Rausu 羅臼町

According to the town, the name comes from the Ainu raushi, "place with animal bones", because the area was an Ainu hunting ground⁶. Hokkaido's official list of Ainu place names gives the form ra-us-i (ラウシイ) for the town, the river, the mountain and the pass, and records three readings:

• "Entrails grow": from the late-Edo interpreter Uehara Kumajirō. The explanation given is that the river rises in a marsh, and so many trout and salmon spawned in it that fish entrails covered the river.
• "Place with entrails and bones": from the explorer Matsuura Takeshirō. The explanation given is that deer and bears were always butchered here.
• "Low place (river)": from the Ainu scholar Nagata Hōsei.

The list says it is hard to decide between them. In its commentary, Yamada Shūzō notes that ra can mean both "low place" and "entrails". Judging from similar place names elsewhere in Hokkaido, he thinks Nagata's "low river" was probably the original meaning²⁰. Japanese Wikipedia summarizes Yamada's view that the "entrails" meaning was a later reinterpretation⁷. Until 1930 the village was named Uebetsu (植別)¹.

• Jōmon to Okhotsk culture: The local history museum shows Jōmon and Epi-Jōmon pottery and stone tools²¹. In the 7th–8th centuries an Okhotsk-culture settlement stood on the north bank of the Matsuhō River. 260 items from the site are a national Important Cultural Property (designated 4 September 2015)²²¹³. They include a wooden vessel shaped like a brown bear's head²³. The later Tobinitai culture, a blend of the Okhotsk and Satsumon cultures, is named after Tobinitai, an old place name in today's Kaigan-chō²².

• Ainu era and Matsumae contact: In 1618 a Menashi chief presented sea-otter pelts to the Matsumae domain. From 1701 the Ainu of Shiretoko traded through the Kiritappu trading post (場所). In 1789 the Kunashir–Menashi uprising broke out, and in 1799 the shogunate took direct control of eastern Ezo⁷.

• Late Edo: Rausu Shrine was founded near the end of the Edo period to pray for safe voyages and good fishing. It moved to its present site in 1895²⁴. A temple bell from the Kōka era (1844–48) is a town-designated cultural property¹³. Matsuura Takeshirō explored Shiretoko in 1858⁷.

• Meiji to Shōwa: The village office history (1879–1961) is summarized in At a glance above¹. Rausu Fishing Port was designated a Class 4 fishing port in 1951⁷.

• 1960, "Shiretoko Ryojo": Morishige Hisaya was filming Chi no Hate ni Ikiru Mono (地の涯に生きるもの) here. He set new lyrics to "Saraba Rausu yo", a song long sung in Rausu¹⁸. Katō Tokiko's 1971 cover spent seven weeks at No. 1 on the Oricon chart and sold about 1.4 million copies¹⁸. A statue in Shiokaze Park modeled on Morishige marks the film¹⁹.

• Tourism era: Shiretoko National Park was designated in 1964. The Shiretoko Pass road opened in 1980, the Rausu Visitor Center in 1983, and Rusa Field House in 2009⁷. In December 1999 Rausu opened Hokkaido's first land-based deep-sea-water intake²⁵. Shiretoko became a World Natural Heritage site in July 2005¹⁰.

• 2015 blizzard: In February 2015 a stalled low brought a record 179 cm of snow depth²⁶. Route 335, the only road out of town in winter, was blocked for three days, and the Self-Defense Forces were called in⁷.

• 2020s: In June 2020 Rausu, Nemuro, Betsukai and Shibetsu were certified together as the Japan Heritage story "Salmon Sanctuary" (鮭の聖地)²⁷²³. In September 2023 Hokkaido issued its first brown-bear advisory for the town⁷. The new Shiretoko Rausu Sangyō-sai "Rarara" festival began in fiscal 2024²⁸. The town's list of events for 2025 includes¹³:

  • a tsunami warning after the Kamchatka earthquake (30 July)
  • a fatal accident on the Iwaobetsu side of Mt. Rausu (14 August). Japanese Wikipedia reports that a hiker was killed by a brown bear²⁹.
  • the Shiretoko Adventure Festival (6–7 September), part of the events for 60 years of the national park and 20 years of World Heritage status
  • closing ceremonies for two kindergartens and two elementary schools (7 December)

  The new Shiretoko Mirai Kindergarten opened in April 2026, and from that month the town has had a single elementary school, Shiretoko Mirai Elementary¹³. On 9 July 2026 a brown bear charged a hiker, who drove it off with bear spray. All Mt. Rausu and Mt. Iō trailheads were closed until 16 July³⁰³¹.

