IANDc.,C~API[ AND URBANPILANN|NG ELSEVIER
Landscape and Urban Planning37 (1997) 85-90
Influence of cultural factors on landscapes of mountainous farm villages in western Japan Mahito Kamada a,-, Nobukazu Nakagoshi b a Tokushima Prefectural Museum, Hachiman, T~,,kushima 770. Japan I, Department of Enrironmental Sciences. Faculty oj'Integrated Arts and Scienee~. Hiroshima Unirersi~.; Kagamiyama. Higashi-Hirashima 739. Japan
Abstract
The landscapes of two different mountainous farm villages. Higashi-lyayaala in Shikoku and Hiwa in western Honshu. Japan, have been studied to clarify both the causes for change and the ¢iJanges in land~ape heterogenetty in relation to traditional land uses and the ensuing changes in land use. Until the 1950s, agriculture was the most important factor in the creation of landscape heterogeneities; grass mowing produced organic fertilizer in both villages and slash-and-bum agriculture was carried out in Higashi-lyayama. These usages have been almost abolished over the last 40years. owing to social changes such as de[,opulation. Some areas of grassland and slash-and-burn agricultural fields have been transformed into conifer plantations. Other areas have been completely abandoned and changed into deciduous forests, through the process of succession. A mosaic landscape, composed of conifer plantations and deciduous forests, has become established in the abandoned agricultural areas. Keywords: Land use; Landscapechange; Landscapeheterogeneity:Mountainousfarm village
1. Introduction
Agricultural landscapes are established and changed under the influence of human activities (Kamada et al., 1991; Baudry, 1993; Na~/eh and Lieberman, 1994; Kamada and Nakagoshi, 1996). In Japan, people have been moving from rural areas to urban areas since the end of World War II. The landscapes in mountainous farm villages have drastically changed owing to depopulation and the change in land use itself.
In attempting to conserve traditional landscapes and to set up ecologically sustained landscapes in mountainous agricultural regions, the factors establishing rural landscapes and the trends towards change in such landscapes must be understood. The aim of this study is to clarify both the causes for change and the changes in landscape structure themselves, in two mountainous farm villages, in relation to traditional land uses.
2. Study areas • Correspondingauthor: Tel. 81 886 68 3636; Fax: 81 886 68 7197: Email:
[email protected] 0169-2046/97/$17.00 © 1997 Elsevier Science All rights reserved. PH SO 169-2046(9~)00372-6
We sct up two study areas: Higashi-lyayama-mura (33°52'N, 133°54'E) in the Shikoku Mountains and
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Hiwa-cho (35°00'N, 132°59'E) in the Chugoku Mountains, in western Japan. The Higashi-Iyayama area has an altitude of 420m to 1955m. There is no alluvial plain and residential areas and croplands are found on steep slopes, up to 1000m altitude. All land below 1000m is covered by secondary vegetation (Kamada and Somiya, 1994). People made a living mainly from millet production in permanent fields and slash-and-burn agricultural fields untit the 1950s. Population decreased from 6542 in 1950 to 2831 in 1990. The Hiwa area has an altitude of 350m to 1280m. There are relatively large alluvial plains. People have lived on those plains and made their living there through rice production. A large part ef Hiwl is covered by secondary vegetation (Nakagoshi et al., 1989), owing to human activities. Population d,:creased from 5341 in 1950 to 2392 in 1985. In both villages, land uses and landscape structures changed from those of the 1950s, because of depopulation. Young people left the two villages to look for ~.mployment in urban areas. Agriculture became a set:ondary job. The intensity of .....2 use decreased with the decrease in the number of farm labourers. Fig. ! shows the changes in several land use areas. The grassland, with its relatively intensive need for management, has decreased. At the same time, conifer plantations, which require little management, h,"ve increased. Forestry has replaced some areas of cropland and natural forest with conifer plantations in Higashi-lyayama.
100000~
Higashi-lyayama
3. Methods Current landscape structures were analysed using actual vegetation maps, drawn at a scale of 1:25 000, for both Higashi-Iyayama (Kamada and Somiya, 1994) and Hiwa (Nakagoshi et al., 1989). For Higashi-Iyayama, a linear sampling method (Forman and Godron, 1986) was applied to describe current landscape structure. A line of 36cm (9km in real size) was set on the vegetation map. The line was subdivided into 144 segments (62.5 m, in real size, per segment). Then, the dominant landscape element type was recorded for each segment. For part of an area around the line, the 1960 distribution of grasslands, slash-and-burn agricultural fields and permanent fields was detected by using a land register and a set of aerial photographs taken in 1954. For Hiwa, the size ant, type of all patches represented in the vegetation map were iaeasured. Land use histories in both villages were mainly recorded through inter,iews with local f, xmers and land owners. Available books on the history of Hiwa were also useful in under3tanding its land management (Someya et al., 1989).
