Mark Brazil - The Japan Times

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Mark Brazil

Mark Brazil, a Briton based in Hokkaido, has written about the natural history of Japan in his Wild Watch column for over 30 years. After careers in conservation and natural history television, Mark taught for nine years at a university in Hokkaido before going freelance. He now travels the world as a lecturer and leader on wildlife-focused expeditions.

For Mark Brazil's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Aug 15, 2002

Isolation spells survival in the Sea of Okhotsk

In penguinlike tuxedoed masses, the Tyuleni Island murres were standing in murmuring hordes, crowding the rock ledges of their remote breeding colony off the east coast of Sakhalin in the Sea of Okhotsk.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Aug 1, 2002

A camphor by any other name

Growing among the the laurel-dominated evergreen forests of central and southern Japan is a tree with a host of names and a host of uses.

COMMUNITY

Jul 28, 2002

Finding my Berings

Imagine traveling halfway around the world overland, building a ship, then being the first to navigate an unknown sea . . . only to have your sponsors disbelieve you. That was the fate of Cmdr. Vitus Jonassen Bering, the Danish seafarer whose name lives on in those of the Bering Sea, the Bering Straits, Bering Island and the Commander Islands . . . but who had to go back and do it all again before he was believed!

COMMUNITY

Jul 28, 2002

Into the unknown Sea of Okhotsk

The Bering Sea, 1999. A wave-dashed shore ahead; leaden skies above. The way the rough sea was lifting and pitching and rolling our ship was not promising. I could just make out a bleak and deserted beach backed by lush knee-high vegetation, with a low, steep bank beyond. Somewhere there, 250 years ago, my naturalist hero Georg Wilhelm Steller weathered an awful icy winter, while around him shipwrecked shipmates died of scurvy -- among them his commander, Vitus Bering.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Jul 18, 2002

Trees' wondrous ways of turning over a new leaf

Now, at the height of summer, when the fresh green of the spring leaves has darkened, I will start this week's column with a question: "Why is it that northern Japan's Mongolian oak and Europe's common beech retain their rustling brown leaves all winter, while sharing their temperate forest habitat mainly with deciduous trees that drop theirs each autumn and regrow them in spring?"

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Jul 4, 2002

Welcome to the world's most successful societies

Ants have an amazing lineage. They have been around for at least 100 million years, since the middle of the Cretaceous Period, and for at least the last 50 million years they have been among the most abundant of all insects. We think we're successful? Our population has recently topped 6 billion, but the great ant scientist, Harvard-based professor E.O. Wilson, has estimated there are about 1 million billion ants in the world.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Jun 20, 2002

The ants' workaday world is wherever you look

Despite the name, I didn't see any ants in Antarctica, though it's the only place I've been that I haven't seen any. Everywhere else, from Alaska to Australia, from Norway to New Zealand, I have encountered them. Ants are an extraordinarily numerous and successful group.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Jun 6, 2002

Don't go making a monkey of yourself, man

Monkey, primate, ape; the terms slip so easily off the tongue, but just what do they mean, and how do they differ? And what does it mean to talk of New World and Old World monkeys?

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

May 30, 2002

Puzzling over monkeys' many ways of life

It was a faint and far-off sound, barely audible, like the distant rumbling of thunder. Something about it triggered memories, and I asked skipper Mike to cut our outboard motor. Even with the engine off and my hands cupped behind my ears, head turning like a radar dish, I was still not absolutely sure.

ENVIRONMENT

May 19, 2002

What the label doesn't say

Scandals about deception in product labeling have been in the news of late, with both the expiry dates and the origins of dairy and meat products called into question. While not as big a news item, the labeling standards for whale meat take deception to further, murkier depths -- and to dangerous ones.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT

May 19, 2002

Whaling: A live issue over death

Whales dolphins and porpoises, the aquatic mammals collectively called cetaceans, number less than 80 species, or fewer than 2 percent of all mammals. They are, however, probably the most talked about and written about of all wild animals -- despite being some of the most poorly understood creatures on earth. Their conservation and hunting are hotly debated -- but why?

ENVIRONMENT

May 19, 2002

How deep does our knowledge go?

The group of animals we call cetaceans represent but two-thirds of the orders of "whales" that have ever existed.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

May 16, 2002

Summer's serenaders of the moon, sun and stars

Summer really is here. It has spread north so rapidly that June- and July-like temperatures were reported in Hokkaido even before the end of April. The cherry blossom wave rushed northward, too, at such a pace it was as if it were trying to take a running jump at Sakhalin.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

May 2, 2002

20 years of writing on the wild side

The biological exuberance of the equatorial region is staggering to behold. Walking through a temperate forest (as one might find in many areas of northern Japan, the northern United States or across much of central Europe), it is commonplace to have a clear view for hundreds of meters -- even to the horizon in hilly country. The temperate forest is almost cathedral-like: calming and peaceful, with pillared trunks and the chorus of birdsong.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Apr 18, 2002

Back when the Badlands were lush

Drive west from Calgary and rolling foothills dotted with aspen and white spruce rise steadily toward the mighty ridgeback of the Rockies, which dominate the view in this part of Canada's Alberta Province.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Apr 4, 2002

'Park on a possum' is far easier said than done

Back in 1848, some bright spark had a "good" idea. Let's import common brush-tailed possums from Australia and fur-farm them in New Zealand, they thought. They followed up on that idea with action -- action that New Zealand's environment has been paying for ever since.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Mar 21, 2002

Confused responses cloud vital issues of ecology

Sept. 11, 2001, a date now etched indelibly in our memories, provided an awfully pertinent lesson in human actions and human responses. Shock, fury, anger; all were reasonable, acceptable emotional responses to horrendous acts of terrorism.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Mar 7, 2002

Waiting with ravens for hunter and hunted to die

Nature Diary notes for Friday, Feb. 8: Lake Kussharo to Notoro Misaki, then along the Sea of Okhotsk coast to Utoro.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Feb 21, 2002

Denizens of the deep that take your breath away

Almost exactly a year ago, I was introduced to scuba diving and the astonishing submarine sights of corals, colorful fish, sea lions, flightless cormorants and even penguins.

Japan Times

ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH

Feb 7, 2002

Precipitate beauty of nature's own ice sculptures

"The sky has holes to let rain in; the holes are small, that's why rain is thin." So wrote the zany British comedian Spike Milligan. Rain. Some hate it; I love it. It's a gift (thin though it may be) from the heavens.

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.

[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Things may look perfect to the outside world, but today's mom is fine with some imperfection at home.

How 'Reiwa moms' are reshaping motherhood in Japan

By Mai Yoshikawa

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Spotlighting a Niigata castle town through sushi

Spotlighting a Niigata castle town through sushi

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