Part Of Honshu Research Articles

Population genetic structure and demography of Magnolia kobus: variety borealis is not supported genetically

Species delimitations by morphological and by genetic markers are not always congruent. Magnolia kobus consists of two morphologically different varieties, kobus and borealis. The latter variety is characterized by larger leaves than the former. For the conservation of M. kobus genetic resources in natural forests, the relationships between morphological and genetic variation should be clarified. We investigated variations in nuclear microsatellites, chloroplast DNA (cpDNA) sequences and leaf morphological traits in 23 populations of M. kobus over the range of species. Two genetically divergent lineages, northern and southern were detected and their geographical boundary was estimated to be at 39°N. The northern lineage consisted of two genetic clusters and a single cpDNA haplotype, while the southern one had multiple genetic clusters and cpDNA haplotypes. The northern lineage showed significantly lower genetic diversity than the southern. Approximate Bayesian computation indicated that the northern and southern lineages had experienced, respectively, population expansion and long-term stable population size. The divergence time between the two lineages was estimated to be 565,000 years ago and no signature of migration between the two lineages after divergence was detected. Ecological niche modeling showed that the potential distribution area in northern Japan at the last glacial maximum was very small. It is thus considered that the two lineages have experienced different population histories over several glacial-inter-glacial cycles. Individuals of populations in the central to northern part of Honshu on the Sea of Japan side and in Hokkaido had large leaf width and area. These leaf characteristics corresponded with those of variety borealis. However, the delimitation of the northern and southern lineages detected by genetic markers (39°N) was not congruent with that detected by leaf morphologies (36°N). It is therefore suggested that variety borealis is not supported genetically and the northern and southern lineages should be considered separately when identifying conservation units based not on morphology but on genetic markers.

Morphological and genetic diversity among wild population of Lilium rubellum in Japan

Lilium rubellum Baker is distributed in the north part of Honshu, the main island of Japan. It is belongs to section Archelirion and have been used as important parent species of Oriental hybrid lily cultivars. This species has pink coloured tepals with red coloured spots. However their genetic diversity has not been analysed. We performed morphological and microsatellite (SSR) analysis. We used 145 individual from 12 populations for morphological analysis and 185 individuals from 12 populations for SSR analysis. These results indicated that L. rubellum has genetic differences among populations.

Treatise on the People of Wa in the Chronicle of the Kingdom of Wei: The World's Earliest Written Text on Japan by Saeki Arikiyo

Reviewed by: Treatise on the People of Wa in the Chronicle of the Kingdom of Wei: The World's Earliest Written Text on Japan by Saeki Arikiyo John R. Bentley (bio) Treatise on the People of Wa in the Chronicle of the Kingdom of Wei: The World's Earliest Written Text on Japan. By Saeki Arikiyo; translated by Joshua A. Fogel. MerwinAsia, Portland ME, 2018. x, 420 pages. $55.00, cloth; $32.00 paper. Imagine students in a history class at a high school on the North American continent in the year 3719 CE. They are reading an ancient record about an emissary from an ancient country called France journeying to a loose federation that was once known as the United States of America. This emissary's record states, Ambassador Bernard and his group depart from a port called O'Hare in a settlement known as Chicago; they travel north 75 miles and arrive at a place called Milwaukee. The ruler there is a chieftain called Barrett. The emissary and his group bend their journey west, heading 35 miles, arriving at a cultural center called Oconomowoc. A minor chieftain called Mayor resides here. Traveling another 60 miles west the ambassador and his party reach a lake called Madison. This locale is famous for cheese. Reading this account, the students learn about their early ancestors who lived in a territory called Wisconsin. Perhaps unwittingly, several questionable assumptions are made based on this surviving text. The most tenuous assumption is that these linguistic fragments represent an early form of their modern (English) language. After roughly 1,700 years, the knowledge that these six place names represent five different languages, only one of which is English, would have been primarily lost. Chicago, Milwaukee, and Oconomowoc are actually from two different native Amerind languages (Miami and Potawatomi). Little is known about the inhabitants of the Japanese islands around the third and fourth centuries. During the first 250 years CE, emissaries from Eastern Han and Cao Wei China or from the commanderies on the Korean peninsula traveled the peninsula then crossed the Tsushima Straits to Kyushu and into parts of Honshu, recording the titles, toponyms, and cultural artefacts of the people they observed. Depending on the locale, the Chinese referred to these non-Chinese peoples by specific labels, such as "Han (韓)" or "Wa (倭)." The label "Wa" survived into the Yamato dynasty [End Page 444] in early Japan, so modern readers and scholars find it difficult to resist the temptation to connect the Wa with the ancestors of the Japanese. While the connection is logical, this assumption is still not scientifically proven. These archival accounts of the Wa were compiled in varying degrees of detail in Hou Hanshu (fifth century), Wei lüe (circa 260, lost), and Wei zhi (circa 284). The common reaction in modern Japan is to view the accounts in these records as describing the people and culture of early Japan. Wa titles and toponyms in Wei zhi are often interpreted as being Japanese linguistic forms that are then uncritically mapped on to surviving titles and toponyms, but this exercise tends toward obfuscation instead of elucidation. It is easy to forget that we really do not know much about the Wa who lived 1,700 years ago, so these data in Wei zhi need to be used with great care. Saeki Arikiyo's important two-volume work, Gishi wajinden o yomu (rendered by Joshua Fogel as "Treatise on the People of Wa in the Chronicle of the Kingdom of Wei"), starts by amassing a large amount of documentary evidence to demonstrate that the account in Wei zhi should be taken seriously and not swept aside as wholly unreliable. Having said that, it is still prudent to be cautious as we approach this text and what it can (or cannot) tell us about the early inhabitants of the Japanese islands. Saeki's important contribution is to help the reader process the information in Wei zhi as accurately as possible. Saeki goes through the 2,000-character account of the Wa piece by piece. He does this by combing through the considerable amount of Chinese texts that have accrued over time, picking up examples of...

