Shiriuchi 知内町

The name comes from Ainu. The Hokkaido Government's list of Ainu place names gives Chir-ot-i (チリオッイ, cir-ot-i), "where birds are," which later became Chiroti (チロチ, cir-oci), "where birds gather in flocks." The list says the area near the river was known for hawks. It rates this derivation "B" on its certainty scale and calls the Chiroti form, attributed to Nagata (永田), the more natural reading²³. The same list records a second theory, Shiri-ochi (シリオチ), said to mean "land–cross," because people crossed over from this valley to other places. A note credited to Yamada (山田) doubts that ochi ever meant "to cross"²³.

The town's own explanation also points to birds. It says Chiri-ochi means "place where birds are." It adds that of the 15 hawks the Matsumae domain presented to the Tokugawa shoguns each year for falconry, more than half were said to have been caught in Shiriuchi²⁴. This link is why the hawk became the town bird⁸.

Several district names also come from Ainu, according to the town²⁴:

• Kotaniishi (小谷石): from kotan-ushi, "place with a village."
• Omonai (重内): from om-nay, "river whose mouth is blocked."
• Osashi (尾刺): from osat-nay, "river with a dry mouth."
• Yagoshi (矢越): from ya-kus, "passing along the inland side."
• Yunosato (湯ノ里): formerly Hagisari/Hagichani (萩砂里), "shallow place where salmon spawn."
• Wakimoto (涌元): thought to be a Japanese coinage. Legend says it was named because gold dust "welled up" (涌) there.

• Paleolithic (about 14,000 years ago): Excavations began in May 1983 ahead of construction of the Tsugaru Kaikyō Line. On 25 October 1983 a Paleolithic grave pit with grave goods was found at the Yunosato 4 Site (湯の里4遺跡)⁷. The 14 items include amber pendants and peridotite beads similar to finds on the Eurasian mainland. They were designated an Important Cultural Property on 21 June 1991¹⁹⁷.
• Jōmon: The Yunosato 5 Site has a Late Jōmon stone circle with a double ring of stones, a layout rarely seen in Hokkaido. Pottery in a pit dwelling at the Yunosato 1 Site held many salmon bones¹⁹.
• 1205–1260 (legend): The Ōno Tosa Diary (大野土佐日記), a document kept at Raikō Shrine, tells the following story. Araki Daigaku, lord of Ihara District in Kai Province (Yamanashi), came to mine gold dust, landing near Wakimoto in 1205¹⁹⁷. In 1244 he had the two Kamo shrines built, which later became Raikō Shrine. In 1247 one of his miners found the hot spring, and Araki built a Yakushi hall there⁷. The diary also says an Ainu uprising killed Araki and his miners in 1260⁷.
• 1457: Wakimoto Fort (脇本館) fell during Koshamain's War⁷.
• 1551: Kakizaki Suehiro, lord of the Matsumae area, made peace with the Ainu. He named Chikomotain (チコモタイン) of Shiriuchi as representative of the eastern Ainu. After that, Ainu trading ships from the east are said to have lowered their sails off Shiriuchi as they passed⁷.
• Edo period: In 1616 the Matsumae domain presented Shiriuchi hawks to the shogunate and set up protected hawk grounds⁷. Gold dust was panned on the upper Shiriuchi River⁶. The survey party of Inō Tadataka stayed a night in Shiriuchi in 1800. Matsuura Takeshirō explored Cape Yagoshi in 1845⁷¹.
• Meiji settlement: In 1884 Yamada Shin (山田慎), a businessman from Fukui, turned land granted to him into the Yamada Farm and worked it with farm machinery imported from the United States⁷. The site had first been chosen as a Kaitakushi sheep ranch, and the adviser Edwin Dun helped select it²⁵. Tenant farmers from Ōno District in Fukui Prefecture landed at Wakimoto in March 1887. Around 1887–88 Fujino Bunzō, a man from Akita, began large set-net tuna fishing at Wakimoto, and its success drew more settlers⁷²⁵.
• Railways: The Fukuyama Line (later the Matsumae Line) reached Oshima-Shiriuchi in 1937 and Yunosato in 1938⁷. The line closed on 1 February 1988. Its four stations in the town were Morikoshi, Oshima-Shiriuchi, Omonai and Yunosato¹.
• After the war: Families began settling Yunosato and nearby areas in 1946, most of them repatriates from Manchuria and Sakhalin. Their number eventually reached 62 households⁷. The population peaked at 9,735 in the 1955 Census⁷.
• Town status and power station: Shiriuchi became a town on 1 October 1967⁶. Hokkaido Electric's oil-fired Shiriuchi Power Station started Unit 1 in December 1983 and Unit 2 in September 1998. Its total output is 700,000 kW²⁶.
• Tunnel era: The Seikan Tunnel opened on 13 March 1988⁹. JR Shiriuchi Station opened on the Kaikyō Line on 1 July 1990, and the friendship pact with Imabetsu across the strait followed in August 1990⁷²⁷. In 1993 Shiriuchi High School played in the national spring Kōshien tournament, the first town-run high school ever to do so⁷²⁴.
• 21st century: Shiriuchi Station closed as a passenger station in March 2014. The Yunosato-Shiriuchi signal station opened on the same site when the Hokkaido Shinkansen began service on 26 March 2016¹. The town was certified as a "Biomass Industry City" in October 2016²⁸. The Shinkansen observation tower opened on 7 November 2016¹⁰. In 2022 the town declared itself a Zero Carbon City²⁹. Open-sea salmon trout farming trials began in 2023¹⁴.

