A Forest Health Check in Tottori: Pictures of Leaves and Blurry Insects

Last time I made a post about the scenery near my home. I've also visited a forest in Wakasa – about 35 kilometers away from here.


Why a mountain forest in Wakasa?
Well... Let's have a look at lumber production in Japan.
A lot of mountain forests in Tottori are not natural, but planted for lumber. So the forest mainly consist of a single, fast-growing pine species. In the case of the forest visited, this was the sugi (杉) species.
The cycle of cutting and planting actually allowed for rich forest diversity. This practice of nature existing in coexistence – and partially thanks to – human influence, is a concept called “satoyama”. Which I am writing a paper about, actually...

But here's the problem: lumber prices dropped. Business being no longer lucrative, the pines don't get cut anymore. And so they grow bigger and bigger. Planted in tight rows, the growing trees loot all the sunlight from the poor starving weeds below.
Undergrowth perishes, animals go on a pine-bark diet and the forest's nature deteriorates.

Recently, an activity was organized to keep track of the forest's health: a yearly forest health check-up.

And I participated. :) Professor Nagamatsu introduced me to the event, and allowed me to participate – even though the application date was over already. *round of grateful applause*
This year there were a little over 40 participants. Guess the event is not well-known yet...

Quite a long intro, isn't it? So... Let's move on to the pictures. The first forest was planted on top of ancient paddy fields.
I found it difficult to imagine that these were once sunny rice terraces... With croaking frogs and butterflies...

I think I saw a deer here, but I'm not certain. It was big, brown and fast. That's all I know. Does seeing a flying brown blob even count as deer sighting? Actually no, it doesn't.


The second forest was quite different... For one, it was STEEP.
Littered with rocks, too. Rocks, and tree roots on top of the rocks. That made climbing quite a challenge - feet getting twisted, rocks stumbling down... The first time a rock came crashing down, I had a mini-heart attack! I thought one of the volunteers was rolling to his death!

Now, what did we do exactly? Measuring. Tree circumference, number of weed species present, slope angle... Especially measuring a tree's height was difficult! No, we didn't climb them. We used some tools and calculations, but the problem was that to calculate correctly, you needed plain view of the tree from top to bottom. And as you read in the introduction: these are fast-growing trees, planted closely together and their planned cutting is long overdue.

 

And at last, after completing the check-up, we left a little wooden board saying we carried out the forest health check, with our names at the back.

The rope and wood we used won't pollute the forest.
It'll get slowly digested by the ecosystem ;)

Sadly, in both forests we visited, the conclusion was the same: too many fat trees binging on sunlight. The forest needs some maintenance... Luckily, as you saw in the pictures, it's not yet too late: there's still some undergrowth and specks of light coming through.

Let's end with a few more pictures from the "Forest Health Check" adventure. :)

 

The next post will be about some plants and animals I encountered. For now, let's just say that I regret not bringing a macro lens to Japan...

Actually, maybe I'll post three times this week. There's also an update needed for my older post "How About Doing Something? Challenges: Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Yearly ": the 100 day challenge has ended, and I want to try a month-challenge.

Note: some images were edited (cropped or contrast upped).

The First Batch Of PICTURES: Scenery of Tottori within Walking Distance

Finally! The pictures have arrived! I kept postponing this to “tomorrow”, and then decided that today is tomorrow. :P


So this post as well as the next few posts will focus on pictures. Today I'll show where I live! If you want to see specific pictures in a following blog post, just ask me!


Let's start with the most important picture:

A lot of people didn't believe this was really my university' mascot. I'm hoping this proves it.
In Belgium, all school/university logos are like this:

No wonder no one believed me.

Many were also curious why I chose Tottori University. It's a small university, not well known in Europe. There were two main reasons: 1. I could freely take on courses 2. The environment had beautiful, rich nature. The mascot might have also played a role in deciding, but let's go with these two.
Taking on courses: check. I enrolled in a few courses.The Japanese level is still too high for me. I think one of the lectures is about plants. Let's hope I figure out the rest too.
Rich nature: mountains! I love mountains! That's the first thing I noticed upon arrival - mountains everywhere! Covered in green, thick forest, seemingly floating above the clouds...