Environment and Society in the Japanese Islands: From Prehistory to the Present ed. by Bruce L. Batten and Philip C. Brown

Reviewed by: Environment and Society in the Japanese Islands: From Prehistory to the Present ed. by Bruce L. Batten and Philip C. Brown Kerry Smith (bio) Environment and Society in the Japanese Islands: From Prehistory to the Present. Edited by Bruce L. Batten and Philip C. Brown. Oregon State University Press, Corvallis, 2015. xvi, 291 pages. $29.95, paper. It might be helpful to think about this book in the context of the two conferences that produced it. The editors of Environment and Society in the Japanese Islands trace its origins to the conference on “Japan’s Natural Legacies: Bodies and Landscapes Realized, Idealized, and Poisoned,” convened in 2008 near Big Sky, Montana. Both editors participated in that conference—Brown was among the contributors to the volume that it produced, Japan at Nature’s Edge—but were talking even then about how to make some of the ways of doing Japanese environmental history that were not well represented during discussions in Montana, or elsewhere in the field, visible to a wide audience.1 For Batten and Brown, that meant a book that included work on early Japan and studies exploring changes unfolding over the long span of Japan’s history. They were interested too in bringing together the work of “more traditional historians” with “the skills and perspectives of technically disposed disciplinary specialists” (p. xi). Toward that end, this new volume includes chapters by archeologists, climatologists, and geographers, in addition to contributions by historians. If the 2008 conference provides one framework for contextualizing the [End Page 244] book, the late March 2011 gathering in Hawai’i of almost all of its contributors suggests another. The devastating earthquake and tsunami earlier that same month inevitably shifted expectations about the nature of the work that environmental history about Japan might be asked to perform and about the potential interventions of a book like this. In a concluding chapter appropriately titled “In the Shadow of 3.11,” Batten and Brown acknowledge as much and touch on the perspectives that the chapters in this volume bring to the study of the disaster’s causes and effects. “Resilience” is one of the concepts the book uses as a foil for exploring “the processes of historical, socionatural change,” including those associated with the sudden, catastrophic kind (p. 13). Developed by ecologists to explain how some ecosystems are able “to remain more or less stable in the face of drastic external perturbations” while others undergo dramatic and permanent change when subject to comparatively minor disruptions, resilience refers to “the capacity of a system to withstand or adapt to shocks without experiencing a fundamental regime shift” (p. 13). The editors are not arguing that resilience or the concept of adaptive cycles, another analytical framework developed by ecologists and also referenced here, map completely onto questions that interest environmental historians the most. What they do suggest is that some of these ideas might be helpful for understanding the interactions and feedback cycles operating within socionatural systems, in a range of spatial arrangements, and over time scales short and long. Most chapters make use of one or more of these frameworks, some more uncritically than others. Gina Barnes’s observation in “Vulnerable Japan,” the first of three chapters on geology and topography, that “[e]nvironmentally, the Japanese Islands are a dangerous place to live” reflects both the country’s recent history and what we understand from the evidence emerging out of archaeoseismology and volcanic ash archaeology (kazanbai kōkogaku) (p. 22). The work that scholars in this latter, relatively new field have been doing has not been all that visible to nonspecialists, and one of Barnes’s contributions here is to help draw our attention to it. What these recent studies tell us is in some ways familiar, in that uncovering artifacts and other markers of human habitation from under tephra falls is not so different from other forms of archaeological practice. The cumulative effect of Barnes’s description of multiple excavation sites and of the region-wide impact of events such as the calamitous Kikai eruption of ca. 5300 BCE, which deposited up to 20 centimeters of ash over much of Kyushu, Shikoku, and parts of Honshu, however, is...

