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Yakushima NP, Kagoshima
Claim this place to tell your story your way.
The same building houses the Environment Ministry’s Yakushima Nature Conservation Office. Rangers use automatic trail counters to record climbers going up and down, data that helps guide mountain management.
Look down at the central field model: it includes Yakushima and neighboring Kuchinoerabu Island, with national-park and World Heritage boundaries marked alongside notable places. The park story spans 2 islands.
The center’s mountain display introduces 岳参り (take-mairi), a traditional pilgrimage in which local communities visit sacred peaks to pray for peaceful lives and abundant harvests.
In a 2025 nature-themed contest, Yakushima Town’s schoolchildren submitted 381 artworks; 25 winning pieces were exhibited at the center. The islands’ next generation gets to tell part of their nature story, too.
A single vegetation model takes you from evergreen forest by the coast to grassland near the summits. Audio explains how Yakushima’s plant communities shift with altitude across the island.
For Japan’s 2025 Year of the Snake, a summer show at the center spotlighted Yakushima’s snakes through photos, video and specimens—a zodiac-year theme featuring the island’s real reptiles.
The second-floor photo corner features a new monthly display of pictures taken by center staff. It also shows specimens of Yakushima’s plants and animals, bringing field observations indoors.
Yakushima’s 1993 World Heritage listing led to this center’s opening in April 1996. Its exhibits were renewed on May 1, 2014—the 50th anniversary year of the island’s first national-park designation.
