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Shikotsu-Tōya NP., Hokkaido
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On April 17, 1912, Austrian Lt. Col. Theodor von Lerch’s party made a ski ascent of Yotei. A local history says newspapers hailed it as an unprecedented feat in Japan—one snowy climb that helped make Kutchan a ski town.
A lava flow from about 4,000 years ago reached part of today’s Kutchan town; Yotei’s last known eruption came about 2,500 years ago. The familiar cone has a surprisingly close connection to town streets.
At Yotei’s foot in Kyogoku, rain and snow seep underground for decades before emerging at Fukidashi Spring. About 80,000 tonnes gush out daily at around 6.5°C—enough water for roughly 300,000 people.
At Yotei’s foot in Kutchan, settlers planted potatoes with beans and grain in 1892. Suited to the cold, potatoes later helped families through repeated poor harvests—and remain one of the area’s signature foods.
An AIST geology account records Yotei’s Ainu name as Matene-siri, “woman mountain,” and nearby Mt. Shiribetsu as Pinne-siri, “man mountain”; the two peaks were regarded as a pair.
Yotei’s alpine zone has been a national Natural Monument since 1921. Above 1,700m, more than 100 alpine plant species are said to flower; the designation especially noted distinctive Ezo-no-tsugazakura and iwaicho communities.
Yotei’s summit zone is home to a named subspecies of Chishima ground beetle: Carabus kurilensis yoteizanus. Its scientific name itself marks this mountain as the beetle’s distinctive home.
Yotei’s summit has craters called Chichigama (“Father”), Hahagama (“Mother”) and Kogama (“Child”). The largest, Father, is about 700m across, and snowmelt can pool inside it as a crater lake.
Older maps labeled Yotei as Shiribeshi-yama, or Kōhō-Yōtei-zan; a 1969 map changed its main label to Yōtei-zan. Yet the summit’s first-order survey point had another name: Makkari-dake.
