Japanese Giant Salamander Tours
Japanese Giant Salamander Tours: join an evening eco tour of the habitat of the Japanese Giant Salamander in Nichinan, Tottori Prefecture.
Meet the Japanese Giant Salamander, オオサンショウウオ
Greg Goodmacher
The Japanese giant salamander can grow to almost 150 centimeters - the height of an average twelve-year-old child.
Tourists, like you, can help protect it. Nature lovers visiting Japan will most probably decide that the Nichinan Giant Japanese Salamander Conservation Experience is one of the most meaningful tours in Japan. Dr. Okada, the world's foremost Japanese giant salamander researcher, will have you wading in the wilds of Tottori in search of salamanders.
Daytime exploration of salamanders' habitat, Tottori Prefecture
Dr Okada with a Giant Japanese salamander
Nichinan
Be one of the first to enjoy this special encounter with the second largest species of salamander in the world. The Japanese Department of the Environment and Tottori locals are just starting to promote these tours. They hope that salamander tourism can help to save its environment, provide money for research, and revive the small town of Nichinan, Tottori, which has adopted the salamander as its symbol.
In the wild, these mysterious amphibians - many facets of their existence are still unknown - might live for a century. Giant salamanders within and around Nichinan, Tottori, require pristine freshwater streams. The national government designated giant Japanese salamanders as "Special Natural Monuments" under the Cultural Treasures Act of 1952, but their habitat, except for rivers within national parks, is not protected.
Giant Japanese salamander habitat in Tottori
Threats to Salamanders' Habitat
Locals used to eat giant salamanders. Some even farmed Chinese salamanders for meat. Escaped Chinese salamanders interbreeding with Japanese ones created hybrid salamanders.
Nowadays, the biggest threats to Japanese giant salamanders are dam, road, and other construction projects that destroy their habitats or cause habitat fragmentation. If salamander tourism becomes popular, the local government could create protected reserves for salamanders and other creatures.
Giant Japanese salamander-themed cookie
The Tour
One evening last May, my friends and I drove over bumpy, unpaved, winding forest roads to the side of a small river in remote Tottori Prefecture. Our goal was to field-test the tour.
We donned chest-high rubber waders and walked directly into a river. Moonlight and starlight filtered through the dense forest canopy in a night silent except for our voices and hoots from an owl.
Despite the cold and our struggle to balance while walking on the streambed's slippery rocks that lay beneath the surface of the transparent stream, we were thrilled.
I think we all felt like children on a treasure hunt. The treasure was a chance to get close to a rare species that has barely changed over millions of years of existence. Our cloudlike exhalations floated in the beams of our torches.
I saw a blur of movement in front of me in the thigh-high water and called out, "There's something here." Dr. Okada walked downriver to my position and swept his gaze under the stream bank. "There is one," he said, and he gently pulled the first salamander of the evening from its hiding place under fallen tree branches in the water.
Measuring a Giant Japanese salamander
Dr. Okada lifted the salamander into a net, which he carried to the side of the stream. We gathered around him as he carefully measured the salamander's length and girth and various parts of its anatomy. He is the only person who is allowed to touch the animal.
We, though, were allowed to run a scanning device above its body. And we found a microchip that Dr. Okada had installed many years previously. The information told us the date of when and the location of where Dr. Okada caught it years beforehand and its size then. The new measurements allowed Dr. Okada to compute its growth rate. Such information helps scientists to better understand the movements and life processes of this little-understood, slimy but endearing creature.
Giant Japanese salamander
Nocturnal Animals
Our small group of five tourists, Dr. Okada, and Richard Pearce, our tour leader, found six gorgeous salamanders in several hours of searching, researching, and then releasing these natural treasures. We saw other forest beings, too.
In this part of Japan, the likelihood of encountering nocturnal animals is high.
As we were leaving the stream in the pitch-black evening, the light from one of our torches illuminated a pair of eyes and a dark from scampering across a nearby rice field. Several of us shone our flashlights in its direction. The beams revealed a fox before it bounded over a ridge. Then, down in the stream, another pair of gleaming eyes exposed a tanuki, Japanese raccoon dog, which might have been hunting for small salamander. The tanuki crept behind a clump of long green grass and disappeared. Above us, a galaxy of stars glittered.
The tour over, we reluctantly departed, but we carried with us a renewed passion for nature and a desire to spread the news about a unique chance to protect the environment.
To ensure that ecotourism will not disturb the animals and the environment too much, Dr. Okada plans to bring a limited number of tourists to different sections of the river each time. During the breeding season, Dr. Okada will not lead tours.
For information regarding pricing, dates and times of tours, and accommodation in or around Nichinan, contact www.bushidojapan.com/japanese-giant-salamander
Getting There
First, go to Yonago City by plane or train from Tokyo, Osaka, Hiroshima and other major cities.
Flights from Tokyo take less than an hour and a half. The nearest train station to Nichinan is Shoyama Station, which can be reached by trains from Okayama Station and Yonago Station.
From Okayama Station the Limited Express Yakumo takes 98 minutes to Shoyama and costs 4,490 yen at present. By local train with a change in Niimi, it takes three hours and costs 1,940 yen.
From Yonago the journey time is 40 minutes by Limited Express Yakumo and costs 2,310 yen. On a local Hakubi Line train bound for Niimi, the time is 70 minutes and costs 840 yen.
You can even arrange for someone from the tour to meet you at Yonago Airport or JR Yonago Station.
The author of this article blogs about Japanese Hot Springs at hotspringaddict.blogspot.jp.
