Hawaiian Skies: ʻIkuwā 2025
By Leilehua Yuen, Hawaiʻi Culture and Language Resident at the International Gemini Observatory / NOIRLab
ʻIkuwā 2025 (22 September - 21 October 2025)
Also spelled ʻIkuā, this month’s name means “noisy, clamorous, loud-voiced,” which does, indeed, describe the weather developing now. The winter storms are returning, and hurricane season is ending, as we can see by the position of Hōkū-iwa [Boötes]. Remember how in our tale of Kuapākaʻa, we can see Boötes as Ka-ʻIpu-Makani-a-Laʻamaomao, which is now in the evening sky and will soon be gone. In the tale, we learn that in the months of Olana (Nana), Welo, and Ikiiki, somewhat corresponding to March, April, and May, the ʻIpu is tightly covered.
As Hōkū-iwa disappears, we start watching for kōlea birds and whales to return from their summer homes in the north as one of the indicators for the coming of Makahiki season. Kōlea, unable to take off from water, make the 4800 km (3,000 m) journey from the Aleutian Islands, Alaska, and the Pacific Northwest to Hawaiʻi in one flight. That means they spend the entire summer breeding and eating as much as they can to store up enough energy to fly three to four days non-stop at 80 kph (50 mph). Highly territorial, these feisty fliers will return to their original nesting site ready to fight off any other birds that have taken up residence in their absence.
I believe the following oli belongs to a cycle of Makahiki chants. Nathaniel Bright Emerson published it in his 1909 collection of hula prayers, chants, and songs, Unwritten Literature of Hawaii: The Sacred Songs of the Hula. Aunty Nona Beamer started teaching it at Kamehameha Schools when she began their first Hawaiian studies classes. This mele has now been taught for generations as a keiki hula.
Kāhuli Aku lists the different signs to watch for to prepare for the coming rainy season. Kāhuli, the endemic (and endangered) tree snail, becomes more active as the forest becomes wetter. In Hawaiian cosmogony, all is balanced; up has a down, things that go will return, and things with similar names have a relationship. As simple as this mele is, we can see these pairings expressed. Kāhuli, the snail, goes and comes, and the seasons with their rain patterns go and come. When it is dry, kāhuli seals its shell and disappears, then, when moistened, returns. At one time, special lei were made from these shells. “Huli” can translate as “to turn over.” “ʻUla” is not only red, but signifies sacredness. Kōlea is the bird that returns at the leading edge of the winter rains —“bearing the rain on the wind of his wings”— and also is a rainforest tree that puts forth red leaf buds that sprout like two slender kōlea wings when the rains return. The ephemeral streams would be dyed red with the earth's ochre and the sap of the ferns released by the sudden onrush of water.
On our charts, you’ll notice that I alternate between using some different names for certain constellations and stars. As mentioned before, depending on the uses to which the objects are being put, the names can be quite different. Also, different migration events brought different traditions and different kūʻauhau, and different genealogical lines within those events each have their own distinct, though related, traditions. Martha Beckwith’s Hawaiian Mythology gives us a brief overview of the diversity found in just a few sample traditions.
Click to view in detail - Credit: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/L. Yuen
Kūmau - translates as customary, usual, regular. It is another name for Hōkū-paʻa, Polaris, which is to be found in its usual place, no matter the season.
The name Mūlehu is very old, and appears to come to us through the Hawaiʻiloa navigation tradition. Hawaiʻiloa was the chief for whom the great navigator Makaliʻi sailed. Mūlehu is suggested in Nā Inoa Hōkū as a possible name for the leading triangle of Cassiopeia, and for one of the stars. Since the original sources indicate that Mūlehu follows its companion stars, I suggest that it is γ-Cassiopeia. The other two stars are Polo-ahi-lani and Polo-ʻula. I suggest Polo-ʻula for α-Cassiopeia, as that is the one red star in the group, which leaves β-Cassiopeia for Polo-ahi-lani.
Now let’s look at the morning stars of this Māhoe Hope / ʻIkuwā transition. In the old days, they would be watched very carefully for hōʻailona—omens, portents, or signs. Just at dawn, ʻAʻā (Sirius), ʻIao (Jupiter), and Hōkū-Loa (Venus) will still be in the sky. In the Kona district of Moku Hawaiʻi, ʻAʻā is important in determining the start of Makahiki, the Hawaiian New Year. For navigators, it is important as the zenith star for Tahiti and Raʻiātea.
ʻIao, Jupiter, like the other planets, also has several names which indicate time of appearance and, I believe, altitude and relationship to other bodies. As a morning star, we call it ʻIao. Figuratively, it means “dawn.” Wehe aʻela ka ʻIao, “dawn breaks.”
Click to view in detail - Credit: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/L. Yuen
Kalani Paiʻea Wohi o Kaleikini Kealiʻikui Kamehameha o ʻIolani i Kaiwikapu Kauʻi Ka Liholiho Kūnuiākea, known to most of the world as Kamehameha I, is said to have been born in the month of ʻIkuwā at Koko-iki, Kohala. Koko-iki was identified as Halley’s Comet by Dr. Maude Makemson. She made her calculations as an Assistant Professor of Astronomy at Vassar College and compared them to Hawaiian astronomical observations to correlate Halley’s Comet with the birth of Kamehameha Paiʻea.
Koko-iki is also identified with the constellation Pegasus. If it is in Pegasus, I think most likely Koko-iki is the star Scheat.
Holoholo-pīnaʻau is one of the names of Saturn. It shares this name with Mars. In trying to understand the etymology of this name, I have asked a number of people, as well as consulted several dictionaries. Some people say the name is Holoholo-pinau, “as the dragonfly goes.” Or might it be an abbreviated compound word? Pīnaʻi (to come or do repeatedly) + ʻauana (wander, ramble from place to place).
We also see that Niʻihau’s tutelary (guardian) star, Kaʻalolo, is now prominent, and it will become more so as the month goes on.
ʻAu-kele-nui-a-Iku is a culture hero and, in some tales, a one-time lover of Pele. Perhaps its reddish color and ability to go into retrograde motion made people think of a voyaging hero.
Digging around in the books, we find Kaulana-a-ka-Lā. A poetic name for “west,” I think it is so lovely, “Famed of the Sun.” It is near Nā-kao, the belt and sword of Orion. We know of one oli which mentions Nā-Kao as harbingers of dawn.
Alternative names for Nā-Māhoe, Castor and Pollux, we come across are Ka-Maile-Mua and Ka-Maile-Hope.
The name Ka-ʻōnohi-aliʻi, “the eyeball of the chief,” would indicate that this is an important navigational star, one which “the chief’s eye”–the navigator–would watch carefully.
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Nā Inoa Hōkū by Johnson, Mahelona, and Ruggles
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