Bette Midler wrongly fells 200 trees

Entertainer Bette Midler is expected to be fined by the state for cutting down more than 230 trees around one of her properties on Kauai.

The staff of the Board of Land and Natural Resources is recommending $6,500 in fines for having the trees felled and for building a graded road without permits required for the land zoned for conservation use.

Max W. J. Graham, an attorney representing the singer and movie star, said she will pay the fines and will follow a replanting program.

Midler, who was born in Honolulu, didn't realize permits were needed to remove the trees on a vacant 58,000-square-foot parcel of land on Kauai's North Shore, Graham said.

"The whole idea with cutting the trees down was with the idea of improving the lot with native species" instead of the nonnative, invasive species that had grown there, Graham said. "It's unfortunate that a mistake was made."

The National Tropical Botanical Garden, which maintains three gardens on Kauai, will design a replanting plan that consists of appropriate native plants, Graham said.

A botanist hired by Midler after-the-fact said 120 Java plum trees, 100 octopus trees and 10 to 20 Madagascar olive trees that were cut down were all nonnative species. Some native trees also were removed from the property, the botanist said.

Midler, who stays on another property when she's in Hawaii, is set to replace Celine Dion as a headline performer at Las Vegas's renovated Caesars Palace next year.