4. Results
4. !. Higashi-lyayama Fig. 2 shows the distribution of permanent fields, slash-and-burn fields, and mowing sites in 1960.
1500t
Hiwa
~O l OO~ 1960 I 1970y(lar 19;0 11990 0-1 1950 (~
19'60Year19'70 195]0
Grassland --&-- Coniferplantation Cropland(Permanentfield) ~ Deciduousforest
)
Fig. I. Land use changes in the study villages.Data from Agricultureand ForestryCensus of Japan (1960-1985) and StatisticalYear Book for Agriculture.Forestryand Fisheryof Tokushima Prefecture(1960-1990).
M. Kamada. IV. Nakagoshi / Landscape and Urban Planning 37 ! 1997) 85-90
1, !
87
100
Relatively small patches of grassland (82.1 ha on average) were distributed on a slope. Miscanthus sit, ensis, grown on these grasslands, was mowed and p u t into the fields to be used as fertilizer. These grasslands were privately owned and used. Large grasslands 0575.2 ha on average) were distributed on the mountain ridges. They were maintained for collecting M. sinensis, used as roof material. These grasslands were shared by the community members. In this v~llage, most ridges from 1200m to 1600m altitude were burnt early every summer, to maintain the grasslands. Controlled burning continued until about 1960, and has now been completely abandoned. In Fig. 3, vegetation change at the Ochiai Pass, at 1520m altitude, is shown by the coverage: ranges of
Fig. 3. Vegetationchange at the Ochiai Pass at 1520m ~ , shown by the coverage ranges of Miscanthus sinensis and Sasa bayatae in five surveyedplots (after Kamada(1994)).
Fig. 2. Distributionof permanent fields, slash-and-bumagricultural fields,and grasslandsin part of the area around the sampled line in Higashi-lyayamain 1960. (See also Fig. 4.)
M. sinensis ann Sasa hayatae in five surveyed plots. In ! 961, M. sinensis dominated mid S. hayatae was subordinate. In 1979, the coverage af S. hayatae became competitive with the coverage of M. sinensis. At presem, o,iy S,,~a rcma'.'~o Th-_~ ;~ the result of the cessation of burning. In other words, M. sinensis grassland can be maintained only under such management as burning and mowing (Kamada, 1994). The distribution of the burnt area co~xesponds to the current distribution of Sasa grasslands. It is considered that the Sasa grasslands growing on ridge below 1600m altitude were formerly M. sinensis grasslands (Kamada, 1994). Fig. 4 shows current landscape structure along the line. Relatively small patches of permanent fields (of 85.9 m length on average), M. sinensis grasslands (89.3 m on average) and conifer plantations (135.4m on average) are distributed in residential areas. When the number of workers decreased, it became hard for farmers to m~ntain all fields, as in the 1960s. Therefore, farmers transformed some fields to grasslands. Grasslands are maintained by relatively extensive management, compared with the management necessary for fields. For the same reason, some fields were turned into conifer plantatior.s. Medium-sized patches of conifer plantations (224.0 m on average) and deciduous forests (250.0 m on average) are distributed around the residential areas. Farmers abol-
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M. Kamada. N. Nakagoshi / Landscape and Urban Planning 37 (1997) 85-90
lys River ~
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Extensive use
Residential area
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Intensive use
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J State forest ~._ I j.Extensive use
Intensive use 1800 1600kArea sh°wn in Fig'2
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[] []
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Beechforest (Tall height) []Deciduous oak forest (Tall h#!ght) [ ~ Deciduousoak forest (Mediumheight) ~ Carpinusforest (Tall height)
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[ ] S a s a grassland [ ] B i r c h forest
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Coniferplantation (Tall height) Coniferplantation (Mediumheight) Miscanthussinensisgrassland
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Degradedland
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River
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Segment number Fig. 4. Current landscape, stvacture along the sampled line in Higashi-lyayama. Forested vegetation was classified by height into ,hree groups according to the vegetation map (Kamada and Somiya, 1994): tall. H > 8 m; medium, 3 m < H < 8 m; short, H < 3 m.
i s h e d s l a s h - a n d - b u r n agricultural fields and grasslands, a n d they p l a n t e d c o n i f e r o u s saplings. A large patch o f natural b e e c h forest (750.0 m ) has r e m a i n e d , far f r o m the settlement.
4.2. H i w a
T h e s c h e m e o f l a n d s c a p e c h a n g e in H i w a is s h o w n in Fig. 5. Before the 1960s, m o w i n g sites w e r e
U n t i l 1950s
Present Abandonment
Post-too I~ DP.ciduous oak ~-_%.~forest ~
~ Conifer plantation ~
Miscanthus sinensis ~ Paddy field and I grassland ~ residential area Movement of collected Miscanthus sinensis
I
Fig. 5. A scheme of landscape change in Hiwa during the last 40 years.
