Satoyama: Japan’s Secret Watergarden
Each home has a built-in swimming pool or tank, partly inside the walls, partly outside…a constant source of spring water is led into the basin so that fresh water is always available. People are rinsing pots in sinks and washing freshly picked vegetables. If they just dumped the leftovers back into the water, they risked polluting the entire village’s water supply. However, carp can also scour a greasy or burnt pan. They wash dishes in Satoyama Village. This traditional arrangement is known as the riverside method. It is used throughout Japan. The tank water cleaned by the carp finally flows back into the canal.
Imagine a land where the seasons change, centuries of farming and fishing have transformed the land, and humans live in harmony with nature. Sangoro Tanaka lives in such a paradise. At 83, he is the caretaker of one of Japan’s secret water gardens.
For a thousand years, towns and villages have developed a unique system of making springs and water part of their homes. The stream flows from their house into Japan’s largest freshwater lake, near the ancient capital of Kyoto. This is such a valuable habitat that the Japanese have a special word for it: Satoyama, where the mountains give way to villages on the plains. They are remarkable environments, essential both to the people who cared for them and to the wildlife that now share them.
