Lateral line
The lateral line called lateral line system or lateral line organ, is a system of sense organs found in aquatic vertebrates, used to detect movement and pressure gradients in the surrounding water. The sensory ability is achieved via modified epithelial cells, known as hair cells, which respond to displacement caused by motion and transduce these signals into electrical impulses via excitatory synapses. Lateral lines serve an important role in schooling behavior and orientation. Fish can use their lateral line system to follow the vortices produced by fleeing prey. Lateral lines are visible as faint lines of pores running lengthwise down each side, from the vicinity of the gill covers to the base of the tail. In some species, the receptive organs of the lateral line have been modified to function as electroreceptors, which are organs used to detect electrical impulses, as such, these systems remain linked. Most amphibian larvae and some aquatic adult amphibians possess mechanosensitive systems comparable to the lateral line.
Due to many overlapping functions and their great similarity in ultrastructure and development, the lateral line system and the inner ear of fish are grouped together as the octavolateralis system. The lateral line system allows the detection of movement and pressure gradients in the water surrounding an animal, providing spatial awareness and the ability to navigate in the environment; this plays an essential role in orientation, predatory behavior and social schooling. A related aspect to social schooling is the hypothesis that schooling confuses the lateral line of predatory fishes. In summary, a single prey fish creates a rather simple acoustic pattern while pressure gradients of many swimming prey fish will overlap; the lateral line system is necessary to detect vibrations made by prey, to orient towards the source to begin predatory action. Fish are able to detect movement, produced either by prey or a vibrating metal sphere, orient themselves toward the source before proceeding to make a predatory strike at it.
This behavior persists in blinded fish, but is diminished when lateral line function was inhibited by CoCl2 application. Cobalt chloride treatment results in the release of cobalt ions, disrupting ionic transport and preventing signal transduction in the lateral lines; these behaviors are dependent on mechanoreceptors located within the canals of the lateral line. The role mechanoreception plays. A school of Pollachius virens was established in a tank and individual fish were removed and subjected to different procedures before their ability to rejoin the school was observed. Fish that were experimentally blinded were able to reintegrate into the school, while fish with severed lateral lines were unable to reintegrate themselves. Therefore, reliance on functional mechanoreception, not vision, is essential for schooling behavior. A study in 2014 suggests that the lateral line system plays an important role in the behavior of Mexican blind cave fish; the major unit of functionality of the lateral line is the neuromast.
The neuromast is a mechanoreceptive organ. There are two main varieties of neuromasts located in animals, canal neuromasts and superficial or freestanding neuromasts. Superficial neuromasts are located externally on the surface of the body, while canal neuromasts are located along the lateral lines in subdermal, fluid filled canals; each neuromast consists of receptive hair cells whose tips are covered by a flexible and jellylike cupula. Hair cells possess both glutamatergic afferent connections and cholinergic efferent connections; the receptive hair cells are modified epithelial cells and possess bundles of 40-50 microvilli "hairs" which function as the mechanoreceptors. These bundles are organized in rough "staircases" of hairs of increasing length order; this use of mechanosensitive hairs is homologous to the functioning of hair cells in the auditory and vestibular systems, indicating a close link between these systems. Hair cells utilize a system of transduction that uses rate coding in order to transmit the directionality of a stimulus.
Hair cells of the lateral line system produce a tonic rate of firing. As mechanical motion is transmitted through water to the neuromast, the cupula bends and is displaced. Varying in magnitude with the strength of the stimulus, shearing movement and deflection of the hairs is produced, either toward the longest hair or away from it; this results in a shift in the cell's ionic permeability, resulting from changes to open ion channels caused by the deflection of the hairs. Deflection towards the longest hair results in depolarization of the hair cell, increased neurotransmitter release at the excitatory afferent synapse, a higher rate of signal transduction. Deflection towards the shorter hair has the opposite effect, hyperpolarizing the hair cell and producing a decreased rate of neurotransmitter release; these electrical impulses are transmitted along afferent lateral neurons to the brain. While both varieties of neuromasts utilize this method of transduction, the specialized organization of superficial and canal neuromasts allow them different mechanoreceptive capacities.
