Asiatic black bear conservation in Nagano Prefecture, central Japan : problems and solutions

The aim of this paper is to clarify the locational characteristics of electric supply enterprises and the local conditions which influenced each enterprise, through case studies in central Japan before 1938.As a result, we can identify three types of location of the electric supply enterprises:(1) The first type of the location of the electric supply enerprises was one in urban areas. In such areas, a typical case was the‘Nagoya Electric Supply Company’established in 1889 in Aich Prefecture. This company built many electric power stations in the upper reaches of Kiso River and began to supply electric power to the urban and manufacturing areas of Aichi Prefecture, and later further to the Osaka area which was developed as the largest manufacture region in this period. Thus, this company developed to the one of the largest electric supply enterprises in Japan, absorbing many other electric supply enterprises in this area, changing its name to‘Toho Electric Supply Company’in 1922. A new company, ‘Daido Electric Supply Company’was separated from the‘Nagoya Electric Supply Company’.In this process, the‘Toho Electric Supply Company’and‘Daido Electric Supply Company’ were developed together and could exchange their electric power to fill the increased demand from electric power stations spread increasingly at the upper reaches of large rivers supported by the improvement of techniques in the generation and transmission of electric power.(2) The second type was one located in the traditional manufacturing areas, such as raw silk manufactures in Nagano Prefecture in central Japan. Raw silk manufacturing had developed in central Japan before World War II, based on increasing exports. The Suwa area in Nagano Prefecture was famous for this manufacturing. In the early days, many managers of this manufacturing weren't interested in electric power as their power source. But, later, they introduced electric power to increase their production, and they planned eagerly to establish many electric supply enterprises and manage these enterprises.Thus, electric power that was produced by these companies was mainly demanded by such raw silk making manufacturing in the Suwa area in the middle of Nagano Prefecture.(3) The third type was one located in the mountain areas, which was established by the public sector, managed by the authority of towns and villages. In peripheral areas, especially in the mountain areas in central Japan, the supply of electric power had to be managed by public sectors in each small village, because the larger electric supply enterprises could not economically supply electric power to these areas, due to their low demand for electric power. Kamisato Village in Nagano Prefecture was one such case. At first, all of the villagers wanted electric power to be supplied by one of the electric power enterprises. But the enterprise agreed to supply electric power only to a part of this village. Thus a conflict between the electric power enterprise and villagers occured.After this, the villagers made a decision to establish a new public enterprise to supply electric power to each household in the village. This could be accomplished because the village had extensive forest land and forest resources, and created a large fund by cutting and selling timbers.

ABSTRACTAn association between provenance variations in growth performance of the Japanese larch (Larix kaempferi) and climatic conditions in the provenances has been found in the natural distributional range in central Japan. To verify whether this association differs in northern Japan, outside of the original habitats, we examined stem productivity of 30-year-old trees planted in three test sites in the Nagano Prefecture in central Japan and three test sites in the Hokkaido Prefecture in northern Japan. The trees originated from 25 provenances throughout the whole range of the natural distribution. Stem-productivity variances of interactions between the test sites and provenances were relatively small. Provenance correlations in the stem productivity among most of the tests sites were positive. Climatic conditions in the provenances and test sites were summarized as two indices: a gradient of warmth and drought (higher temperature and less precipitation at lower elevations) and a cline of climatic seasonality (from the northwestern to southeastern sides of the Japanese mainland, with decreasing and increasing seasonal variations in temperature and precipitation, respectively). The maximum stem productivity among the provenances was frequently observed at both extremities of the warmth/drought gradient and on the southeastern side of the climate-seasonality cline. These associations were detected in test sites in both central and northern Japan. These findings suggest similar provenance variations in growth performance of the Japanese larch among different growing environments in Japan.