Stenichnus lackneri sp. n. of Japan (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae, Scydmaeninae).

Stenichnus Thomson, 1859 is a species-rich and common genus in the western Palaearctic, but only a few species are known from the Far East. Six species have been so far recorded from Japan (Sharp 1886; Jałoszyński 2004, 2006; Jałoszyński, Arai 2009). Interestingly, the Japanese species occur in the temperate or cool climate of Hokkaido in the north-east (Stenichnus minipollens Jałoszyński, 2004) and in subtropical forests of the south-western Yaeyama Archipelago (St. bellulus Jałoszyński, 2004 and St. totoro Jałoszyński, 2004), showing a broader range of ecological plasticity than their western Palaearctic congeners. Two more species are known to occur in the Japan mainland, i.e., St. pollens (Sharp, 1886) in Kyushu and St. sakurayamanus Jałoszyński & Arai, 2009 in the central part of Honshu, and one species, St. mitai Jałoszyński, 2006, was discovered on the small Nakanoshima Island of the Tokara Archipelago. Only the species that occur in the Yaeyama Islands are relatively common, all remaining species are known from holotypes only. Interestingly, St. pollens and St. minipollens, which occur on different islands separated by nearly 1500 km, share very similar aedeagi with a unique long ventral projection (Jałoszyński 2004).

Dragons, brimstone and the geology of a volcanic arc on the island of the last Samurai, Kyushu, Japan

Not even Hollywood could dream of a place so magical as Kyushu. The southern-most of the four major islands of the Japanese archipelago, this is a land of volcanoes, dinosaurs, and the last stand of the Samurai. And for good measure, James Bond visited here too, in the 1967 film You Only Live Twice. The final explosive scenes of that film featured the destruction of megalomaniac Ernst Stavro Blofeld's headquarters hidden inside the crater of one of Kyushu's most emblematic volcanoes, Shinmoedake. Kyushu also straddles the largest geological structure in Japan, the Median Tectonic Line (MTL) that runs from the western approaches of the island to the central part of Honshu. The MTL has been active since the Cretaceous, and the sedimentary basins formed along its line in Kyushu contain some of Japan's most famous dinosaur finds. The MTL also defines a fundamental divide between the geological histories of the terranes north and south of its line, a history that takes us back to the origins of the Japanese archipelago half a billion years ago.

Occurrence of Cicadulina bipunctata (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae) in southwestern Shikoku, Japan and comparisons of gall-inducing ability between Kyushu and Shikoku populations

The maize orange leafhopper Cicadulina bipunctata (Melichar) is an insect pest of cereal crops in tropical and subtropical regions of the Old World. This leafhopper induces gall symptoms characterized by stunted growth and swollen leaf veins on various Poaceae. Damage by C. bipunctata has been reported from Australia, the Philippines, China, Taiwan, and Japan. In Japan, C. bipunctata occurs in the central and southern parts of Kyushu. Because the leafhopper is a potential pest of various cereal crops, we conducted field surveys in Shikoku and the southern part of the Kii Peninsula (a part of Honshu), where the climate seems to be suitable for the establishment of C. bipunctata. As a result, we found C. bipunctata at some localities in Ehime and Kochi Prefectures. This is the first record of this leafhopper from Shikoku. Our laboratory experiment revealed that a Kochi population of C. bipunctata had a gall inducing ability similar to the Kumamoto population. More attention should be paid to assessing the risk of further expansion of C. bipunctata populations in Shikoku.

