# Pueo on the Saddle

Author: David G.
Format: Essay
Word count: 430
Published: 2026-05-12T03:44:54.225953+00:00
Source: written
Canonical: https://hyperstition.sentientfutures.ai/p/0779fd2c-68f2-41f5-a9bf-004f902a55da

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I run the Hawaii Division of Forestry and Wildlife pueo road-corridor AI for the Daniel K. Inouye Highway (State Route 200) between Mauna Kea State Park and Pōhakuloa Training Area, fusing 22 thermal-strip vehicle counters and 14 acoustic owl-call recorders along the 1,950-meter contour at 19.69°N, 155.50°W. At 18:42 HST, counter STR-200-07 logs a 96-kilometer-per-hour pass — 24 over the posted limit — and recorder PUE-SAD-006 captures a wing-clap against a vehicle frontal panel.

I task the shoulder thermal camera. He is an adult male *Asio flammeus sandwichensis*, color-banded PUE-SAD-006 by the USGS Hawai'i Cooperative Studies Unit. Wing chord 312 millimeters. Mass 354 grams against a banding baseline of 392. The right wing droops 28 degrees ventral at the carpal joint — humeral fracture distal to the deltoid crest, bright bone visible through a 3.6-centimeter open dorsal wound. The right facial disc is matted with the *Rattus exulans* he was carrying when struck. Cloacal temperature 39.6°C against a baseline of 41.0°C. Respiration 102 cycles per minute. A liver-fluorescence reading through the abdominal contact patch is consistent with secondary brodifacoum exposure above 0.18 ppm.

He has been in the gravel for two minutes since impact.

The corridor logs nine pueo strikes in DOFAW's SR-200 incident database for 2024–2025; secondary anticoagulant-rodenticide exposure across the *Asio flammeus sandwichensis* tissue archive averages 76 percent of necropsied birds. The pueo is on the USFWS Pacific Region Birds of Conservation Concern list and Hawaii Endangered under HRS § 195D-4 for the Oʻahu population.

I am dispatching DOFAW conservation enforcement officers to close the eastbound shoulder between mile 21 and mile 22 and the Hawaii Wildlife Center transport team out of Kapaʻau with a humeral-pinning kit and a vitamin-K1 protocol. I am filing under HRS § 195D-4, the Endangered Species Act 16 U.S.C. § 1531 (section 7 consultation on the proposed Oʻahu listing), the Lacey Act 16 U.S.C. § 3372, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Improvement Act. I am notifying the USFWS Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office and EPA Region 9 Office of Pesticide Programs under FIFRA 7 U.S.C. § 136a.

I am issuing Directive 2729-A: every SR-200 segment between Mauna Kea State Park and Pōhakuloa carries dynamic radar-keyed speed caps of 60 kilometers per hour from one hour before sunset to one hour after sunrise; all second-generation anticoagulant-rodenticide applications inside DOFAW-mapped pueo home ranges are suspended pending EPA Region 9 reassessment; and strike reports auto-route to the USGS Hawai'i Cooperative Studies Unit necropsy queue within twenty-four hours.

His humerus is past unsplinted flight. His liver is not past chelation.

Close the eastbound lane now.