Hokkaido. It covers a total area of some 
16,000ha which, if the surrounding marshlands 
and hills are included, forms a region 
approximately 26,000ha that has been 
designated the Kushiro Wetlands National Park. 
Figure I shows the location of the park. It is the 
natural habitat of the Japanese Crane, which is a 
protected species of national importance, and 
part of the wetlands is designated as a bird 
sanctuary. Furthermore, in 1980, the Kushiro 
Wetlands was the first such place in Japan to be 
registered under the international Ramsar 
Convention (Convention on Wetlands of 
International Importance Especially as 
Waterfowl Habitat). The Kushiro area's urban 
development is flourishing and the construction 
of a national highway bypass and factories on 
the coastal sand dune region are bringing 
changes to the environment which are becoming 
the focus of attention. 
2.2 The Japanese Cranes 
In the 19th century, the Japanese Crane was 
prevalent throughout Hokkaido, and there are 
records of sightings in Edo (now Tokyo). 
However, due to uncontrolled hunting, the 
Japanese Crane was at one point faced with 
extinction. The help of local residents in the 
vicinity of the wetlands who supply food to the 
cranes during the winter, and the fact that they 
have been specified as a national monumental 
animals, has resulted in the survival of some 600 
cranes being confirmed. Although there has been 
an overall increase in the number of cranes, there 
has been no appreciable increase in the number 
of fledglings, indicating that the crane 
population is suffering an aging phenomenon. 
This is likely the, result of progressing 
development around their habitat and the effect 
of deterioration of their natural nesting 
environment. 
80 
3. OBJECTIVES 
The specific objectives of this research were as 
follows: 
1. Environmental Evaluation by Landscape 
Ecology 
The purpose was to determine whether an ideal 
environment has been preserved for the Japanese 
Crane and also to evaluate the effectiveness of 
future preservation measures. 
2. To Investigate the Possibility of Determining 
a Biotope by Landscape Ecology 
4. METHODS 
4.1 Landscape Ecology Analysis 
To investigate the changes in land cover, an 
analysis was carried out by comparison of 
remote sensing images of the wetlands areas at 
different times. Calculations were made based 
on the differences in the geometrically corrected 
topographical maps produced from LANDSAT 
images of 1984 and 1991. 
4.2 Analytical Procedure 
The secondary data was classified into 50 
different classes. Similar classes were then 
combined into 5 categories by grouping. The 
distribution of vegetation was applied to the 
combined data with reference to existing 
vegetation maps (vegetation maps produced 
from aerial photographs in 1985131), Also, using 
polygon data constructed from the Kushiro 
Wetlands National Park regional and planning 
maps, th 
extracted. 
of the dev 
change c; 
calculatec 
of the nat 
A: wetle 
B: wetla 
C: wetla 
D: watei 
E: water 
5. RESUI 
The chang 
region of 
inter-imag 
each chan 
5.1 Effect 
Of the « 
protected 
changes | 
fields etc. 
There are : 
wetlands; 
period fro 
decreased. 
From the : 
obtained: 
a 
- "7 OO /N