Tag - animal-tracker

 
Menu
Search
 
April 29, 2024
 

Today's print edition

Home Delivery
Subscribe for more access

ANIMAL TRACKER

ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Oct 19, 2001
Migratory locust
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Oct 12, 2001
Five-lined skink
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Oct 5, 2001
Praying mantis
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Sep 28, 2001
Blue admiral
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Sep 21, 2001
Japanese macaque
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Sep 14, 2001
Golden orb spider
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Sep 7, 2001
Siberian chipmunk
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Aug 31, 2001
Reeves turtle
* Japanese name:Kusagame * Scientific name: Chinemys reevesii * Description: A freshwater, semi-aquatic turtle with a carapace (shell) 10-30 cm long. Females are bigger than males. This turtle has three keels, or ridges, running along its carapace, which is a yellow-brown to olive color. Some may be very dark, almost black. Females and young turtles often have yellow stripes around the neck. For sexing, look at the tail: Males have a longer tail than females, with a bulge at the base. * Where to find them:Where to find them: From Honshu to Kyushu, in farm ponds, canals, rivers and streams. During the day they often bask on stones and riverbanks. The World Conservation Union has the Reeves turtle listed as endangered; they are still used in Chinese medicine (the shell is purported to nourish the liver and kidneys), and they are often seen dead on the roads in the summer, run over by cars as they migrate to new streams. They hibernate in winter. * Food:Classic omnivores, Reeves turtles will eat almost anything: snails, slugs, crayfish, tadpoles, crustaceans, crickets, earthworms, fish, vegetation. Large food items will be torn up with the front legs. * Special features: Males will chase females tirelessly during courtship, attempting to rub snouts. Females lay between four and 14 eggs in an underground burrow that they dig with their back legs under vegetation: If you see a plant shaking, this might be why. Eggs hatch in 90 days, and some females may lay a second or third clutch. The turtle has the distinction of being the only one of the four mystical animals of Chinese legend (phoenix, dragon and unicorn are the others) that really exists, though the stories that the world rests on the shell of a turtle or that they can change into a beautiful young woman are best disregarded.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Aug 24, 2001
Salty dragonfly
* Japanese name: Shiokara tonbo * Scientific name: Orthetrum albistylum speciosum * Description: A fast-flying dragonfly 48-57 mm long. Males have a pale-blue body; the end of the abdomen is pointed and black, and is equipped with a pair of clasping appendages. Females are usually a brown-yellow color, but there is much variation. The end of the female abdomen is broader than in males; it stores eggs and fires them out in a scatter pattern. As males mature, a waxy white substance develops on their abdomens -- this explains their Japanese name, salty dragonfly. In English, these dragonflies are often called darters because of their habit of darting out from perches to feed. * Where to find them: In rice paddies, swamps, ponds, fields, shrines, temples and city parks from April to October. They like bright areas. Females lay eggs in shallow water while hovering, and a male usually guards her. * Food: Other flying insects. All six legs are held together to form a basket, which is used to scoop insects out of the air. * Special features: Males are unusual in that they have two sets of genitalia. The testes are located at the end of the abdomen, and a secondary set, containing a specialized penis, is located at the junction of the abdomen and thorax. This is why dragonflies have to form a wheel shape when they copulate -- the female is caught by the neck (in midair) by the claspers on the male's abdomen and swung around to engage with the penis. Before he inseminates the female, the male scrapes out sperm the female has stored from previous matings, using hooks and bristles on his penis.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Aug 17, 2001
Fire-bellied newt
