I suspect that the parent poster is talking about the geology of Hawaii.<p>New Zealand was part of Gondwanaland, and became isolated by continental drift.  Anything living there when the islands became separated from the rest of the supercontinent is native.<p>Hawaii is a bunch of volcanoes that sprung out of the middle of the ocean.  There were no land animals on the islands when they first became islands.<p>Now, that&#x27;s a slightly topsy-turvy definition of native, which (etymologically) should mean any species that came into existence on the island.