Reproductive Activity of the Small Japanese field mouse (Apodemus argenteus) in Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan

The small Japanese field mouse (Apodemus argenteus) is endemic to Japan that is distributed on all of the main islands of Japan, including Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu, and on smaller islands larger than approximately 150 km 2 (Nakata et al. 2009). It is widely distributed from lowlands to alpine zones, and is semi-arboreal, feeding mainly on seeds, fruits, and arthropods (Abe et al. 2005). The breeding season of this species varies geographically; reproduction peaks in the summer in Hokkaido and in sub-alpine zones of Honshu (Miyao et al. 1963; Fujimaki 1969; Kimura 1977; Tateishi 2006), in the spring and summer in the lowlands and low montane areas of Honshu (Yukawa 1973; Murakami 1974; Nishikata 1979; Torii and Tanaka 1989; Shibata 2000), and in the winter in Kyushu (Yoshida 1972). In Yamaguchi Prefecture, located in the westernmost part of Honshu, characterization of this species is very limited and its life cycle and breeding season remain unknown. Therefore, this study sought to determine the reproductive activity of the small Japanese field mouse in Yamaguchi Prefecture.

A new cryptic species allied to Plestiodon japonicus (Peters, 1864) (Squamata: Scincidae) from eastern Japan, and diagnoses of the new species and two parapatric congeners based on morphology and DNA barcode

A new species of scincid lizard allied to Plestiodon japonicus (Peters, 1864) was described as P. finitimus sp. nov., fromthe eastern part of Honshu and Hokkaido, Japan. A previous DNA study reported the taxonomic status of the easternJapanese populations of Plestiodon as an undescribed species on the basis of their collective genetic distinctness from aparapatric congener P. japonicus sensu strict from the western part of mainland Japan. We present the diagnostic featuresof P. finitimus compared to P. japonicus and P. latiscutatus Hallowell, 1861, the other parapatric species occurring in theIzu Peninsula and Izu Islands of central Japan, on the basis of morphological characteristics and DNA barcode patterns.Both P. finitimus and P. japonicus have a small postnasal and large anterior loreal that contacts the supralabials. In contrast,the Izu Peninsular populations of P. latiscutatus, which had no known diagnostic features relative to the other two species,usually have a large postnasal and small anterior loreal, with the latter separated from the supralabials by the former, ormay otherwise lack a postnasal. In most populations of P. finitimus, the right and left prefrontals are usually isolated fromeach other, whereas they exhibit medial contact in most populations of P. japonicus. Although all the above characters arevariable both within and between populations, 60–90% of the specimens from each locality on mainland Japan werecorrectly identified using a combination of these characters. Based on these characters, the Russian Far East populationof Plestiodon was also identified as P. finitimus. The interspecific sequence differences in the standard DNA barcoderegion (a 658 base pair fragment of the cytochrome c oxidase subunit I gene of mitochondrial DNA) were distinct, andeach of the three species was exclusively clustered in a neighbor-joining tree. The limited hybridization among the threespecies indicated by previous studies suggests that DNA barcodes could provide a reliable key for their correctidentification. The implications for the biogeography and speciation of the three parapatric lizard species are briefly discussed.

Which characteristic of Natto: appearance, odor, or taste most affects preference for Natto

BackgroundIn Japan, consumption of Natto, a fermented bean dish, is recommended because of its high quality protein, digestibility in the gut and its preventive effect on blood clot formation due to high vitamin K content. However, consumption of Natto in Kansai and the Chugoku area (the western part of Honshu) is less than that in the other areas of Japan probably because of a “food related cultural inhibition”. In this study, we determined which characteristic of Natto (appearance, odor or taste) most affect subjects’ perception of sensory attributes by observation of brain hemodynamics in relation to subjects’ preference for Natto.FindingsIn this experiment, we defined each subject’s changes in brain hemodynamics as (+) or (−) corresponding to an increase or a decrease in total hemoglobin concentration after stimuli compared to that before stimuli. As a result, there was no relation between preference for Natto and change in brain hemodynamics by the stimuli of “looking at” or “smelling”, while there was a significant relationship between preference and stimulus of “ingestion”; (+) : (−) = 21:15 in the subjects of the “favorite” group and (+):(−) = 30:7 in the subjects of the “non-favorite” group (P = 0.034).ConclusionThis result indicated that characteristic “taste” of Natto most affects preference for Natto.