Located at the surface of an animal's skin, superficial organs are exposed more directly to the external environment. Though these organs possess the standard "staircase" shaped hair bundles, overall the organization of the bundles within the organs is haphazard, in
Hellbender
The hellbender known as the hellbender salamander or spotted water gecko, is a species of aquatic giant salamander endemic to eastern North America. A member of the family Cryptobranchidae, the hellbender is the only member of the genus Cryptobranchus, is joined only by one other genus of salamanders at the family level; the hellbender, much larger than all other salamanders in its geographic range, employs an unusual means of respiration, fills a particular niche — both as a predator and prey — in its ecosystem, which either it or its ancestors have occupied for around 65 million years. The species is listed as Near Threatened; the origin of the name "hellbender" is unclear. The Missouri Department of Conservation says: The name'hellbender' comes from the animal's odd look. One theory claims the hellbender was named by settlers who thought "it was a creature from hell where it's bent on returning." Another rendition says the undulating skin of a hellbender reminded observers of "horrible tortures of the infernal regions."
In reality, it's a harmless aquatic salamander. Vernacular names include "snot otter", "lasagna lizard", "devil dog", "mud-devil", "grampus", "Allegheny alligator", "mud dog", "water dog", "spotted water gecko", "leverian water newt"; the genus name is derived from branchion. The subspecific name, bishopi, is in honor of American herpetologist Sherman C. Bishop. C. alleganiensis has a flat head, with beady dorsal eyes and slimy skin. Like most salamanders, it has short legs with four toes on the front legs and five on its back limbs, its tail is keeled for propulsion; the hellbender has working lungs, but gill slits are retained, although only immature specimens have true gills. It is blotchy red-brown in color, with a paler underbelly. Both males and females grow to an adult length of 24 to 40 cm from snout to vent, with a total length of 30 to 74 cm, making them the third-largest aquatic salamander species in the world and the largest amphibian in North America, although this length is rivaled by the reticulated siren of the southeastern United States.
An adult weighs 1.5 to 2.5 kg, making them the fourth heaviest living amphibian in the world after their Chinese and Japanese cousins and the goliath frog, while the largest cane toads may weigh as much as a hellbender. Hellbenders reach sexual maturity at about five years of age, may live 30 years in captivity; the hellbender has a few characteristics that make it distinguishable from other native salamanders, including a gigantic, dorsoventrally flattened body with thick folds travelling down the sides, a single open gill slit on each side, hind feet with five toes each. Distinguished from most other endemic salamander species by their size, hellbenders average up to 60 cm or about 2 ft in length; this demarcation can be made by noting the presence of external gills in the mudpuppy, which are lacking in the hellbender, as well as the presence of four toes on each hind foot of the mudpuppy. Furthermore, the average size of C. a. alleganiensis has been reported to be 45–60 cm, while N. m. maculosus has a reported average size of 28–40 cm in length, which means that hellbender adults will still be notably larger than the biggest mudpuppies.
The genus Cryptobranchus has only been considered to contain one species, C. alleganiensis, with two subspecies, C. a. alleganiensis and C. a. bishopi. A recent decline in population size of the Ozark subspecies C. a. bishopi has led to further research into populations of this subspecies, including genetic analysis to determine the best method for conservation. Crowhurst et al. for instance, found that the "Ozark subspecies" denomination is insufficient for describing genetic divergence within the genus Cryptobranchus in the Ozark region. They found three divergent genetic units within the genus: C. a. alleganiensis, two distinct eastern and western populations of C. a. bishopi. These three groups were shown to be isolated, are considered to most be "diverging on different evolutionary paths". Hellbenders are present in a number of Eastern US states, from southern New York to northern Georgia, including parts of Ohio, Maryland, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Mississippi, Missouri, a small bit of Oklahoma and Kansas.