Reviewed by: A Malleable Map: Geographies of Restoration in Central Japan, 1600-1912 Marcia Yonemoto A Malleable Map: Geographies of Restoration in Central Japan, 1600-1912. By Kären Wigen. University of California Press, 2010. 340 pages. Hardcover $45.00/£30.95; softcover $34.95/£24.95. A colleague in Asian history who has used cartographic materials as historical sources once drily observed that, "The problem with working on maps is that people always assume you know something about geography." Kären Wigen both works on maps and knows her geography, as she demonstrates in the clear prose and ample illustrations of A Malleable Map. Wigen was trained as a geographer but has made a career as a historian; as such, she is a rare example of a post-linguistic-turn historian with a humanist's understanding of text and meaning and a social scientist's inclination toward the explanatory value of system and function. Both sets of skills are successfully applied in her analysis of Shinano province's transformation into Nagano prefecture over the course of the Tokugawa and Meiji eras. A Malleable Map is not simply "regional history": from a methodological and theoretical point of view the author tackles head-on one of the most intractable issues in the historiography of modern Japan—the question whether the political and social transformations of the Meiji period are best characterized as a modern revolution or as an imperial restoration. Ultimately, Wigen makes the somewhat paradoxical, but ultimately sensible, argument that it was the visual and verbal language of restoration—specifically the purposeful resurrection [End Page 178] of the early imperial spatio-cultural concept of the kuni, or province—that enabled the revolutionary establishment of the modern nation-state. Wigen's argument is based on a close reading of textual evidence from what she calls Japan's early modern and modern "chorographic archive": maps, atlases, gazetteers, statistical yearbooks, school textbooks, and regional newspapers. The first half of the book, "A Province Defined," is comprised of three chapters on maps of Shinano province and Nagano prefecture from the early seventeenth through the early twentieth centuries. In Chapter 1, Wigen analyzes several types of maps produced in the medieval and early modern periods. She begins with depictions of the province of Shinano in the earliest maps of the Japanese archipelago, the so-called Gyōki-style maps, the extant examples of which date from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. These highly schematic works did much to establish the visual image of the sixty-six provinces and the trunk roads that connected them to the imperial capital of Kyoto. The author contends that these early stylized maps offer a view from the perspective of Kyoto that envisioned Shinano as a far-flung frontier outpost. This image, however, changed significantly in the early modern period, as new maps commissioned by the Tokugawa shogunate emphasize Shinano's importance in controlling access to "backdoor" approaches to the military capital at Edo. Finally, road or itinerary maps, which were published in great numbers in the mid- to late Edo period, disaggregated the province of Shinano into a network of famous places and potential travel destinations. Throughout this long span of time, in maps made in different genres and for various purposes, "provinces remained the general-purpose framework for making sense of national space" (p. 54). The book then segues into its most compelling chapter, "Shinano Up Close." Here, Wigen systematically analyzes the Shinano kuniezu, the official provincial maps that were commissioned by the Tokugawa government and compiled and drawn up by local map intendants beginning in the seventeenth century. Her careful and persuasive reading of kuniezu allows for a new and revealing analysis of these maps' discursive functions and latent messages. This may be the closest that historians can come to understanding how these richly informative documents, until now difficult to access and apprehend, were viewed and used. She begins her textual analysis by reading kuniezu for what they convey about physical terrain, power relations, economic production, trade and communication, and perspective. However, the revelatory nature of her treatment stems from the way in which she interprets these "layers of data" individually, but then also critically assesses them...

Abundant fossil beetles were obtained from the Lower Pleistocene Ookui Formation in Kitamimaki-mura, Kitasaku-gun, Nagano Prefecture, Central Japan. These fossils are composed of ground and aquatic beetles, such as Carabidae, Dytiscidae, Hydrophilidae, and Donaciinae of Chrysomelidae. Several fossils of ground beetles are identified with three interesting species, Hemicarabus maeander, Apotomopterus maacki, and Chlaenius gebleri. Among them, H. maeander is not distributed in Honshu where the fossil occurred, but can be found in Hokkaido, Chejudo, Sakhalin, N. E. China, Mongolia, East Siberia, and North America at the present time. The fossil finding indicates that the widely and continuous distributional range of this species seemed to become discontinuous, and extinct in Honshu after the Early Pleistocene. Thus, this species can be considered as a geographic relict species in Honshu during the Pleistocene. The paleoenvironment of the Upper member of the Ookui Formation based on beetle fossils seems that there were mainly low moor of reeds accompanied with areas of still water. These beetle assemblages, especially including H. maeander and C. gebleri, suggest presence of low moor which is similar to those found in Hokkaido during the Upper member of the Ookui Formation deposited.