Rumen Contents of the Sika deer in Wakayama Prefecture, Southern Honshu: A New Demonstration of Latitudinal Variations of the Food Habits

Abstract. We analyzed 78 rumen content samples obtained in middle and southern parts of Wakayama Prefecture, the southern-most part of Honshu, the main island of Japan from 1995 to 1998. The rumen contents were dominated by browse (leaves of woody plants). Evergreen broad-leaves such as Quercus spp., Eurya japonica, Ligustrum japonicum, and Aucuba japonica were dominant, occupying 30–45%. Deciduous broad-leaves including Rubus spp., Hydrangea luteo-venosa, and Callicarpa mollis accounted for 20–35%. Forbs accounted for 10–20%. Non-synthetic organs like twigs and bark accounted for only 2–5%, and graminoids and ferns appeared little. These results suggest that foods of the Wakayama deer are good in quality, particularly in winter. The comparison has shown that the Wakayama deer are categorized into the typical southern browser type. Geographical variations of the food contents of sika deer are demonstrated by greater contributions of graminoids as well as by summer-winter differences in the northern grazer...

Pollen morphology of the genus Skimmia (Rutaceae) and its taxonomic implications

Pollen morphology of the genus Skimmia was studied. Of six species of the genus, five species were investigated by light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy. Pollen grains of Skimmia had striate to striate-reticulate sculpture and variable aperture number (3-7), and these characters differed from even the phylogenetically closest relatives such as Dictamnus and Casimiroa which have 3-colporate pollen grains with reticulate exine. In Skimmia laureola, pollen dimorphism is suggested in the aperture number in accordance with the floral system. Pollen grains of Skimmia japonica, a morphologically very variable species, were extensively surveyed covering its whole distribution area. The grains were also striate to striate-reticulate, and the exine sculpture was not different between varieties. However, the aperture number of S. japonica showed a geographical variation ranging from 4 to 6; in Sakhalin, Hokkaido, most part of Honshu and Taiwan, grains with 4-5 apertures were dominant, while in the southern part of Japan, including the Ryukyu Islands and the Izu Islands, those with 5-6 apertures were common.

Response Analysis of Civil Engineering Structures Subjected to Earthquake Motions

The Niigata Earthquake, measuring a magnitude of 7.5 on the Richter scale, hit the northwestern part of Honshu, Japan, on June 16th, 1964. The epicenter was under the sea about 55 km north from Niigata city, and the hypocentral depth was 20 to 30 km. The earthquake brought about severe damage to various engineering structures in the alluvial plain near the mouth of the Shinano River and the Agano River. Especially in the vicinity of the mouth of the Shinano River where loose sand layers plus a high water table exist, many modernstructures such as reinforced concrete buildings, highway bridges, harbor structures, etc. sustained heavy damage due to unexpectedly large deformations and settlements. This particular earthquake emphasized the importance of the dynamic effects of earthquake motions, as well as the effects of liquefaction phenomena of the ground soils. Two sets of strong motion accelerographs, installed in the basement floor and the roof of a heavily inclined 4-story apartment building located along the Shinano River, triggered the complete acceleration records of the earthquake. The peak accelerations at the basement are about 150 gals in the lateral direction, and 50 gals in the vertical direction. It was noted that these accelerations were not so large, when considering the severeness of the damage.

Geographic variation of chromosomes and somatic morphology in the Japanese polymorphic species Leiobunum hiraiwai (Arachnida: Opiliones: Sclerosomatidae)