M. Kamada. N. Nakagoshi / Landscape and Urban :~lanning 37 (1997) 85-90
maintained around paddy fields. M. sinensis was mowed and used as organic fertilizer. A farmer kept grasslands at several sites, and the total grassland area was double that of paddy fields (Someya et at., 1989). Pastures were maintained at sites far from the settlement. Large patches of pasture were kept in the public area and shared by community members. The grassland area decreased drastically after the 1960s (Fig. 1), correlated with depopulation, the replacement of organic fertilizer with chemicals and the replacement of cattle with machines. Parts of the abandoned grasslands were replaced by secondary oak forests, through succession; others were replaced by conifer plantations, depending on the decisions of farmers. A chequerboard landscape was established over this post-gras, land area, owing to differences in treatment as well as the timing of decision-making by farmers. In the district with larger paddy fields, a highly heterogeneous landscape has been created, because the large grassland area was owned and managed by
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=E
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Area of paddy field in each district (%) Fig. 6. The relationships between the area of paddy field and the number of patches Iw.r 1000ha (A), and mean size of patches (B) among nine districts in Hiwa (after Someya et al. (1989)).
89
many farmers. This hypothesis has been examined for r,ine districts in Hiwa (Fig. 6). There is a large number of patches and their average size tends to be small, in these larger paddy fields districts (Someya et al., 1989).
5. Discus.,~ion The landscape structure in mountainous farm regions in Japan, and agricultural uses of the mountains (such as slash-and-burn agriculture and grass mow~.ag), were the main factors in establishing landscape heterogeneities up to the 1950s. A heterogeneous ann multi-agricultural landscape was maintained, supported by a complex social organization with stric~ rules as to management of resources. This landscape might t,e similar to that of the Cantabrian mountains in Spain, as reported by Gtmez-Sai et at. (1993). The traditional regime that creates and maintains landscape heterogeneity has completely changed over the last 40years. New patches of conifer plantations and deciduous oak forests emerged in the abandoned grasslands, owing to private forestry and natural succession, in both Higahi-lyayama and Hiwa. So.,r,~e cropland areas were converted into grassland and plantations in Higashi-lyayama. These changes in landscape structure are similar to those in an area of the Cantabrian mountains (Gtmez-Sal et al., 1993): there was a loss of crop area that was converted into different t~pes of grassland or scrub-land, and some pastures were replaced by pine plantations. Then the shrub pasture changed to more complex forest, and croplands were replaced by grasslands. Succession and plantation may be the dominant forces of landscape change in depopulated mountainous areas. The former distribution of grasslands--where grass mowing was continued until the 1950sin strongly affects current landscapes, in both Higashilyayama and Hiwa. Because the grasslands on slopes were privately owned and maintained by local farmers, a chequerboard landscape has been established on former grassland, owing to differences in treatment and timing of decision-making by farmers. Baudry (1993) and Medley et al. (I 995) stressed that the cultural and technological factors that operate at the farm level, coupled with meso-scale variation in
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M. Kamada, N. Nakagoski / Landscape and Urban Planning 37 (1997) 85-90
the physical conditions of an alea, tend to influence landscape-level patterns more than regional socioeconomics and governmental police:,. In both Higashi-Iyayama and Hiwa, cu,;rent lat~dscapes are arranged in accordance with the gradient o f availability or accessibility of the sites for farmers. In the residential area, farmers can privately own and intensively manage their lar~ds. There are small patches of cropland and grassland. The nearby mountain slope is composed of medium-sized patches of deciduous forests and conifer plantations. "rhe vegetation far from the residential area is owned by the district community and managed extensively, or else it remains natural forest. Therefore the landscape is composed of a small number of large patches. A similar patxem of landscape structure has been reported in the Chilean landscape; the most degraded land is found near the settlement, the shrubby matrix appears in the middle range, and original vegetation remains on relatively inaccessible slopes (Fuentes, 1990). These landscape patterns are derived from the differences of energy necessary to maintain the patches (Corona, 1993); this seems to be a common trend in mountainous farm landscapes. In conclusion, similar traits in "he iand,~cape pattern and its changing process ~,re found in mountainous farm areas in variot~s regions: two study regions in Japan and the other regions in the rest of the world. A less organ'~zed pattern in farm regions might be produced if personal preference were the determining factor of land use. To specify the pattern and process of rural landscapes, it will be necessary for world-wide studies to be well designed in an analogous sense.
Acknowledgements We thank Takashi Someya of the Asia Air Survey and Ms. Tamami Fukuda of the Osaka Prefecture University for their assistance in data collection. We also thank Dr. Jacques Baudry from the INRA in France, for giving us the chance to present this paper at the I A L E Congress 1995, Toulouse. This study was supported in part by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (No. 07308066) from the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture of Japan.
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