The subspecies C. a. bishopi is confined to the Ozarks of northern Arkansas and southern Missouri, while C. a. alleganiensis is found in the rest of these states. Some hellbender populations—namely a few in Missouri and Tennessee—have been noted to be quite abundant, but several man-made maladies have converged on the species such that it has seen a serious population decline throughout its range. Hellbender populations were listed in 1981 as extinct or endangered in Illinois, Indiana and Maryland, decreasing in Arkansas and Kentucky, threatened as a species throughout the
Gill
A gill is a respiratory organ found in many aquatic organisms that extracts dissolved oxygen from water and excretes carbon dioxide. The gills of some species, such as hermit crabs, have adapted to allow respiration on land provided they are kept moist; the microscopic structure of a gill presents a large surface area to the external environment. Branchia is the zoologists' name for gills. With the exception of some aquatic insects, the filaments and lamellae contain blood or coelomic fluid, from which gases are exchanged through the thin walls; the blood carries oxygen to other parts of the body. Carbon dioxide passes from the blood through the thin gill tissue into the water. Gills or gill-like organs, located in different parts of the body, are found in various groups of aquatic animals, including mollusks, insects and amphibians. Semiterrestrial marine animals such as crabs and mudskippers have gill chambers in which they store water, enabling them to use the dissolved oxygen when they are on land.
Galen observed that fish had multitudes of openings, big enough to admit gases, but too fine to give passage to water. Pliny the Elder held that fish respired by their gills, but observed that Aristotle was of another opinion; the word branchia comes from the Greek βράγχια, "gills", plural of βράγχιον. Many microscopic aquatic animals, some larger but inactive ones, can absorb sufficient oxygen through the entire surface of their bodies, so can respire adequately without gills. However, more complex or more active aquatic organisms require a gill or gills. Many invertebrates, amphibians, use both the body surface and gills for gaseous exchange. Gills consist of thin filaments of tissue, branches, or slender, tufted processes that have a folded surface to increase surface area; the delicate nature of the gills is possible. The blood or other body fluid must be in intimate contact with the respiratory surface for ease of diffusion. A high surface area is crucial to the gas exchange of aquatic organisms, as water contains only a small fraction of the dissolved oxygen that air does.
A cubic meter of air contains about 250 grams of oxygen at STP. The concentration of oxygen in water is lower than in air and it diffuses more slowly. In fresh water, the dissolved oxygen content is 8 cm3/L compared to that of air, 210 cm3/L. Water is 100 times more viscous. Oxygen has a diffusion rate in air 10,000 times greater; the use of sac-like lungs to remove oxygen from water would not be efficient enough to sustain life. Rather than using lungs, "aseous exchange takes place across the surface of vascularised gills over which a one-way current of water is kept flowing by a specialised pumping mechanism; the density of the water prevents the gills from collapsing and lying on top of each other, what happens when a fish is taken out of water."Usually water is moved across the gills in one direction by the current, by the motion of the animal through the water, by the beating of cilia or other appendages, or by means of a pumping mechanism. In fish and some molluscs, the efficiency of the gills is enhanced by a countercurrent exchange mechanism in which the water passes over the gills in the opposite direction to the flow of blood through them.
This mechanism is efficient and as much as 90% of the dissolved oxygen in the water may be recovered. The gills of vertebrates develop in the walls of the pharynx, along a series of gill slits opening to the exterior. Most species employ a countercurrent exchange system to enhance the diffusion of substances in and out of the gill, with blood and water flowing in opposite directions to each other; the gills are composed of comb-like filaments, the gill lamellae, which help increase their surface area for oxygen exchange. When a fish breathes, it draws in a mouthful of water at regular intervals, it draws the sides of its throat together, forcing the water through the gill openings, so it passes over the gills to the outside. Fish gill slits may be the evolutionary ancestors of the tonsils, thymus glands, Eustachian tubes, as well as many other structures derived from the embryonic branchial pouches; the gills of fish form a number of slits connecting the pharynx to the outside of the animal on either side of the fish behind the head.
There were many slits, but during evolution, the number reduced, modern fish have five pairs, never more than eight. Sharks and rays have five pairs of gill slits that open directly to the outside of the body, though some more primitive sharks have six pairs and the Broadnose sevengill shark being the only cartilaginous fish exceeding this number. Adjacent slits are separated by a cartilaginous gill arch from which projects a cartilaginous gill ray; this gill ray is the support for the sheet-like interbranchial septum, which the individual lamellae of the gills lie on either side of. The base of the arch may support gill rakers, projections into the pharyngeal cavity that help to prevent large pieces of debris from damaging the delicate gills. A smaller opening, the spiracle, lies in the back of the first gill slit; this bears a small pseudobranch that resembles a gill in structure, but only receives blood oxygenated by the true gills. The spiracle is thought to be homologous to the ear opening in higher vertebrates.
