Ranching Could Soon Come To An End On Moloka‘i. Paniolo Blame TB Testing

The slaughterhouse on Molokaʻi stands mostly empty these days. Where cattle carcasses once hung regularly in the cutting room, the Hawaiian cowboys who work there now process just one or two animals per month, a stark decline from the 15 to 20 head of locally raised cattle they used to handle.

The reason for this dramatic downturn has nothing to do with current disease outbreaks. Molokaʻi hasn’t confirmed a single case of bovine tuberculosis in its cattle since 2021. Yet state and federal agriculture authorities continue to enforce strict quarantine measures on the island’s cattle operations, threatening to extinguish a ranching tradition that stretches back nearly two centuries.

For the roughly 7,000 residents of this rural Hawaiian island, the stakes extend far beyond economics. Ranchers say their livelihoods, cultural heritage, and way of life hang in the balance, with ripple effects touching the environment, food security, and community identity.

“We’re kind of at a breaking point,” said MP Kamakana, vice president of the Molokaʻi Homestead Livestock Association.

Nine livestock operations have united to issue an open letter outlining eight demands they say are essential to keeping the industry alive. Their requests include better communication from government agencies, testing wildlife populations suspected of transmitting the disease, and an end to the practice of culling entire herds when tuberculosis cases are discovered.

The ranchers have issued a stark warning: Without meaningful change, they will stop testing their cattle for bovine tuberculosis altogether. While years of negative tests suggest their herds are clean, abandoning the testing protocol could prove catastrophic for Hawaii’s entire cattle industry, which generates more than $75 million annually. The state’s tuberculosis-free status, critical for shipping cattle to the mainland, would be compromised. Without that designation, the economic viability of ranching across all Hawaiian islands would collapse.

Several Molokaʻi ranchers are already shutting down their operations, and those still functioning exist in a state of near-dormancy. The island’s cattle population tells the story in numbers. From more than 10,000 head in the 1980s, the current count has plummeted to approximately 220 animals.

“Within months, that number will effectively be zero if the bTB quarantine and annual testing mandate remain in place,” the ranchers wrote in their letter.

The financial pressures are crushing. Mandatory testing is expensive and physically demanding. The quarantine has eliminated crucial revenue streams, making it prohibitively costly to ship animals to mainland feedlots even as beef prices reach historic highs. For older paniolo especially, watching ranching disappear means denying future generations opportunities on an island that takes pride in its rural character.

State agriculture officials acknowledge they face a difficult situation. They must find solutions to Molokaʻi’s unique predicament while satisfying federal regulations and maintaining the state’s disease-free certification, all while operating under constraints imposed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture four years after quarantines began.

“At the end of the day, we’ve got to make money, get paid. We cannot continue to keep dishing out money,” Kamakana said. “There’s no end game to it. So there’s no way of planning.”

The island’s troubled history with bovine tuberculosis runs deep. The respiratory disease has killed or necessitated the slaughter of tens of thousands of cattle across Hawaii over more than a century, but no island has suffered as much as Molokaʻi.

James “Uncle Jimmy” Duvauchelle, who worked for the 55,000-acre Molokaʻi Ranch for over 60 years, witnessed the devastation firsthand. He recalled the government-ordered eradication of nearly 10,000 cattle in 1985 after the disease was detected in 2% of the population. The islandwide cull permanently altered the landscape, and opinions in the ranching community were mixed about the drastic measure.

Despite assurances that the slaughter was necessary, Molokaʻi Ranch’s cattle operations never fully recovered, finally ending in 2008. The property’s remnants, including a dilapidated lodge, golf course, and restaurant, have been on the market for years. The broader industry entered a long decline.

“After all that we did to try to survive that stand down, it seems we’re still coming up with more problems,” the 82-year-old Paniolo Hall of Famer told reporters.

By the time tuberculosis cases emerged again in 2021, only about a dozen ranches remained operational, down from 40 in the 1980s. The new outbreak followed a year in which six herds tested positive, the highest number since the late 1970s.

The current quarantine, implemented in 2022, prohibits livestock from moving on or off the island, dead or alive, without permits. Animals cannot even be transferred between ranches, creating serious problems during drought conditions when ranchers need to relocate herds to better pastures.

In 2024, the state signed an 11-page memorandum with the USDA further formalizing restrictions. Molokaʻi’s ranchers were not consulted in that process, which ironically helped non-Molokaʻi operations maintain their ability to ship cattle freely to the mainland.

“It’s almost as if Molokaʻi has become the sacrificial cow” for the state’s industry, Congresswoman Jill Tokuda said, calling it unfair that island ranchers weren’t included in the inter-agency negotiations.

The testing process itself is grueling. It takes 72 hours to complete and requires ranchers to corral animals, separate cows from calves, and push them through chutes for injections. After three days, the entire process repeats to read results. The stress on cattle is extreme, sometimes fatal.

“I had to put down one animal. She was just down in the chute. Overheated,” Kamakana said.

Animals flagged as “reactors” face another 72 hours confined, passing through the chute up to four times annually. Even then, autopsies have revealed false positives, according to Jack Spruance, who co-manages the island slaughterhouse.

Ranches on Molokaʻi’s east side have endured this testing since 1999. The toll has been heavy across operations, with some losing multiple animals, including valuable breeding bulls.

State Veterinarian Isaac Maeda explained that his department is constrained by science, logistics, and federal bovine tuberculosis regulations, leaving them unable to create a concrete plan with definite timelines. The state must work within the federal framework while the USDA itself considers revising its regulatory approach to allow more nuanced, district-level responses rather than blanket state bans.

Maeda said the department operates on a trial-and-error basis, proposing solutions to the USDA and awaiting approval. An attempt to combine post-mortem testing with whole herd testing to reduce the annual burden failed because federal officials believed the island didn’t slaughter enough animals to provide adequate sample sizes.

The USDA did not respond to requests for comment, though a 2025 report indicated the state is meeting its obligations under the existing agreement.

The ranchers’ nuclear option, stopping all testing, would devastate Hawaii’s cattle industry. The state produces only about 9% of the beef consumed by its residents but exports approximately 45,000 calves annually to mainland markets. Losing tuberculosis-free status would cripple those operations statewide.

The threat has gotten attention. The Hawaii Cattlemen’s Council is now in discussions with Molokaʻi ranchers to better understand their situation. The council has offered to help cover mainland shipping costs and advocate in Washington and Honolulu.

For ranchers like 82-year-old Kip Dunbar of Kainalu Ranch, the situation has become untenable. His operation has tested annually since 1999 without a single positive result. His herd has dwindled to 60 animals on pastures that once supported far more.

“Unless there is a real change of heart by the state in really helping us move forward, I’m not sure I’m going to continue,” Dunbar said. “It’s really make or break for us.”

Third-generation rancher Russell DeCoite and his 26-year-old son Dylan have already begun dismantling their V8 Ranch herd. From 50 cattle on 500 acres, they’re down to just five animals. Russell DeCoite’s new footwear symbolizes the change: “I wear slippers now,” he said, a painful departure from cowboy boots.

For Dylan DeCoite, a fourth-generation rancher at 26, the crisis represents not just the end of his family’s legacy but the extinction of a way of life for aspiring young ranchers. He believes officials are waging a war of attrition against the small ranching community, offering only platitudes when he calls for help.

If any of the ranchers’ eight demands are met, and if they’re included in discussions when the state-federal memorandum comes up for renewal in November, there may be hope. But rebuilding could take a decade, and time is running out. The ranching tradition that has defined Molokaʻi for generations may have only months left.

This story was originally published by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.