Traditional Custom of the Utilization of Herons and Great Cormorants at Lake Biwa —the Culture of Bird Utilization from the Edo Period to the Present Day

Abstract

Herons and Great Cormorants Phalacrocorax carbo nested at Chikubushima Island in Lake Biwa, Japan, during the Edo and Meiji periods (18 century ‒ early 20 century). Local residents had much experience with these bird species and a deep folkloric knowledge. The local residents ate the eggs and meat of these birds, and used their feathers for fishing gears and other purposes. Some of them caught the young cormorants and trained them for “cormorant fishing” in Fukui, in the Japan Sea side. However, from the middle of the Showa period (the mid-1900’s) they no longer utilized these bird species, even after the population increase of these bird species during the 1990s.