52 species assignable to 39 genera of Middle Permian (Midian in the Tethyan standard scale) foraminifers are distinguished in the limestone blocks exposed in Kaize, southern part of the Saku Basin, Nagano prefecture, central Japan. Faunal composition and biostratigraphic distribution of these taxa are described and discussed, in addition to systematic description of eleven species including Yabeina kaizensis based on the topotype materials. The ozawainellid genus, Primoriina is concluded to be probably a junior synonym of Sichotenella. The Kaize fauna is represented by (1) abundant occurrence of Yabeina kaizensis and Yabeina higoensis, (2) complete absence of genera assignable to Verbeekinidae and Staffellidae, (3) variable non-fusulinacean foraminifers consisting of 39 species assignable to 31 genera, and (4) occurrence of Robuloides, Dagmarita, and Postendothyra, characteristic of the Tethyan Upper Permian. These fora-minifers are important paleogeographically in relation to the faunal composition and taxonomic diversity of the Tethyan and Circum-Pacific regions in the late Middle Permian time.

A new fossil filefish, Aluterus shigensis sp. nov., with a close resemblance to the extant Aluterus scriptus (Osbeck), is described from the Middle Miocene Bessho Formation in Nagano Prefecture, central Japan. It is characterized by: 21 total vertebrae; very slender and long first dorsal spine with tiny anterior barbs; thin and lancet-shaped basal pterygiophore of the spiny dorsal fin, with its ventral margin separated from the skull; proximal tip of moderately slender first pterygiophore of the soft dorsal fin not reaching far ventrally; soft dorsal-fin base longer than anal-fin base; caudal peduncle having nearly equal depth and length; and tiny, fine scales with slender, straight spinules. The occurrence of this fossil filefish from the Bessho Formation is consistent with the influence of warm water currents suggested by other fossils, but it is inconsistent with the deep-water sedimentary environment of this Formation. This is the first fossil occurrence of a filefish in Asia; previously described fossil filefishes are known from the Pliocene and Pleistocene of Italy, the Pliocene of Greece, and the Miocene and Pliocene of North America. These fossil records suggest that the genus Aluterus had already been derived and was widely distributed during the Middle Miocene with taxa closely resembling Recent species.

A local tephra embedded in a hand-auger boring core drilled at the near-shore of the Kinugasanoike Pond approximately 4.6 km northeast of Mt. Yakedake, which is one of the most active volcanoes in central Japan, was found to be composed mainly of several kinds of volcanic glass shards (microlite-bearing, blocky, fluted, and micro-vesicular types) and minor amounts of crystal minerals, including quartz, plagioclase, hornblende, biotite, and pyroxene. The plant remains recovered from the horizon 10 cm below the tephra layer revealed 14C ages of 2,331 – 2,295 cal years BP and 2,270– 2,155 cal years BP (19.2% and 76.2 % probability distributions, respectively). In this study, we measured the major element compositions of 241 individual glass shards using an electron probe microanalyzer, and found that they plotted on SiO2–K2O, SiO2–Na2O+K2O, and FeO*–K2O diagrams in different regions than those of the major regional tephras distributed in central Japan. Moreover, the observed clast and chemical compositions coincide with those of a tephra embedded in the Nakao pyroclastic flow deposit distributed approximately 2 km north-northwest of Mt. Yakedake, which is dated at approximately 2,300 cal years BP. Thus, this tephra could be used as a local marker of 2,300 cal years BP for the southern part of the Northern Japan Alps.

The writer analyzes in this paper the “pension” management which began in Japan in the first half of the 1970s, taking the case of Minenohara Plateau, Nagano Prefecture. As the result, the writer shows several facts as follows:1) The “pension” in Japan means a small lodging cottage with both the simplicity of Minshuku (Minshuku is a cheap lodging houses in tourist resorts, and most of them are usually operated by farmers or fishers as a side work) and the modern form of hotel. Small party travellers or families use the pension in their vacation trips in mountain area. In 1980, there were 652 pensions in Japan, out of which 357 (55% of all) were located in Nagano Prefecture. The pensions generally depend on family-employees. They operate their business for half a year or more.2) Minenohara Plateau is located in Jyoshin-etsu Kogen National Park, Central Japan, and now this plateau is one of the typical “pension” regions in Japan. This plateau had remained as non-residential woodland by 1971, when the area began to develop for pensions. The area was developed under guidance of the prefecture authorities with the local settlements in partnership.3) In this plateau, the most of managers of pension came from Tokyo Metropolitan regions, and their former occupations were in varieties. It was necessary for them to raise the capital of 55 milion yen in the case of the accomodations for 40 people when they opened a pension. They depend on bank-loan for their opening of pension, which occupied two-thirds of their necessary capital. Consequently, their business has been in needy circumstances, in general.