* Japanese name:Imori * Scientific name:Cynops pyrrhogaster * Description: Fire-bellied newts have rough, blackish-brown skin and a vibrant, crimson-orange belly. This is the most common salamander in Japan, found from Honshu to Kyushu. Females grow to between 8 and 14 cm (including the tail); males 7-11.5 cm. In the breeding season males develop smoother skin, and grow a thin tail filament at the tip of the tail; the body and tail get a blue-purple sheen. There are six subspecies in different parts of Japan, each with different colorations. * Where to find them: In clean water of ponds, rice fields, swamps and streams. Adults usually live in the mud at the bottom of the pond, but juvenile newts are terrestrial, and can be found under stones, bark and leaves. Females lay their eggs on the of leaves of aquatic plants. They can lay up to 200 eggs in a breeding season (April to early July); eggs hatch after about 20 days and metamorphose after 3-5 months. Juvenile newts are terrestrial for 1-3 years, but when they are sexually mature, they return to the water. Imori should not be confused with yamori (lizards), which look similar but are reptiles, not amphibians. * Food: Worms, insects, tadpoles. * Special features: If startled, they assume a defensive posture, showing their red belly to the potential predator. The red belly is a warning signal meaning "poison." In case the predator needs more persuasion, the newt secretes a foul-smelling mucus from the skin. During courtship, males chase after females, ramming them with their nose and blocking their path. They waft their tails at the female, which bathes the females in pheromones. The subspecies of this newt in the Kansai Region encourages the female to stay by putting his hind leg on her neck while he wafts his tail. If she decides to mate, the male produces a bag of sperm which the female draws into her body and uses to fertilize her eggs as she lays them.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Aug 10, 2001
Rhinoceros beetle
* Japanese name:Kabutomushi * Scientific name:Allomyrina dichotoma * Description: One of the best-known and best-loved insects in Japan, this beetle is also one of the easiest to identify. Males have a large horn extending from the head and another, smaller one from the thorax. They are very strong, heavy insects, but they can fly; like all beetles, their wings are hidden under their wing covers. They are dark brown or reddish-brown and are between 30 and 60 mm long. The second part of their scientific name, dichotoma, means "divided into two," because males come in only two sizes -- big or small, never medium-size. * Where to find them: From June to August you can find them in supermarkets all over the country, but in the wild, they are active at night in forests. They smell sap oozing from wounds in trees and fly to them. The larvae live in rotten tree stumps or buried in soil, feeding on rotting wood. Once the larvae are fat enough, they pupate. * Food: Horned beetles feed on tree sap. If you are keeping them in a terrarium, feed them cucumber or watermelon and provide them with a ball of cotton wool soaked in sugar water. Change the cotton wool daily to prevent it from getting moldy. * Special features: The horn. Kabutomushi literally means "helmet insect." Their horns and armored exoskeleton recall the armor worn by samurai. Males fight like samurai, too, using their horns to fight each other for control of scars on trees (where valuable sap comes from). Females visit the trees to feed, and it is here that males have the best chance of mating with them. Competition between males for these sap sites is intense. The fights take place on the tree trunk. Males attempt to get their horn under the body of their opponent, then flick. If successful, the losing male goes flying off the tree.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Aug 3, 2001
Common toad
* Japanese name: Nihon hikigaeru * Scientific name: Bufo japonicus * Description: This is one of the biggest amphibians in Japan. Adults are between 8-18 cm long; tadpoles are 3.5-4 cm long. They have the classic toad traits of poisonous, warty skin and yellow, bulging eyes. Male toads are yellowish-brown and females are darker. Some have red splotches, and there are black markings on the belly. There is a black belt along the flanks of the body, bordered with white stripes. They are terrestrial and have dry skin. * Where to find them: Grasslands and woodlands. They can be found in large parks in cities, but are now rare in gardens. You are most likely to see them on the road after it's been raining. They breed from April tp May, each female laying between 6,000 to 15,000 eggs in shallow water in ponds, ditches and swamps. Tadpoles become toadlets by early June. * Food: Insects, worms and river crabs. * Special features: Toads have a highly developed sense of smell, which helps them find their way back to the breeding pond they lived in as a toadlet, two-three years before. Once there, males will clasp anything that is about the same size as a female toad. If this happens to be a male toad, the clasped male will make a release call, and the errant male will move on. If he clasps a female after she has laid her eggs, she vibrates her body, and again he will release her. When he finds a female before she has laid her eggs, he clasps her in a state known as amplexus (as in the photo). This can last up to 12 hours. After she lays her eggs, he releases his sperm. Males fight strongly to achieve amplexus with a female. Sometimes females are even killed by the pressure exerted by masses of sexually excited males.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jul 27, 2001
