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San'in Kaigan NP, Kyoto
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At Shotenkyo’s western tip, a channel only about 30 m wide connects Kumihama Bay with the Sea of Japan. Sheltered waters rich in plankton let oysters reach harvest size in 1 year, versus the usual 2–3.
Kumihama’s dune-watermelon story began in 1861, when seeds arrived from Saikyo. Today, growers sell a rugby-ball-shaped mini-watermelon called “Dune Egg,” named for the way it seems to pop from the sand.
At nearby Hakoshihama, on the same dune coast, finds span Jōmon to Muromachi times—including a coin from China’s Xin dynasty (8–23 CE). The site was designated a National Historic Site in 1921.
Around 20,000 years ago, sea level here was over 100 m lower and 4 rivers joined in a valley open to the Sea of Japan. After the ice age, rising seas and Shotenkyo’s sandbar created Kumihama Bay.
On the connected Hakoshihama dunes, blue-purple Tōteiran grows wild—an endemic flower found at only a few sites in Japan. It is Kyotango’s city flower, and locals take pride in its rare colony.
Kyoto geologists think Shotenkyo grew by joining older dune remnants at Kuzuno and Minatomiya. At Kuzuno, charcoal in soil atop a raised old sandbar dated to 4,790 ±100 years BP.
Local volunteers succeeded in trial oyster farming in 1937, with raft culture beginning around 1950. By 1959, Kyoto, the town and fishers’ co-op had developed a method for this bay; its oyster rafts are now recognized as a cultural landscape.
At nearby Hakoshihama, black-pine planting began in the Edo period. Wartime resin tapping and later pine-wilt outbreaks put the grove at risk; local high-school students now help restore it.
Shotenkyo’s sand isn’t shaped by one steady current: Kyoto’s geological survey reports a dominant eastward alongshore flow in summer and westward in winter. It also records 1–4 submerged sandbars within 500 m offshore.