So let's show off some mountains! Click on a picture to enlarge it.

Pretty much mountains all around. Except for the beach part. The mountains slowly fade into hills, and then there's suddenly the Japanese sea!

 

 

Next, a few random trees and shrine scenery. I love nature. The first time visiting a shrine, I didn't bring my camera. However, yesterday I went to the forest! With my camera! That's material for a different post.

Took this one whilst riding my bike. :P

 

To end with, here I am with my classmates ^_^

 
So in today's post I only covered scenery within walking distance from my house. A few were shot by Marcos (link leads his Portugese blog).
Note: all pictures are unedited.

Reasons Why I Shouldn't Travel By Plane

Tomorrow I finally leave for Japan... 

1. I try to board the wrong plane

"Look, a plane!"
"I have to be on a plane..."
"Must. Get. On. Plane."

Luckily, there's always a lady at the gate to stop me.

2. I lose my stuff

Credit to hotblack, MorgueFile license

3. I forget about boarding rules

4. I like airplane food

...and that just can't be a good thing!

23kg, that's 288 pairs of socks, or 1/32 of a cow

You know the weight limit checked luggage has? 23kg per piece. 23 kilograms. How much of my life would fit in a 23kg piece of luggage?

I bought a big ass bag.

Seriously. I fit in it.

I tried sleeping in it, but it isn't as comfortable as it is big.

If I with my 65 kilos fit in my bag, then how much will it weigh once I've filled it to the brim? Will it weigh 65kg? That's quite a pricy overweight luggage fine. I should only fill it with lightweight stuff, like socks. Let's keep the shampoo and rock collection aside for now.
So I started packing.

Shoes! Socks! Tops!

After I had filled my case with socks (and a few towels), I tried to lift it.
OH DEAR SO HEAVY
This was 80 kilos at least!

So I acquired a scale to check its weight.

10,1 KG

Oh, okay. It were just my arms being weak. Quite a surprise, as I'm able to do as much as six push-ups! For real, check it out:

So... This bag bursting out of its zippers...
Wait, 10,1 KG? Not even half of the limit? This thing was filled to the brim! Or to the zipper, if that's the expressions for luggage.

I was flabbergasted. People, what's this fuss about weight limit panic? It's not like I am taking too little with me – I got four pairs of shoes, and five pants!

I looked for more possessions to stuff in my bag. The unnecessary but not completely useless kind of things, you know. And the heavier the better.

"This rock would make a great paperweight."

 
 I ended up packing stacks of printing paper, to not let the unused kilos go to waste.

CHILDHOOD STORIES: Why I Ate My Boogers

As I child, I ate my boogers. Openly. Incessantly. Proudly.
My parents must have been desperate. They couldn't make me stop in any way. My parents failed to figure out why I did this. Or why I even encouraged other children to do it. 

If they had known why, maybe they could have stopped me. It all started with a penguin.

On a family trip to the zoo, we met this guy:

I asked why this new penguin had yellow thingies on his head.

"That's spaghetti," my father said.
"Yes," added my mother. "When he's starving, he can eat it."


Woa. How mesmerizing, the wonders of nature! A built-in food factory? Amazing!
It didn't take me long to realize that we, humans, also had such a food factory.

Finally I understood why my nose made icky boogers all the time! I was lacking food!
So I started eating my boogers. As nature had intended.

Day in, day out, my nose continued to provide boogers, signaling my lack of sufficient nutrition. I noticed boogers in other children's noses. Eager to save them from starvation, I convinced many, many fellow toddlers to join me eating the fruits of my immune system.


Too bad they didn't taste like spaghetti.

~Closing Note~
Yes, I did eventually realize that the penguin didn't carry spaghetti around. Moral of the story: don't listen to your parents.