Hui Ku Maoli Ola traces its lineage back to 1999, when friends Rick Barboza and Matt Schirman established the nursery with a mission to preserve and celebrate the distinct flora of the Hawaiian Islands. Today, the company beautifies federal lands, private homes, and retail businesses with more than 100 species of native Hawaiian plants, the descendants of specimens brought from distant shores by ancient Polynesian settlers and very strong wind. The helpful crew tends to rows of waving ferns, shady trees, and flowering bushes as they restore native habitats with professional landscaping or educate students with lectures and field trips.