Cibotium menziesii

COMMON NAME	Hawaiian Tree Fern or  hāpuʻu ʻiʻi
TYPE	Fern
FAMILY	Cibotiaceae
NOTES	Hawai'i's largest tree fern. It can reach 35 feet in height, but often grows only 7 to 25 feet tall. The trunk can be up to 2 1/2 feet in diameter. The fronds arch and can grow as long as 12 feet. The fronds of Cibotium menziesii are smooth and slightly paler underneath with yellowish midribs. They are singly divided, but the divisions are lobed. Soft, brown hairs cover the young fronds, but upper parts of the frond stalks are covered with stiff, black hairs. The pulu, the soft woolly material around the base of the fronds, was used by Hawaiians up to the mid-1800s for dressing wounds, embalming bodies, and for pillow and mattress stuffin..  Wild pigs (puaʻa) have had a severe effect on hāpuʻu populations in some areas, eating the entire starchy inner core thus destroying the plants
GEOGRAPHIC REGION	Endemic to the Hawaiian Island
NATIVE HABITAT	Occurs in mesic to wet forests from 820 to nearly 4600 feet.
WEB SOURCES	https://www2.hawaii.edu/~eherring/hawnprop/cib-menz.htm http://nativeplants.hawaii.edu/plant/view/Cibotium_menziesii https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cibotium_menziesii