Most sharks rely on ram ventilation, forcing water into the mouth and over the gills by swimming forward. In slow-moving or bottom-dwelling species among skates and rays, the spiracle may be enlarged, the fish breathes
Philipp Franz von Siebold
Philipp Franz Balthasar von Siebold was a German physician and traveler. He achieved prominence by his studies of Japanese flora and fauna and the introduction of Western medicine in Japan, he was the father of Kusumoto Ine. Born into a family of doctors and professors of medicine in Würzburg, Siebold studied medicine at University of Würzburg from November 1815, where he became a member of the Corps Moenania Würzburg. One of his professors was author of the Flora Wirceburgensis. Ignaz Döllinger, his professor of anatomy and physiology, most influenced him. Döllinger was one of the first professors to treat medicine as a natural science. Siebold stayed with Döllinger, he read the books of Humboldt, a famous naturalist and explorer, which raised his desire to travel to distant lands. Philipp Franz von Siebold became a physician by earning his M. D. degree in 1820. He practiced medicine in Heidingsfeld, in the Kingdom of Bavaria, now part of Würzburg. Invited to Holland by an acquaintance of his family, Siebold applied for a position as a military physician, which would enable him to travel to the Dutch colonies.
He entered the Dutch military service on June 19, 1822, was appointed as ship's surgeon on the frigate Adriana, sailing from Rotterdam to Batavia in the Dutch East Indies. On his trip to Batavia on the frigate Adriana, Siebold practiced his knowledge of the Dutch language and rapidly learned Malay, during the long voyage he began a collection of marine fauna, he arrived in Batavia on February 18, 1823. As an army medical officer, Siebold was posted to an artillery unit. However, he was given a room for a few weeks at the residence of the Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies, Baron Godert van der Capellen, to recover from an illness. With his erudition, he impressed the Governor-General, the director of the botanical garden at Buitenzorg, Caspar Georg Carl Reinwardt; these men sensed in Siebold a worthy successor to Engelbert Kaempfer and Carl Peter Thunberg, two former resident physicians at Dejima, a Dutch trading post in Japan, the latter of whom was the author of Flora Japonica. The Batavian Academy of Arts and Sciences soon elected Siebold as a member.
On 28 June 1823, after only a few months in the Dutch East Indies, Siebold was posted as resident physician and scientist to Dejima, a small artificial island and trading post at Nagasaki, arrived there on 11 August 1823. During an eventful voyage to Japan he only just escaped drowning during a typhoon in the East China Sea; as only a small number of Dutch personnel were allowed to live on this island, the posts of physician and scientist had to be combined. Dejima had been in the possession of the Dutch East India Company since the 17th century, but the Company had gone bankrupt in 1798, after which a trading post was operated there by the Dutch state for political considerations, with notable benefits to the Japanese; the European tradition of sending doctors with botanical training to Japan was a long one. Sent on a mission by the Dutch East India Company, Engelbert Kaempfer, a German physician and botanist who lived in Japan from 1690 until 1692, ushered in this tradition of a combination of physician and botanist.
The Dutch East India Company did not, however employ the Swedish botanist and physician Carl Peter Thunberg, who had arrived in Japan in 1775. Japanese scientists invited Siebold to show them the marvels of western science, he learned in return through them much about the Japanese and their customs. After curing an influential local officer, Siebold gained the permission to leave the trade post, he used this opportunity to treat Japanese patients in the greater area around the trade post. Siebold is credited with the introduction of vaccination and pathological anatomy for the first time in Japan. In 1824, Siebold started a medical school in Nagasaki, the Narutaki-juku, that grew into a meeting place for around fifty students, they helped him in naturalistic studies. The Dutch language became the lingua franca for these academic and scholarly contacts for a generation, until the Meiji Restoration, his patients paid him in kind with a variety of objects and artifacts that would gain historical significance.
