Kushiroshitsugen

Kushiroshitsugen lies in eastern Hokkaido and protects the largest marsh in Japan, formed around the Kushiro River and its tributaries, together with the hills that surround it. It extends some 36 kilometres from north to south and 25 from east to west, and its origin goes back to an ancient arm of the sea: the accumulation of peat over the sea floor and the subsequent withdrawal of the waters, some 3,000 years ago, gave rise to the present wetland. Vegetation covers around 80% of the surface, dominated by low marsh of reeds and sedges, with raised sphagnum bogs where alpine and cold-climate plants such as cottongrass and crowberry grow, and with water chestnut and yellow water lilies in the lakes and reservoirs.

For a long time the marsh was considered useless land because of the difficulty of farming it. After the Second World War, food shortages drove its clearance, along with urban growth and the felling of the surrounding slopes, and the wetland began to dry out and shrink. The reaction of local researchers and conservation groups reversed that trend: in 1980 Kushiroshitsugen was the first Japanese wetland listed under Ramsar, and on 31 July 1987, seven years later, it was declared a national park.

Its symbol is the red-crowned crane, or tancho, declared a Special Natural Monument of Japan. Overhunting and habitat transformation led it to be considered extinct in the country, until in the 1920s a small surviving flock was discovered here. Decades of protection and winter feeding stations have restored the population, which today stands at around 1,700 birds in eastern Hokkaido. The marsh is also home to some 170 bird species and to cold-climate wildlife such as the Siberian salamander, regarded as an ice-age relict, for which very few suitable environments remain in Japan. The Hosooka observatories and the Onnenai visitor centre, the Norokko scenic train and canoe trips down the Kushiro River are the usual ways of exploring it.