• Setting: Rausu covers the southeastern side of the Shiretoko Peninsula. It faces the Nemuro Strait, with Kunashir running parallel to the coast⁶. The ground rises steeply from the sea, so there is little flat land, and settlements sit along the coast and in river valleys⁷. Only 5.42 km² is cropland and 0.75 km² pasture. About 89.5% is classed as "other" land¹³.

• Mountains: Mt. Rausu (羅臼岳) is the highest peak of the Shiretoko volcanoes. It is one of Japan's 100 Famous Mountains and is nicknamed "Shiretoko Fuji". GSI revised its height to 1,661 m in 2014, but the town's tourism site still gives 1,660 m²⁹³². Other peaks include Mt. Unabetsu (1,419 m), Sashirui-dake (1,564 m), Shiretoko-dake (1,254 m) and Eirei-zan (521 m), right beside the town⁷.

• Rivers and lakes: The main rivers are the Uebetsu, Kasuga-ōkawa, Chinishibetsu, Rausu, Sashirui and Kennebetsu⁷. The town describes Lake Rausu (羅臼湖) as the largest lake on the peninsula³³.

• Coast: Hokkaido Prefectural Road 87 runs north from the town centre and ends at Aidomari, 24 km away¹⁷³⁴. Beyond it, Cape Shiretoko can be reached only on foot along the shore, past several difficult sections⁷. The sea is rich partly because deep water wells up here²⁵.

• Parks: The upland and the northern coast lie in Shiretoko National Park (1964) and the Shiretoko World Natural Heritage site (2005)⁷¹⁰.

• Climate: The table gives figures for the JMA Rausu station.

  Measure	Value
  Annual mean temperature	6.1°C
  February mean (coldest)	−4.8°C
  August mean (warmest)	17.8°C
  Annual precipitation	1,657 mm
  Annual snowfall	545 cm
  Average deepest snow cover	87 cm

  The averages are for 2005–2020³⁵. Records are 33.0°C on 22 July 2025, −17.3°C on 9 February 2019, a snow depth of 179 cm on 2 February 2015 and a gust of 41.9 m/s on 21 October 2016²⁶. The climate is Köppen Dfb³⁶. Compared with the Shari side, Rausu is cooler in summer and milder in winter, but its weather is unsettled, windy and wet⁷.

• Fishing: The 2020 Census counted 1,069 of the town's 2,829 workers in fishing, or 38%. Another 310 worked in manufacturing¹³. A 2015 town estimate, cited by Japanese Wikipedia, put the share in fisheries-related work at over 60%⁷. The main fisheries are:

  • set nets for autumn salmon
  • walleye pollock (sukesō)
  • kombu
  • gill nets for Pacific cod¹¹¹

  In 2024, landings were 26,120 t worth ¥10.50 billion. In 2025 the autumn salmon run collapsed to 788 t (¥1.50 billion), from 4,241 t the year before, and total landings fell to 18,830 t worth ¥7.38 billion¹³. The other main 2025 catches were:

  Catch (2025)	Volume	Value
  Pacific cod	3,893 t	¥1.11 billion
  Walleye pollock	5,240 t	¥737 million
  Kombu	172 t	¥516 million
  Kinki (menme)	105 t	¥371 million
  Sea urchin	86 t	¥295 million

  The rare keiji salmon rounds to 0–1 t a year¹³. Across the whole Nemuro Subprefecture, the 2025 autumn salmon set-net catch to the end of November was only 17% of the previous year's³⁷.

• Deep-sea water: Since fiscal 2007 the port has pumped 4,560 t a day of deep-sea water from 350 m down, 2,817 m offshore. About 96% is used by the fishing industry, which lets Rausu run as a hygiene-controlled fishing port²⁵. Autumn salmon are killed on board (ikejime) and washed in deep-sea water, then auctioned and shipped to restaurants and processors within two hours¹¹.

• Other industries:

  • Dairy: 8 farms with 651 cows shipped 2,898 t of milk in fiscal 2025¹³, mostly in the Minehama district near Shibetsu⁷.
  • Manufacturing (2021): 16 plants with 221 workers shipped ¥14.8 billion of goods.
  • Commerce (wholesale and retail, 2021): 56 shops with 283 workers had annual sales of ¥6.6 billion¹³.