Racoon dog
* Japanese name:Tanuki * Scientific name: Nyctereutes procyonoides viverrinus * Description: Tanuki look a bit like fat foxes, with short legs and black and gray fur. They grow up to 60 cm long and have distinctive stripes of black fur under their eyes, a bit like pandas. * Where to find them:Standing at the door of many traditional restaurants in Japan. Statues of tanuki, holding a bottle of sake, welcome guests arriving to eat. Real tanuki are not so easy to find, but are quite abundant from Honshu to Kyushu. They live in lowlands, forests and mountain valleys (up to 2,000 meters in altitude) and sometimes come into gardens looking for food. Unfortunately for them, this can bring them into contact with dogs, from which they can catch dangerous diseases. * Food: Almost anything. Tanuki are the classic omnivores, eating rodents, lizards, frogs, fruit, berries, insects and other invertebrates, including slugs and snails. They can even stomach poisonous toads, apparently producing huge amounts of saliva that dilutes the toad's poison. * Special features: Tanuki don't usually carry bottles of sake, but the statues are correct about their biology in one important detail: testes size. Rather than being used as an impromptu drum, as Japanese folklore would have it, the scrotum is large because of high levels of competition among males for females. This means that they copulate very frequently -- and need large testes. Also, according to folklore, tanuki can change shape at will. Despite their playful nature, tanuki are wild animals and should never be kept chained up like in the photo above.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jul 20, 2001
Long-horned beetle
* Japanese name:Gomadara kamikir * Scientific name:Anoplophora malasiaca * Description: A black, 25-35 mm long bullet-shaped beetle with white spots and long, black and white-striped antennae, up to 11/2 times the body length. The legs are bluish; there is a spine on each side of the thorax. The white dots on the body give it another name: starry-sky beetle. These beetles make a rasping noise, like a ruler being dragged on the edge of a desk, by rubbing parts of the thorax together. The larvae are 50 mm long, fully grown.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jul 6, 2001
Beach wood louse
* Japanese name:Funamushi * Scientific name: Ligia exotica * Description: Beach wood lice are isopods, which are in the crustacean group, like shrimps. But unlike shrimps, their bodies are flattened parallel to the ground. Like regular wood lice, they have seven pairs of legs and large eyes. They also have two sensory "tails." They start breeding in spring from the age of 1 and may breed three times a year. They live up to three years. They're an ancient group of animals, having been around at least since the Carboniferous (300 million years ago). * Where to find them: They live at the seashore, just above the sea line, and venture into the intertidal zone, where rock pools form, when the tide is out. At high tide, they move higher up the beach. Turn over rocks, and you'll find many isopods of different sizes and colors. They have gills and can survive for short periods in seawater. For this reason, they are known as semiterrestrial isopods. They are also found in houses and boats near the sea, hence the Japanese name, funamushi, or "boat bug." * Food: These isopods are the cockroaches of the seashore (and are also known as sea roaches). They are scavengers, eating garbage, dead fish and algae (seaweed). They are harmless to humans. * Special features: Females don't lay eggs. After fertilization, the eggs are retained in a brood pouch in the female's body, where they hatch and remain for two months. Then they emerge as juveniles, which look like small adults. They have a neurogenic heart, which means that the heartbeat is controlled by a pacemaker. An impulse is sent by a special nerve to control the rate of the heart beat, like in a human heart. Unlike our hearts though, the isopod heart is tubular.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 29, 2001
Far East tree frog
* Japanese name:Nihon amagaeru * Scientific name:Hyla japonica * Description: These small, green frogs grow up to 5 cm long. They have discs for toes and a brown stripe running down each side of the body starting from the nostrils.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 22, 2001