These everyday objects became the basis of his large ethnographic collection, which consisted of everyday household goods, woodblock prints and hand-crafted objects used by the Japanese people. During his stay in Japan, Siebold "lived together" with Kusumoto Taki, who gave birth to their daughter Kusumoto Ine in 1827. Siebold named a Hydrangea after her. Kusumoto Ine became the first Japanese woman known to have received a physician's training and became a regarded practicing physician and court physician to the Empress in 1882, she died at court in 1903. His main interest, focused on the study of Japanese fauna and flora, he collected as much material. Starting a small botanical garden behind his home Siebold amassed over 1,000 native plants. In a specially built glasshouse he cultivated the Japanese plants to endure the Dutch climate. Local Japanese artists like Kawahara Keiga drew and painted images of these plants, creating botanical illustrations but images of the daily life in Japan, which compl
Stream
A stream is a body of water with surface water flowing within the bed and banks of a channel. The stream encompasses surface and groundwater fluxes that respond to geological, geomorphological and biotic controls. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a stream may be referred to by a variety of local or regional names. Long large streams are called rivers. Streams are important as conduits in the water cycle, instruments in groundwater recharge, corridors for fish and wildlife migration; the biological habitat in the immediate vicinity of a stream is called a riparian zone. Given the status of the ongoing Holocene extinction, streams play an important corridor role in connecting fragmented habitats and thus in conserving biodiversity; the study of streams and waterways in general is known as surface hydrology and is a core element of environmental geography. Brook A stream smaller than a creek one, fed by a spring or seep, it is small and forded. A brook is characterised by its shallowness.
Creek In North America and New Zealand, a small to medium-sized natural stream. Sometimes navigable by motor craft and may be intermittent. In parts of Maryland, New England, the UK and India, a tidal inlet in a salt marsh or mangrove swamp, or between enclosed and drained former salt marshes or swamps. In these cases, the stream is the tidal stream, the course of the seawater through the creek channel at low and high tide. River A large natural stream, which may be a waterway. Runnel the linear channel between the parallel ridges or bars on a shoreline beach or river floodplain, or between a bar and the shore. Called a swale. Tributary A contributory stream, or a stream which does not reach a static body of water such as a lake or ocean, but joins another river. Sometimes called a branch or fork. There are a number of regional names for a stream. Allt is used in Highland Scotland. Beck is used in Lincolnshire to Cumbria in areas which were once occupied by the Danes and Norwegians. Bourne or winterbourne is used in the chalk downland of southern England.
Brook. Burn is used in North East England. Gill or ghyll is seen in Surrey influenced by Old Norse; the variant "ghyll" is used in the Lake District and appears to have been an invention of William Wordsworth. Nant is used in Wales. Rivulet is a term encountered in Victorian era publications. Stream Syke is used in lowland Cumbria for a seasonal stream. Branch is used to name streams in Virginia. Creek is common throughout the United States, as well as Australia. Falls is used to name streams in Maryland, for streams/rivers which have waterfalls on them if such falls have a small vertical drop. Little Gunpowder Falls and The Jones Falls are rivers named in this manner, unique to Maryland. Kill in New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey comes from a Dutch language word meaning "riverbed" or "water channel", can be used for the UK meaning of'creek'. Run in Ohio, Michigan, New Jersey, Virginia, or West Virginia can be the name of a stream. Run in Florida is the name given to streams coming out of small natural springs.
River is used for larger springs like the Silver Rainbow River. Stream and brook are used in Midwestern states, Mid-Atlantic states, New England. Bar A shoal that develops in a stream as sediment is deposited as the current slows or is impeded by wave action at the confluence. Bifurcation A fork into two or more streams. Channel A depression created by constant erosion. Confluence The point at which the two streams merge. If the two tributaries are of equal size, the confluence may be called a fork. Drainage basin The area of land. A large drainage basin such as the Amazon River contains many smaller drainage basins. Floodplain Lands adjacent to the stream that are subject to flooding when a stream overflows its banks. Gaging station A site along the route of a stream or river, used for reference marking or water monitoring. Headwaters The part of a stream or river proximate to its source; the word is most used in the plural where there is no single point source. Knickpoint The point on a stream's profile where a sudden change in stream gradient occurs.