BackgroundWe previously found that a forest bathing (shinrin-yoku) program significantly reduced the scores for depression, anxiety, anger, fatigue, and confusion and increased the score for vigor in the profile of mood states (POMS) test and showed a potential preventive effect on the depressive status in both males and females. In the present study, we investigated the effects of a forest bathing program on the level of serotonin in serum, depressive symptoms and subjective sleep quality in middle-aged males.MethodsTwenty healthy male subjects aged 57.3 ± 8.4 years were selected after obtaining informed consent. These subjects took day trips to a forest park, the birthplace of forest bathing in Japan named Akasawa Shizen Kyuyourin, Agematsu, Nagano Prefecture (situated in central Japan), and to an urban area of Nagano Prefecture as a control in June 2019. On both trips, they walked 2.5 km for 2 hours each in the morning and afternoon on Saturday and Sunday, respectively. Blood was sampled in the afternoon before and after each trip. Concentrations of serotonin and lactic acid in serum were measured. The POMS test and a questionnaire for subjective sleep quality were conducted before and after the trips. Ambient temperature and humidity were monitoring during the trips. The Ethics Committees of the Nippon Medical School and Nagano Prefectural Kiso Hospital approved this study.ResultsThe forest bathing program significantly increased level of serotonin in serum, and significantly increased the score for vigor and decreased the score for fatigue in the POMS test. The forest bathing program also improved the sleepiness on rising and feeling refreshed (recovery from fatigue) in the Oguri-Shirakawa-Azumi sleep inventory MA version (OSA-MA).ConclusionsTaken together, the present study suggests that forest bathing may have potential preventive effects on depression (depressive status).

1. Hamlet of Kattsuru in the village of Chikumaji, Nagano Prefecture was subjected to a human ecological survey as a basis of rural sanitation and guidance of local family planning. The hamlet, 890-950m above sea-level, fills a narrow valley of a rivulet, Takenoiri-gawa, and is a typical highland community in the Central Japan.2. There is cultivated area of 2.44 acres (1.12 acres of rice paddie and 1, 32 acres of dry field) per household in the average. Restricted by the geographical and climatic condition, the agriculture with this acrage corresponds to the sustenance limit. Most of the villagers seek to earn an extra income from semething or other : dairy farm, silkworm raising, civil engineering work or charcoal production to mention the main items.3. Annual food expenditure per household in 1953 was Y101, 101 which was 61.8% (Engel coefficient) of the whole livelihood expenditure, Y178, 000. It must be mentioned, however, that the harvest of this year was generally poor, owing to extraordinary lack of sunshine and heat during the summer. In an ordinary year the Engel coefficient would be a little lower.4. Uncultivated arable area is 14.9 acres for the whole hamlet of 78 households. This wasteland between the forest and the cultivated field produces hay for- the live-stock. The forest grows on a steep mountain side. So it is not practicable to change it into farming area.5. Population of Kattsuru hamlet as of September 1953 was 408 (219 males and 189 females). Ane increase would entail a reduction of livelihood level, since no effective means of increasing the population capacity are available.6. This community, considerered as a whole, is economically incapable of improvement of sanitary conditions. Suggestions derived from the present survey are :(i) Avoid further increase of population.(ii) Emigratin out of the hamlet ought to be encouraged.(iii) Mechanization of the agriculture should be introduced.(iv) Dairy farming, now isolatedly introduced, ought to be encouraged.(v) Road communication, about 4 km. connecting the hamlet with Ono station of the Central Line of the National Railway should be repaired or improved, at least to make it passable for bicycles.