Genji firefly
* Japanese name: Genjibotaru * Scientific name: Luciola cruciata * Description: Fireflies aren't flies -- they are beetles, as you can tell from the hard shell that protects their wings when they're not flying. Adults are 12-18 mm long. They have black bodies and legs, and a red thorax. The most amazing thing about fireflies, though, is the bright green light they generate in their abdomens. Nothing else flying at night does this -- if you see the green light, you know it's a firefly.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 15, 2001
Hummingbird hawkmoth
* Japanese name: Oosukashiba * Scientific name: Cephonodes hylas * Description: These moths are sometimes mistaken for hummingbirds, because they fly just like them. But they are in fact insects -- day-flying moths. The thorax and abdomen of this species are bright green, with red, black and yellow stripes, and it has a 50-70 mm wingspan. Its two pairs of wings are joined together (in most other species of insect, the two pairs of wings beat separately). Most other moths and butterflies have scales on their wings, but the wings of the hummingbird hawkmoth are clear. After its first flight the scales on its wings fall off, giving it another name -- the clearwing hummingbird moth. Its antennae are club-shaped and are used for balance -- if one gets damaged, the insect will fly around in circles.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 8, 2001
Gecko
*Japanese name:Nihon yamori *Scientific name:Gekko japonicus * Description: A type of lizard, geckos are soft-bodied, 10-14 cm long, bright gray in color, with bands or speckles on their backs and bulging eyes in a large head. Geckos have special expanded toes with suction pads that allow them to climb on glass and upside down on ceilings. The name probably comes from the "ge-ko" call that they make. *Where to find them:In houses. This species of gecko is common in cities from Honshu to Kyushu. They breed from May to August, and females lay one or two clutches of eggs in crevices in walls. The eggs take about 50 days to hatch. *Food:Geckos are carnivorous, eating insects that also live in houses. Maybe this is why in Japanese they are called "house guardians." * Special features: Like many lizards, geckos can automatically detach their tail if attacked by a predator (such as a cat). Special cells at the base of the tail snap shut the blood vessels so no blood is lost, but the gecko does lose a valuable supply of fat. Tails contain fat that the gecko can use if food supplies are short. The tail contains bone and nerves, but receives no signals from the brain when detached, so it jumps about and twitches on its own until it "dies." A tail jumping about on its own is enough to startle most predators, and the gecko can make its escape and grow a new tail.
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 1, 2001
Japanese rat snake
* Japanese name: Aodaisho
Number of homeless in Japan hits record low
Homeless people sleep on the street in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward in August 2021.
In Japan, regional revitalization fails to halt population decline
Sakiyama elementary school in Tamba, Hyogo Prefecture, in March .Over the past decade, the government has directed efforts toward policies designed to give young people incentives to base themselves in rural areas.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.
Ukraine is far from doomed
When comparing Ukraine’s military situation in 2024 to Europe’s in 1941, Russia’s defeat seems entirely possible.
When will Japan intervene to support the yen?
Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki has reiterated the government's readiness to take an appropriate action as the yen continues to slide against the U.S. dollar.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.
Casa del Cibo: A thriving jewel born from Tohoku’s harsh past
When chef Ryohei Ikemi moved to Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, and opened Casa del Cibo in 2011, it was the first proper Italian restaurant in the city.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.
Kyotographie's strong 12th edition shines light into the margins
Yassine Alaoui Ismaili, who goes by Yoriyas, turned to photography, shooting motion while in motion himself, after an injury forced him to give up his career as a professional breakdancer.

Podcast

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

Longform

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.
The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores
By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

A young restaurant leads the way in Karuizawa
A young restaurant leads the way in Karuizawa

SPECIAL SUPPLEMENTS note

Read more

SUPPLEMENTS BINDER