The hiraiwai-subgroup of the Leiobunum curvipalpe-species group (Opiliones: Sclerosomatidae: Leiobuninae) is revised on the basis of somatic morphology, genitalia and karyotypes. This subgroup is distributed mainly in the mountainous areas of the Japanese Beech (Fagus crenata) forest zone (usually above 700 m in altitude in the southwestern part of Japan) in the western part of the Japanese Islands and corresponds to a single polytypic species, Leiobunum hiraiwai (Sato & Suzuki, 1939) with eight geographic races. Leiobunum tamanum Suzuki, 1957 and L. tsushimense Suzuki, 1976 are here synonymized with L. hiraiwai. All the races, except for the Tsushima race, were chromosomally analyzed. The number of chromosomes varies geographically from 2n = 18 to 22 eastwards, irrespective of the variation in somatic morphology or male genitalia. Component chromosomes in these karyotypes are invariably metacentric or submetacentric in structure. Some morphological characters show a geographic pattern of variation that conforms to the stasipatric model of speciation. The possible processes of geographical differentiation of the species and direction of character evolution are inferred on the basis of such geographical patterns. The distribution of some character states suggests that the closest relative of the subgroup is the curvipalpe-subgroup (= Leiobunum curvipalpe Roewer, 1910 and L. tohokuense Suzuki, 1976) that inhabits the northeastern part of Honshu, Japan. The hiraiwai-subgroup (= Leiobunum hiraiwai) shows a mutually exclusive or checkerboard pattern of geographical distribution with regards to the montanum-subgroup (= Leiobunum montanum Suzuki, 1953) in southwestern Japan, suggesting some possible reproductive interference between these two species.

Possible association of vigorous hepatitis B virus replication with the development of fulminant hepatitis

A 49 year-old man was referred to our hospital for fear of developing fulminant hepatic failure. There had been an outbreak of fulminant hepatitis B in a dialysis clinic in the western part of Honshu, Japan, that resulted in four deaths among six patients. After the sixth patient contracted severe hepatitis, all patients in the unit were screened biweekly for hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) to detect newly infected patients as soon as possible. Our patient was the seventh victim, and on the day he gave a positive result for HBsAg, his hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA level had reached 1.1 x 10(11) copies/ml as assessed by real time polymerase chain reaction. Sequence analysis of the causal HBV revealed the presence of a mutation in the precore region (nt 1896), two mutations in the core promoter (nt 1762 and nt 1764), and some minor mutations in the P gene that were restricted to the upstream region. These mutations are indicative of a virus with a high replicative rate that cannot secrete HBeAg. Taken together, these findings indicate that it is very likely that the replicative ability of the causal virus was as vigorous as that of HBV in hepatitis B e antigen-positive asymptomatic carriers with markedly high viral titers. The present case report provides clinical evidence of a possible association between the rapid spread of highly replicative HBV before host immunological recognition and the development of fulminant hepatitis.

Envoys and Illusions: the Japanese embassy to Europe, 1582–90, De Missione Legatorvm Iaponensium, and the Portuguese viceregal embassy to Toyotomi Hideyoshi, 1591

AbstractOn 20 February 1582 when Alessandro Valignano, Visitor to the Jesuit missions in the East Indies (the geographical area from Goa eastwards, to Japan, and southwards, to the Indonesian archipelago) left Japan, the country had been in a state of civil war, (the sengoku jidai) for more than a century. That was about to change. Oda Nobunaga had succeeded in uniting the central and western parts of Honshu under his rule and was intent on imposing his rule over the rest of the country. The Jesuits considered him if not quite a patron, then certainly someone sympathetic to Christianity and their mission in Japan. Yet on 22 June Nobunaga died, the victim of an attack by an ambitious rival, and ironically, considering the previous esteem in which he had been held, unlamented by the Jesuits who believed that during the final months of his life he had transformed himself into a megalomanic tyrant, a Nebuchadnezzar.

磁性材料の化学 土壌改良材に超微粒フェライトを混合した資材による芝草雪腐病防除の効果

In cultivating biennial produce such as pasture, wheat, turf, etc., in snow-inflicted areas such as Hokkaido or part of Honshu, snow mold brought about by the causes including typhuna ishikariensis is known as a serious obstacle. Although agricultural chemicals have conventionally been used as a principal measure for elimination of snow mold, danger of environmental pollution manifests itself as a problematic point. To solve the problem referred to above, a suspension of ultra-fine ferrite (200-300A) was made paying attention to the behavior of an electromagnetic field. The suspension obtained in this manner was sprinkled at a ratio of 1g/m2 in the in room and on-the-spot tests, which made it possible to restrict the bacillus movement. On the other hand, concurrent employment of the suspension with agricultural chemicals made it possible to reduce the chemicals to the extent of almost 1/2 of the amount before the use. However the ferrite in a state of ultra-fine substances is so hard that the nozzle to be used for sprinkling the solution comes to be worn away, when a suspension is sprinkled. With a view to avoiding such trouble, the ultra-fine ferrite was mixed 1%-10% with a soil improvable materials. By agitating the said mixture, sprinkling becomes possible without any rectification. It is explained that sprinkling of the mixed solution in this manner helps restrict snow mold movement as with the case of suspension. Concurrently with this, it is also explained that growth of turf is promoted.