ABSTRACTThe Ryoke metamorphic belt records the conditions of the middle–upper crust during Cretaceous crustal deformation and magmatism. To understand the development and evolution of the middle–upper crust, it is important to investigate the thermal structure of the Ryoke metamorphic belt. The Ryoke metamorphic rocks crop out widely in the Takato–Komagane area in Nagano Prefecture, central Japan. However, the spatial variations in metamorphic conditions in both areas are still unclear. We therefore investigated the metamorphic zoning and conducted Raman spectroscopy of carbonaceous material (RSCM) thermometry, chemical analyses, and pseudosection modeling of the Ryoke metamorphic rocks. The Bt, Sil–Kfs, and Grt–Crd zones in the Takato area, and the Bt, Kfs–Crd, and Grt–Crd zones in the Komagane area were redefined based on the mineral assemblages in metasedimentary rocks. The metamorphic zoning is different between the Takato and Komagane areas. We revealed that sillimanite occurs throughout both areas, although its occurrence changes gradually from in the matrix to inclusions in cordierite, between the Takato and Komagane areas. Peak P–T conditions of the Sil–Kfs zone are estimated to be 630°C–650°C and 320–380 MPa using RSCM thermometry and pseudosection modeling. Pseudosection modeling, microscopic observations, and thermometry results indicate higher temperatures in the Komagane area than in the Takato area. It is interpreted that part of the regional metamorphic belt underwent thermal overprinting induced by a late‐stage pulse of the gneissose Ryoke granitoids, resulting in the formation of a metamorphic zone distinct from that in the Takato area, characterized by the occurrence of sillimanite inclusions.

Amorphous material formed by the mechanochemical effect in natural pseudotachylyte of crushing origin: A case study of the Iida-Matsukawa Fault, Nagano Prefecture, Central Japan

Coexistence of the two closely related species, Eurydema rugosum and E. pulchrum was studied both in the laboratory and in the field at Takato in Ina district, Nagano Prefecture, Central Japan. We investigated the distribution, life cycle, seasonal changes of adult population size, host plant preferences, and the effects of host plants on the survival and development of nymphs of the two species. Eurydema rugosum was distributed widely, whereas E. pulchrum was distributed locally in mountainous areas. Therefore, coexistence of the two species generally occurred in the Ina district which has a mountainous terrain. Adult populations of E. rugosum were highest in early or mid-May and decreased gradually thereafter. On the other hand, those of E. pulchrum increased from early July or late August, and the latter out-numbered the former in the autumn. We estimated that E. rugosum had two generations, whereas E. pulchrum had three. No appreciable difference in host plant preferences was found between the two species : the nymphs and the adults of both species fed together on the same host plant throughout the season. In addition, no appreciable difference in the survival and development of the nymphs on different host plants was found between the two species.

Chemical discrimination of obsidian sources in the Kirigamine area and provenance analysis of obsidian artifacts from the Hiroppara prehistoric sites I and II, central Japan

Nocturnal temperature inversion (NTI) is an important factor characterizing the local climate in mountainous areas. In central Japan, most of the mountain slopes are covered by forests, but the effects of their leaf expansion/fall on the NTI variations in basins have not been clarified. According to a three-year leaf area index (LAI) observation in the mixed forest of the Sugadaira Highland (1320 m a.s.l.), Nagano Prefecture, Japan, we identified weakening of the NTI associated with leaf expansion and strengthening after leaf fall in a small basin. Using digital elevation and land-cover data, we defined the distribution of the deciduous and mixed forests in the catchment area of nocturnal cold air drainage. The estimated timings of leaf expansion/fall at the catchment scale based on the effective cumulative temperature almost coincided with the NTI changes. Micrometeorology observations showed that NTI at the forest floor and downslope winds at the adjacent grassland strengthened during the dormant (leafless) season in the nighttime when the radiative cooling is strong. Calm and clear nights were chosen during the spring dormant season and the summer growing season for 22 and 30 nights, respectively. The heat loss during the cold-air pool development was estimated, and converted to storage heat flux in the forest areas. The storage heat flux was 3.8 W m−2 more on average in the growing season than the dormant season, and it was less than that of forests estimated in previous studies (several 10 W m−2), indicating that an increase in storage heat flux of the forests with leaf expansion could cancel nocturnal radiative cooling and weaken gravity currents at the forest floor.