lasted only a few months, it was 50,000 metric tons a day.

♪♪ Anything metal is toast.

Fences were just melting.

And my dad always coined it.

He says, "Yo, Girlie."

That's my nickname.

He says, "Girlie, we'll never end up with something that's too good of an operation because we're just gonna end up with what nobody else wants."

So I was kind of raised that way, that we always ended up with something that was pretty rough.

There was no dependable water.

It was really an undesirable landscape.

♪♪ This is a pretty spectacular one.

It's easy to get in and out of.

But they're everywhere.

The original Lava Lounge.

This is more like the cave that I fell into.

10, 12 feet.

Straight drop.

Eh, maybe not -- Maybe quite this deep.

I don't know.

I haven't been to it in 30 years.

I fell through the hole, through the skylight.

To have that sensation that you're falling and you've gone from daylight to complete darkness and you're falling...

I thought I had died and I was falling into hell.

And I remember saying to myself, "Lord, how have I forsaken you?"

We landed on a bunch of rocks like that, and the horse tumbled down.

Greg and my dad, we were all working a group of cattle, so they missed me right away.

And I yelled at him.

I said, "Look out!"

Because he was right above me on his horse.

My dad said, "Well, you stay with the horse."

I was in shock.

But we camped in the hole that night.

And the next morning, we took shovels and pry bars and opened up the skylight so that we could pull the horse out with a helicopter.

[ Helicopter blades whirring ] So, this is the next morning after we'd been in the hole.

Stayed with the horse all night.

And that's me coming out on the ladder.

Really can't see into the hole at all.

You know, everybody's all relieved.

Yeehaw.

We got the horse out of the hole.

The chopper didn't crash.

So she's pr-- She's fully sedated, thank God.

And so while she was still pretty sedated, the vet got her all stitched up, and I led her home.

♪♪ So, we started here at this ranch, and it was broken-down.

My dad, he just kept fixing things and fixing things.

We just worked hard.

I mean, we got weaned off of mother's milk and handed a pipe wrench.

We all knew how to twist pipe and fix fences.

♪♪ Look at it now.

Because of fertility and pasture management, it's not only pretty to look at, it's productive.

♪♪ And this is actually the 160th anniversary of Kapapala Ranch.

♪♪ I had -- This is a picture of the ranch in the late 1800s.

It doesn't really have a specific date.

It just says it was the late 1800s.

♪♪ My family that worked here back in the 1800s, they were Hawaiian -- Hawaiian Haole.

To be in charge of a 160-year legacy -- and to be part Hawaiian on top of that -- I'm quite honored.

I'm humbled.

My husband and I made a decision back in 2002 when we left our full-time jobs and we said, "The ranch has to pay."

So we do what we do best, and we were profitable at it.

[ Cellphone rings ] That's me.

-Oh.

Okay.

-Oh, this is my son.

-Does he live here and work here?

-No, because he's like, "I mean, Mom, I'm 34.

The long-term lease expires in nine years.

I'm gonna be 40.

In my 40s.

And why would I come back here?"

♪♪ ♪♪ Kapapala Ranch operates on a state lease that is set to expire in 2029.

None of us knows what's gonna happen after that.

♪♪ We've invested millions into improving resources here.

We did because we were certain of our future at that time.

If we were facing the same uncertainty we're facing today, it's questionable if we'd have made those same investments.

♪♪ Long-term investments need long-term tenure.

So we're at a crossroads that's really hard.

♪♪ -[ Speaking indistinctly ] ♪♪ -Our day starts at 7:30, repairing fence or right now we're putting in a new major water line.

We're not a big crew, but we all work as a team, especially my husband and I.

♪♪ It is amazing how much just a few people that are motivated can get done.

[ Cattle lowing ] You know, when we came here 40 years ago, there was no fences, so the men had to push the cattle really hard, and they ended up doing a lot of roping.

And the animals were so afraid.

Now they're not afraid.

-Good?

-Yep.

We just call them and go on over, open the gate.

[ Cattle lowing ] "Not fair.

You get to go first.

No fair.

No fair."

So, of everything we did today, that was the nicest move, to me.

The cattle, they did the happy-cow walk.

-Yeah.

-The happy-cow walk is... And the calves would buck a little bit and... And a lot more head down, swinging, like... Like, if they were whistling, they'd be whistling.

Um, And each herd will do it.

I mean, it's just this morning, those cattle have had plenty to eat.

Their calves are on their own, kind of eating on their own.

You see a guava plant coming up like that.

There's another one over there.

I've actually seen quite a few.

And that's probably the most aggressive plant we have on the ranch -- guava.

And so, you know, there's your sign.

