Trout and Char of the World

15: Trout and Char of Japan

Kentaro Morita

doi: https://doi.org/10.47886/9781934874547.ch15

As in North America and Europe, stream salmonids are iconic species for Japanese anglers and naturalists. Unfortunately, much of the important information regarding the natural history of the species of trout and char found in Japan has been published in Japanese. As a result, full representation of the Japanese species is somewhat unknown to the non-Japanese-speaking scientific community. This article reviews relevant reports—especially those written in Japanese—for the benefit of a broad audience with an interest in the trout and char of Japan.

Four species of stream salmonids are native in Japan. Their scientific, English, and Japanese names are, respectively,

• Salvelinus malma, Dolly Varden, oshorokoma;
• Salvelinus leucomaenis, White-spotted Char (also, Whitespotted Char), iwana;
• Oncorhynchus masou, Masu Salmon (also known as Cherry Salmon), yamame for resident or landlocked and sakura-masu for migrant or anadromous; and
• Parahucho perryi (synonym Hucho perryi), Sakhalin Taimen (also known as Jap- anese Huchen), itou.