North Polynesia (49,293 – 28,578 BCE): Upper Paleolithic I — Volcanic High Islands, Reef Beginnings, and Seabird Kingdoms

Geographic & Environmental Context

North Polynesia includes the Hawaiian Islands chain except Hawaiʻi Island (the Big Island) — principally Oʻahu, Maui, Kauaʻi, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Niʻihau — plus Midway Atoll.

• Anchors: Oʻahu’s twin shield ranges (Koʻolau, Waiʻanae) with deeply incised gulches; Kauaʻi–Niʻihau as the older high-island pair; Maui Nui as a broad, shallow platform with multiple emergent peaks; Midway Atoll as a carbonate cap on the subsiding Emperor–Hawaiian chain.

• Sea level sat well below modern during glacial maxima, exposing wide reef flats and coastal benches.

Climate & Environmental Shifts

• Late Pleistocene glacial climate: cooler SSTs, stronger trade-wind seasonality; broad coastal steppe–scrub around high-island skirts.

• Episodic dust, stronger winter surf; reef growth pulsed between coolings.

Biota & Baseline Ecology (No Human Presence)

• Seabird rookeries dense on offshore stacks and atolls (proto-Midway); Hawaiian monk seals hauled out on remote beaches.

• Native forests atop ridges were a mosaic of cloud forest and dry woodland; streams were clear, with endemic fish/invertebrates.

Long-Term Significance

This epoch set the geomorphic template: high islands with fertile amphitheaters, narrow coastal plains, and nascent reef systems—conditions that would later support intensive Polynesian agro-ecologies.