♪♪ Intensively managed herds tackle the invasive plants that we deal with.

I mean, you think about what a cow eats and compare it to somebody going out and trying to mow grass.

It's impossible to have 10,000 weed eaters going 12 hours a day, 365 days a year.

♪♪ Here's the boundary between the Kau Forest Reserve and the ranch.

This is blooming night jasmine.

And, boy, you can see right down the fence line, the cattle actually graze it where it comes over and reaches over the fence.

30 years ago, we started to see a few plants.

And it's just in the last 10 years, you just -- you can't even get through it.

You know, the native force as we know it is getting pushed back.

You have the grasses that grow up.

They ripen.

They die.

It becomes a huge fire load.

The fire in 2018 actually started in Keauhou Ranch.

The cattle were taken out of there, hm, about 20 years ago.

The ranch forfeited that land for the national park.

And it's had no livestock.

And, boy, when that fire hit, it exploded.

And it burned for six days.

When it got to our boundary, of course, there was no fuel load.

So we marched up and down that fence line for six days to make sure it didn't come in the ranch.

And then we provided water from our reservoirs.

So, the first thing I do when I come up here is check the rain gauge.

Ooh.

Lucked out.

Two inches.

And there's more!

2 and 1/2 inches.

So 140,000.

That's 280,000.

And half again.

That's 70.

280.

350,000 gallons of water since we were here last.

Kaniwai was developed as a high-elevation source of water to eliminate the necessity for pumps and the need of fossil fuel to deliver water in very expensive high-pressure systems.

And using gravity, all natural resources, to deliver water over 100 miles of pipeline on 34,000 acres.

It all flows freely.

So it's taking almost a full pipe out to the national-park boundary, to those paddocks of... Well, the water is critical to everything.

No water, no life.

It's taken the nene a while to find this spot, but now that they've found it, it makes me feel good.

In a DLNR lease, at the end of your term, all your improvements are owned by the state, and then the property is appraised and then goes out to public auction.

So you have to buy your improvements back.

And we just put in a million-dollar water system.

[ Engine starts ] You know, you can't just go and put in a million-dollar investment and then just give it to the state.

It doesn't give anybody any incentive to put capital improvements into the land.

♪♪ ♪♪ "The legislature believes that positive advancement in sustainable agriculture, carbon sequestration challenges, wildlife management, wildfire protection, and forest health concerns can be cooperatively managed through mutually beneficial practices with ranching, wildlife protection, and native forest restoration."

They talk about wanting to keep lands in productivity, and yet they take out all the incentives to invest any money to keep it in productivity.

You know, I guess I'm a little -- facing the reality that everything that we're going to deal with is going to be short-term.

And I can't tackle invasive species... that are so highly adapted.

I can't tackle them year to year or five years or... We're at a crossroads that's really hard.

Um...

Especially being at our age.

You know, do you pick up at 60 years of age and go start over someplace or...?

I mean, I'm too old to start over.

Does giving up mean that you freaking close your eyes and look the other way because you're not doing what you can -- that you know better?

But you can't afford to do better.

Is it better just to -- just go?

Sorry.

I'm getting -- I've been told that I get combative.

Well... Kepa, come.

There's not a lot I can do as a land manager on a lava field that's a hundred years old.

We do produce food on land that would be otherwise used for nothing.

♪♪ Any business has to generate a return on its investment.

You know, we've turned just a ma-and-pa ranch into a ranch that is profitable most years.

♪♪ ♪♪ When I approach an animal, I always, number one, look at them and see if they're having a good day.

And you can tell.

You step into a pen full of cattle, they're talking to you.

They're telling you what they feel.

They're telling you how they think.

And, you know, if you're -- if you take that into consideration, if you're considerate to them, they will do everything that you want them to do.

Most of the time.

♪♪ You know, that is so powerful, to walk into 500 cows and all their calves, and they look at you and they go, "Okay.

What do you want us to do?"

♪♪ And when they're happy cows, they raise big fat calves, you know, and they -- And big fat calves bring you a bigger paycheck.

And then we can go do it all again!

We'll build some more fence and put in some of our pipe and -- And you know what?

We'll go tackle some more of that country that used to look like this.

♪♪ Oh, people ask me, "What do you envision for this property?"

And I say to leave it better than I find it every day.

So you're never-ending, right?

They kind of want to know when I'm gonna retire, and I'm like... "I am retired.

I'm doing exactly what I want to do."

And I'll keep doing it, and hopefully there will be another generation that comes.

You know, my son just the other day -- "Never stop fighting, Mom."

It's -- It's hard.

But I'll do it for all the people that -- that rode this ranch before me.

♪♪ ♪♪ [ Men singing in native language ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