Usujiri Fisheries Station

Field Science Center for Northern Biosphere,
HOKKAIDO UNIVERSITY
Usujiri 151, Hakodate, Hokkaido 041-1613
Tel: 01372-2-3237, 01372-2-5088
Fax: 01372-2-5088
http://www.hokudai.ac.jp/fsc/usujiri/usujiri.html

Staff

Director: Dr. Hiroyuki Munehara
           (Fish Ecology, Behavioral Ecology)

Outline

   Usujiri Fisheries Station was established at the mouth of Volcano Bay in the southern part of Hokkaido in 1970, and was equipped for study and education of researchers and students of the Faculty of Fisheries Science.  It is also open to researches from other Institutes.
   The coast, where this station is located, is under the strong influence of the Chishima cold current although the Tsugaru warm current is running off the shore.  Consequently, the research conducted here is mainly focused on the creatures inhabiting low water temperatures (the range of 2.6-19.1 C).
   The station is at 40km from the center of Hakodate city, and it is about an hour by car.  If you wish to visit the station, you are requested to contact us and must inform us your firm schedule and we can help your research plan.  The accommodation built in the station site is available to the visitors of the station.  The charge is \850 per one night from in summer and \1,140 in the other seasons.  This charge includes rental room fee, bed sheet supply and service. 

Facilities

   A total of 5,000 researchers and students visit to this Station per one year.  Seawater supply is the important facilities for them.  Seawater is pumped up to the laboratory rooms, so all visitors can use much seawater for their experiments.  Our station also has many microscopes for marine biological exercise.  In addition to these educational apparatus, a various study instruments are equipped for researchers.

(Keeping tools for creatures)

Cold rooms (70 square meters, 30 square meters)
Tanks (10 liters - 7,000 liters)
Cooler and heater

(Vessel) 

A boat of capacity of 8 persons
GPS plotter

(Experiment tools and instruments)

DNA auto sequencer
DNA auto extractor
Thermal cyclers
Clean bench
Cooling centrifuges
Apparatus for histological preparation
Spectrophotometer
Fluorescent microscope and high quality digital camera

(Scuba equipment)

High pressure compressor and air tanks
Dry suits, wet suits and sinkers
Underwater scooters

Education and Research  

   The Station staff and the graduate students are studying the reproductive ecology, molecular ecology and biogeography of the coastal animals.  Usujiri coast is the unique region where boreal species and temperate species are concurrently distributed. Concerning fishes, most residents such as Cottidae, Agonidae, Hemitripteridae, Hexagrammidae and Stichaedae originate from boreal regions.  These fishes are the important resources for fisheries sciences and the precious elements in the local ecosystem.  On the other hand, temperate species such as Sparidae, Embiotocidae, Pomacentridae, Monacanthidae, Tetraodontidae seasonally occur in the shore for drifting from the southern Japan by Kuroshio warm current during the eggs and larvae.  These seasonal migrants are a good index element for global warming problem.  The DNA of these fishes may show the historical trace in biogeographic scale.  Coexistence of the boreal and temperate elements sounds to compare with a harmony among creatures in a sphere.  A goal of our research is to find the global theorem through local ecological studies.

Policies

   This Station is opened for the researchers who hope to conduct any academic activities.  We do our best to support all the legal projects planned by visiting researchers.  If you have a project availing the native environment with the facilities provided in this Station, please let me know your plan.  We are willingly to support all the active visitors.