Hawaiian ethnobiology is the study of how people in Hawaii, particularly pertaining to those of pre-western contact, interacted with the plants around them.
This causes animosity between natural resource collectors (subsistence fisherman) and state legislature (local Department of Fish and Wildlife).
[1] Hawaiian sacred plants include ʻawa (Piper methysticum), which was used both religiously as a sacrament, and by the common people as a relaxant/sedative.
The historical Hawaiian people draw their direct lineage from Haloa, and did, and some still do, assume his responsibility to care for kalo.
This responsibility, and need for food, drove the building of huge kalo growing complexes called loʻi.