Mouth The point at which the stream discharges via an estuary or delta, into a static body of water such as a lake or ocean. Pool A segment where the water is deeper and slower moving. Rapids A turbulent, fast-flowing stretch of a stream or river. Riffle A segment where the flow is shallower and more turbulent. River A large natural stream, which may be a waterway. Run A somewhat smoothly flowing segment of the stream. Source The spring, or other point of origin of a stream. Spring The point at which a stream emerges from an underground course through unconsolidated sediments or through caves. A stream can with caves, flow aboveground for part of its course, underground for part of its course. Stream bed The bottom of a stream. Stream corridor Stream, its floodplains, the transitional upland fringe Streamflow The water moving through a stream channel. Thalweg The river's longitudinal section, or the line joining the deepest point in the channel at each stage from source to mouth. Waterfall or cascade The fall of water where the stream goes over a sudden drop called a knickpoint.
The stream expends kinetic energy in "trying" to eliminate the
Natura Artis Magistra
Artis, short for Natura Artis Magistra, is a zoo in the centre of Amsterdam. It is one of the oldest zoos of mainland Europe. Next to possessing a zoo, Artis contains an aquarium and a planetarium. Artis has an arboretum and a large art collection. A part of the art collection is on display in the Aquarium building of the zoo. Artis contains 27 monumental buildings, most of which are used as enclosures for the animals, making Artis a unique cultural heritage of the 19th century; the zoo is a member of the Dutch Zoo Federation, the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, the International Species Information System, the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums. The zoo was founded in 1838 by Gerard Westerman, J. W. H. Werlemann and J. J. Wijsmuller, it was open only to members. Starting in 1851 it was opened to the public during the month of September. In 1920 it was opened year-round to the public; the core of the current zoo property the "Middenhof" estate, was purchased by the board of the zoological society "Natura Artis Magistra" late in 1838 in the Plantage, a rural area on the outskirts of Amsterdam.
From the start it exhibited both mounted specimens. The zoo is referred to as Artis, because the zoo has three gates with the words'Natura','Artis', and'Magistra' written above each of them, respectively. More than not, only the middle gate was open, so that people who walked through it, seeing that'Artis' was written above it, believed that the zoo was just called Artis. Thanks to this, soon few people knew it by its full name: Natura Artis Magistra; the last quagga in captivity died at Artis on 12 August 1883. At the time, because all zebras were referred to as quagga, nobody realized that this was the last quagga alive until years later. Artis includes 27 historic buildings; the Aquarium was built in 1882 on land leased from the city on condition that only a museum be built on it. The library dates back to 1867 and the building the'Ledenlokalen' on the right side of the main entrance dates back to the 19th century as well; the wolf house, the Masman Garden House which now houses scarlet ibis were both on the site before the zoo was established.
Artis has a library on the history of botany. It houses the library of the zoo, as well as the libraries of the Zoological Museum Amsterdam and the Amsterdam Botanical Garden, it hosts the archives of a number of zoologists and botanists, such as the archive of Hugo de Vries. It contains 3000 manuscripts and 80,000 animal prints; the library is part of the special collections of the University of Amsterdam. Mehos, Donna C.. Turtles of the United States and Canada. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 90-5356-739-9. Retrieved 24 June 2011. Media related to Artis at Wikimedia Commons Official website
Zanthoxylum piperitum
Zanthoxylum piperitum known as Japanese pepper, Korean pepper, sanshō, chopi, is a deciduous aromatic spiny shrub or small tree, belonging to the Rutaceae family. Natural range spans from Hokkaido to Kyushu in Japan, southern parts of the Korean peninsula, Chinese mainland; the related Z. schinifolium occurs as far south as Yakushima. It is an important host plant for several Japan indigenous swallowtail butterfly species, including the common Papilio xuthus. In Japanese, the name sanshō refers to Z. piperitum, the name inuzanshō refers to Z. schinifolium. In Korean, the cognate name sancho refers to Z. schinifolium, the name gaesancho refers to Z. armatum. In Korea, Z. piperitum is called chopi. In Japan, Z. armatum var. subtrifoliatum, a variety of Z. armatum, is called fuyuzanshō. The tree blooms in April to May, forming axillary flower clusters, about 5mm, yellow-green in color, it is dioecious, the flowers of the male plant can be consumed as hana-sanshō, while the female flowers yield berries or peppercorns of about 5mm.
