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Hibiscadelphus distans; photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons CC BYDavid Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Hibiscadelphus distans L.E.Bishop & D.R.Herbst

Kauai hau kuahiwi

Malvaceae · Hawaii

Cited as Kew's World Checklist cites it, Hibiscadelphus distans L.E.Bishop & D.R.Herbst: GBIF's backbone key for this page carries the name with another author, L.E.Bishop & Herbst.

No habitat climate
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Hibiscadelphus distans, photograph Daderot., CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsHibiscadelphus distans, photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsHibiscadelphus distans, photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsHibiscadelphus distans, photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsHibiscadelphus distans, photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsHibiscadelphus distans, photograph David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons 8 photographs ›

Summary

Hibiscadelphus distans (Kauai hau kuahiwi) is an extremely rare species of flowering plant in the mallow family, Malvaceae, that is endemic to the island of Kauaʻi in Hawaii. It is known as hau kuahiwi in Hawaiian, which means "upland Hibiscus tiliaceus." It is a bush or small tree with heart-shaped leaves and yellow flowers and grows at between 1,000 and 1,800 feet (300 and 550 m) in the remnants of native dry forests. Despite its rarity, it is believed to be the only surviving species in the genus Hibiscadelphus which is only known from Hawaii, the other five species having recently become extinct in the wild, some being known from only a single plant.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Hibiscadelphus distans", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Nothing derived: no habitat climate for this species.

Climate across the habitat

No habitat climate can be derived: 3 in-range records, none placed to within 10 km. 3 of the 3 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or to no stated accuracy and fewer than three decimals or by something other than a person's observation, and cannot place a climate cell, though they count for the map and its marker.

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeHawaii · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker21.89, -159.52 · in the densest population, 3 records (100% of those in range)
Kew's description“tree” · “wet tropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 3 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 2 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker in the same place. Under a dozen records behind the map. No climate across the range is derived for this species. 3 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 3 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Hibiscadelphus distans, photograph 1did not loadHibiscadelphus distans, photograph 2did not loadHibiscadelphus distans, photograph 3did not loadHibiscadelphus distans, photograph 4did not loadHibiscadelphus distans, photograph 5did not loadHibiscadelphus distans, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: Daderot., CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons; David Eickhoff from Pearl City, Hawaii, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons (5).

Other Hibiscadelphus 1 in the reference

Hibiscadelphus giffardianus Hibiscadelphus giffardianus Kilauea hau kuahiwi Photo: CC BY, Tara Severns

Names & registers

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Malvaceae
Described by
L.E.Bishop & D.R.Herbst
Native to
Hawaii
Wild records
3 in range · 2 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22GBIF's key 3152785 is Hibiscadelphus distans L.E.Bishop & Herbst; the page links Kew's Hibiscadelphus distans L.E.Bishop & D.R.Herbst, and the name is cited as Kew cites it
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 3 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (3 at a botanic garden or arboretum; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate nothing to reportasked 2026-10-223 in-range records, none placed to within 10 km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild nothing to reportasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media nothing to reportasked 2026-10-22
Wikimedia Commons commons answeredasked 2026-10-22
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 3 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

Opening your plants…