• Tourism: Rausu counted 569,550 visitors in fiscal 2025. Most were day-trippers (534,408), with 35,142 overnight visitors (37,400 counting consecutive nights). The busiest month was August, with 105,969³⁸. The town has five hotels and more than ten guesthouses (minshuku), as of 2020³⁹, and about 20 restaurants⁴⁰. The tourism association was founded in September 1956⁴¹.

• Population and aging: The resident register fell from 5,774 in March 2013 to 4,087 in March 2026. In 2025 there were 18 births, 60 deaths and a net loss of 70 people to moves. In 2025 people aged 65 and over numbered 1,446, or 35.3% of the population¹³.

• Revitalization:

  • The 8th comprehensive plan covers fiscal 2024–2031 under the theme "Fish castle town Rausu" (魚の城下町らうす)¹.
  • Furusato nozei donations reached ¥778 million from 40,296 gifts in fiscal 2025. They were ¥525 million in fiscal 2024 and ¥913 million in fiscal 2023⁴². The program's tagline is "Rausu's everyday is Japan's feast" (羅臼のふつうは、日本のごちそう)⁴³.
  • Every school from kindergarten to high school is a UNESCO Associated School and teaches a local "Shiretoko studies" (知床学) curriculum, including brown-bear education⁴⁴.

• Discontinued events: Shiretoko-biraki (June) and the Rausu Sangyō-sai Isaribi Matsuri (September) ended in 2023⁷.
• Works set in Rausu: Japanese Wikipedia lists Takeda Taijun's novella Hikarigoke (ひかりごけ) and its film and opera versions, the film Chi no Hate ni Ikiru Mono, the TV drama Kita no Kuni kara 2002 Yuigon, and Yoshi Ikuzō's song "Rausu" (羅臼)⁷.
• Shrines and temples: Rausu Shrine (Sakae-machi) is the guardian shrine of Shiretoko. Its grounds have Rausu Gongen-sui, a spring fed by the Mt. Rausu range²⁴. Seitai-ji temple (誠諦寺) holds a costume bon-odori contest in summer⁴⁵.
• Performing arts: Shiretoko Ibuki-daru (知床いぶき樽) is a local folk performing art kept up by a preservation society. It has been a town-designated cultural property since 1991¹³. The museum publishes the score and a recording of its piece "Shiretoko no Shiki"²². Actress Toyoshima Yukari's casting as the drummer in Swing Girls is credited to her Ibuki-daru experience⁵⁵.
• Other town-designated sites: the former Uebetsu Shrine site and the Kyūemon no Ma cove site (both 1973), and a fossil of the scorpionfish Sakurai Rausu shirokasago (サクライラウスシロカサゴ; 2022)¹³.
• Museums: The Rausu Local History Museum (羅臼町郷土資料館, Minehama-chō) opened in December 2011 in the former Uebetsu School. That school closed in March 2010 after 106 years. Admission is free²².

• Place names: Rausu is part of Menashi (目梨), the historical name of this Ainu region. The name appears in the 1618 tribute of sea-otter pelts to Matsumae and in the 1789 Kunashir–Menashi uprising⁷. Many local place names are Ainu:
  • Rausu: see Name origin above.
  • Rikushibetsu (陸志別): ru-kus-pet, "river where the trail passes", along the old route over to Shari.
  • Mosekarubetsu (モセカルベツ): "river where nettles are cut"²⁰.
  • Seseki (セセキ): said to mean "hot spring"⁵⁶.
  • Tachinius River (タチニウス): "where Erman's birches grow"⁵⁷.
• Old place names: In 1961 many old Ainu-derived district names, such as Tobinitai, Sashirui and Rusha, were replaced by new names⁷.
• Chashi site: The site of a chashi (Ainu fortified site) on the north bank of the Tachinius River is part of the Japan Heritage "Salmon Sanctuary" story²³. The "Manabi" trail in Bōkyō-no-Mori passes it⁵⁷.
• Museum displays: The local history museum covers Ainu culture from the medieval to the early modern period. Its Okhotsk-culture finds are thought to have influenced Ainu spiritual culture²¹²².

No dedicated Ainu cultural center was found in the town.

None found. The Nemuro Subprefecture's 2026 overview lists overseas partnerships only for Nemuro and Betsukai within the subprefecture⁸³. No domestic partner municipality was found on the town's website.

• Toyoshima Yukari (豊島由佳梨, born 1983): actress and musician from Rausu, known for Swing Girls (2004)⁵⁵.
• Mori Yamato (森大翔, born 2003): singer-songwriter from Rausu. He won the international under-16 "Young Guitarist of the Year 2019" competition in London and debuted in 2021⁸⁴.