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Minami Alps NP, Shizuoka / Nagano
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At 2,592 m, Mount Tekari is Japan’s southernmost peak above 2,500 m. Yet its summit barely clears the forest line, so the highest point is tucked among trees rather than perched on a bare, panoramic crest.
The name Tekari, or “shining,” points not to the summit but to the 50-metre limestone tower just below it: in evening light, its pale face can gleam against the dark forest.
The pale limestone tower is more than a landmark: its rocky habitat shelters ice-age relict plants, including Chounosuke-so and Miyama-akebonosou, as well as alpine butterflies.
Nearby Izaruga-dake—not Tekari’s summit—is the world’s southernmost breeding site of Japan’s ptarmigan. A 2025 Environment Ministry review lists 24 territories across the wider Hijiri–Tekari range in 2019/2023.
At Senjigahara, between Tekari Hut and Izaruga-dake, grass-topped earth hummocks rise about 40–50 cm. Bare ground freezes first, lifting nearby plant-covered soil into these small mounds.
In August 1923, a 19-person survey party—including local plant researchers, teachers, guides and porters—crossed Tekari, Hijiri and Akaishi over 6 nights to study this remote mountain country.
In 2025, local stewards added deer fencing around Tekari Hut and at nearby Shizutaka-daira. Deer browsing had left a once-noted flower meadow with only Hakusan-fuuro and kobai-keiso still flowering.
On the Nagano-side route to Tekari, a local mountain group opened a rental-tent camp at Mendaira in 2021. Climbers can leave their tents behind—but are asked to pack out rubbish, including portable-toilet waste.
Tekari’s forests change markedly with elevation: cool-temperate beech and mizunara oak grow to about 1,700 m; subarctic conifers take over above, leading to alpine dwarf pine and plants adapted to limestone.