For commercial harvesting, thornless varieties called the Asakura sansho are cultivated. Around September to October, the berries turn burst, scattering the black seeds within; the branch grows pairs of sharp thorns, has odd-pinnately compound leaves, alternately arranged, with 5〜9 pairs of ovate leaflets having crenate margins. In Japan, Wakayama Prefecture boasts 80% of domestic production. Aridagawa, Wakayama produces a specialty variety called budō sanshō, which bears large fruits and clusters, rather like a bunch of grapes; the thornless variety, Asakura sansho, derives its name from its place of origin, the Asakura district in the now defunct Yokacho, integrated into Yabu, Hyōgo. The pulverized mature fruits known as "Japanese pepper" or kona-zanshō are the standard spice for sprinkling on the kabayaki-unagi dish, it is one of the seven main ingredients of the blended spice called shichimi, which contains red chili peppers. Finely ground Japanese pepper, kona-zanshō, is nowadays sold in sealed packets, individual serving sizes are included inside heat-and-serve broiled eel packages.
While red chili pepper is never used on eel, otherwise, in many usages, the Japanese red chili pepper, or the shichimi blend of peppers can be used in lieu of Japanese pepper alone, according to taste: e.g. to flavor miso soup, various noodles in broth or dipped in tsuyu, teriyaki, or fried chicken. Young leaves and shoots, pronounced ki-no-mé or ko-no-mé herald the spring season, garnish grilled fish and soups, they have a distinctive flavor, not to the liking of everyone. It is a customary ritual to put a leaf between cupped hands, clap the hands with a popping sound, this serving to bring out the aroma; the young leaves are crushed and blended with miso using suribachi to make a paste, a pesto sauce of sorts, used to make various aemono. The stereotypical main ingredient for the resultant kinome-ae is the fresh harvest of bamboo shoots, but the sauce may be tossed into sashimi, squid or other vegetable such as tara-no-me; the immature green berries and salted, are called ao-zanshō. The berries are traditionally simmered into dark-brown tsukudani, but nowadays are available as shoyu-zuke, just steeped in soy sauce.
The berries are cooked with small fry fish and flavored with soy sauce, a specialty item of Kyoto, since its Mount Kurama outskirts is a renowned growing area of the plant. In central and northeastern Japan, a non-sticky rice-cake type confection called goheimochi, basted with miso-based paste and grilled, sometimes uses the Japanese pepper as flavor additive to the miso. Being marketed are sansho flavored arare, snack foods, sweet sansho-mochi. Both the plant itself and its fruit, known as chopi, are called by many names including jepi, jenpi and jopi in different dialects used in southern parts of Korea, where the plant is extensively cultivated and consumed. In Southern Korean cuisine and ground chopi fruit is used as a condiment served with varieties of food, such as chueo-tang, maeun-tang, hoe. Young leaves of the plant, called chopi-sun, are used as a culinary herb or a namul vegetable in Southern Korean cuisine; the leaves are eaten pickled as jangajji, pan-fried to make buchimgae, or deep-fried as fritters such as twigak and bugak.
Sometimes, chopi leaves are added to anchovy-salt mixture to make herbed fish sauce, called chopi-aekjeot. In Japan, the thick wood of the tree is traditionally made into a gnarled and rough-hewn wooden pestle, to use with suribachi; the husks are used medicinally. In traditional Chinese medicine it finds uses similar to the hua jiao or Sichuan pepper In Japanese pharmaceuticals, the mature husks with seeds removed are considered the crude medicine form of sanshō, it is an ingredient in bitter tincture, the toso wine served ceremonially. The pungent taste derives from sanshoamide, it contains aromatic oils geraniol, citral, etc. In Southern parts of Korea, the fruit is traditionally used in fishing. Being poisonous to small fish, a few fruit dropped. Sichuan pepper Andoh, Elizabeth.
Media related to Andrias japonicus at Wikimedia Commons
