Various Local resources in Nikaho
Blessings of the Ocean
Summary
The average depth of the Japan Sea is about 1,667 meters. There are four straits; Mamiya, Soya, Tsugaru, and Tsushima whose water depths are shallow, which makes the Japan Sea known as insular. The volume of the Japan Sea is 1.7 × 106 cubic kirometers representing about 0.13 % of the world's oceanic water, which tells how small the Japan Sea is. However there is a huge amount and variety of seafoods thanks to the tide where warm and cold currents meet. Hatahata is known as the prefectural fish because a shoal of hatahata grown with cold nutrient-rich water comes close to the coastline along the warm current moves north and the area around here is good place to catch.
FEATURE
Nikaho has four fishing ports; Kisakata, Kosagawa, Konoura, and Hirasawa. Their common fishing methods are bottom trawls, set net, gillnet, longlines, skin diving, etc. We can see a diverse variety of fish such as hatahata, codfish, salmon, trout, flounder, mackerel, crab, rock oyster, turban shell, abalone, shrimp, jack mackerel, octopus, shark, and sea lettuce. A rock oyster has naturally grown on the coastline thanks to the spring water from Mt. Chokai which is nutrient-rich and always cold. Many tourists visit Nikaho for them in summer.