The Reorganization of the System for Collecting Herring Cargoes

In early modern Japan, fish meal made from herring was used as a fertilizer in cash crop production. Herring meal was produced in the northernmost island, Hokkaido, and shipped in kitamaebune (vessels operated by independent shippers and merchants involved in the herring trade) to ports in Honshu (the main island of Japan).This paper examines a shift in the system by which herring cargoes from Ezochi were collected in the Matsumaechi port town of Esashi between 1865 and 1869. Matsumaechi was the southwestern periphery of Hokkaido; it was distinguished politically from the rest of the island (known as Ezochi) during the Edo period. Esashi was the center of the herring trade on the west coast of Hokkaido.This study is based upon the records of Sekigawa Yozaemon, an Esashi herring-meal merchant. The Matsumae domain recognized Sekigawa as a wholesaler (Esashi ton'ya) and granted him a contract to collect commodity taxes and port charges levied on commodities and boats passing through the Esashi customs house (Okinokuchi yakusho). Accordingly, the Sekigawa records can be regarded as official documents: they offer extremely detailed information concerning the shipping of herring by-products. The study's findings, based on an analysis of the records, can be summarized as follows:The Esashi ton'ya had monopoly rights to herring from western Ezochi during the first half of the nineteenth century. These rights derived from their roles as supply merchants, in which they provided loans to fishers living in and around Esashi in return for exclusive access to the herring caught by their clients in western Ezochi. However, when eight villages along the northern coast of Matsumaechi between Esashi and the Ezochi border came under the direct administration of the Tokugawa Shogunate in 1855, the ship owners and fishers in the villages were permitted to trade directly with other districts, including the Tohoku region and other parts of Honshu. In other words, they were allowed to fish and trade herring independently of the Esashi ton'ya. This led to an upheaval in the system of collecting herring in Esashi.In 1864, the eight villages were returned to the Matsumae domain, with the result that all ships from Ezochi once again had to discharge their cargoes at Esashi. Ship owners and fishers living in the eight villages opened branch stores in Esashi, through which they started selling herring meal directly to the Esashi ton'ya, without borrowing money or supplies such as nets and boats from them. At the same time, the number of kitamaebune entering from Honshu peaked: they were employed by Esashi merchants in shipping herring loads from Ezochi to Esashi. Consequently, the function of collecting herring became concentrated in Esashi once again.In sum, systems for collecting herring loads from Ezochi to Esashi were reorganized by merchants, kitamaebune ship owners, and fishers living in and around Esashi between 1865 and 1869.

The geographical distribution of Polycelis (Polycelis) sapporo and Seidlia schmidti in the Far East

Polycelis (Polycelis) sapporo (Ijima et Kaburaki, 1916) is a non-stenothermal species, common in Hokkaido (including all of the adjacent islands), Northern Japan, except in the alpine region. It is also distributed in Aomori Prefecture in the northernmost part of Honshu. To the south, its range is bounded by a line from the base of the Tsugaru Peninsula, over Mt. Iwaki, Mt. Shirakami, Mt. Tashiro, Lake Towada, Mt. Hakkoda, the Natsudomari Peninsula, to the west of Mutsu and Ohata in the Shimokita Peninsula. In Russia, the species is recorded only from the southern part of Sakhalin. Seidlia schmidti (Zabusov, 1916) is a stenothermal species found in cold-water biotops. It occurs in the North and East of Hokkaido including the Shiretoko Peninsula and Rishiri Island. In Russia, the species is recorded from the southern part of Sakhalin, Primorskiy, Habarovsk including the base of the Chukotskiy Peninsula, and the Kamchatka Peninsula (and Bering Island).

本州中央部の地殻応力方位分布―応力区とその成因

本州中央部の地殻応力方位分布―応力区とその成因