Shiriuchi lies in the southwest of the Oshima Peninsula. Plains and river terraces face the Tsugaru Strait on the east, and mountains surround the town on the other three sides⁶. The Shiriuchi River (知内川) runs west to east through the middle of the town. Its lower valley holds the farmland and the town center³⁰¹. The river rises in the Daisengen-dake (大千軒岳) mountains, one of the best-known peaks of southern Hokkaido³¹. Salmon run up it in autumn, and flocks of swans come in winter³⁰. Other rivers include the Koronai (頃内川), and there is the Shiriuchi Dam (知内ダム)¹.

The coast is 21 km long. About two-thirds is sandy beach, from the Tateari River near Kikonai to Wakimoto, and the rest is rocky shore³⁰. South of Wakimoto, around Kotaniishi, the coast becomes a line of oddly shaped rocks, including Ikarikai Island (イカリカイ島), Janohana (蛇ノ鼻), "Old Man Rock" (爺岩), Tate-iwa (立岩) and Jigoku-ma (地獄澗)⁶. Cape Yagoshi (矢越岬) and the cliffs around it belong to the Matsumae-Yagoshi Prefectural Natural Park (松前矢越道立自然公園)²¹. The highest peak, Nanatsu-dake (七ツ岳), sits on the border with Fukushima and Kaminokuni³⁰. Wikipedia gives its height as 957 m, and the town history gives 966 m¹³². Other peaks include Katsura-dake (桂岳, 734 m) and Tōmyō-dake (燈明岳, 577 m)¹. Forest covers more than 80% of the town³⁰.

Climate: The Japan Meteorological Agency's station in Shiriuchi measures precipitation only. Its normal annual precipitation is 1,633.1 mm (2005–2020), with the wettest month in August (196.0 mm)³³. The record daily rainfall is 190.5 mm, on 2 November 2021, and the record monthly total is 623.0 mm, in August 2022³⁴. For temperature, the nearest station is in neighboring Kikonai. There the annual mean is 8.9°C, January averages −2.3°C and August averages 21.6°C (1991–2020)³⁵. Kikonai's records are 34.2°C on 29 July 2023 and −15.6°C in February 1978³⁶. JMA publishes no snow-depth normals for either station.

• Agriculture: Farms combine greenhouse crops (nira, spinach, tomatoes) with rice, field crops and dairy. Produce is shipped to Hokkaido cities and to Honshu under a Shiriuchi vegetable brand¹¹. Nira is grown almost year-round by combining heated and unheated greenhouses with summer–autumn harvests¹¹. In 2015 the town shipped about 1,705 t of nira worth about ¥1.175 billion, more than half of its roughly ¥1.8 billion farm output, according to an Asahi Shimbun report cited by Wikipedia¹. Tomatoes have held Hokkaido's "Yes! Clean" certification since FY2010, and the main rice variety is Fukkurinko, a southern Hokkaido brand¹¹.
• Fisheries: The town has five fishing communities: Nakanokawa, Morikoshi, Maehama, Wakimoto and Kotaniishi. As migratory catches (squid, Atka mackerel, trout) declined, fishing shifted from "catching" to "raising"³⁷. Nakanokawa is now a major center for scallop and oyster farming. From Maehama to Kotaniishi, kelp farming and the rearing of juvenile sea urchins are the mainstays³⁷. In 2022 the catch was 738 t worth ¥472 million. Aquaculture made up 87.9% of the volume, and the largest items by value were sea urchins and urchin seedlings (¥185 million), kelp (¥101 million) and oysters (¥80 million)³⁷. The Kamiiso-gun Fisheries Cooperative (上磯郡漁協) was formed in 2004 by merging four cooperatives. It had 162 full members in April 2023³⁷.
• Salmon farming: A sea pen for salmon trout, 40 m across and described by the town as the largest class in Hokkaido, arrived off Morikoshi on 31 October 2023. According to the town, it is the only open-sea salmon farm in Hokkaido, since all the others are inside harbors. About 150 t of fish averaging 3.5 kg were harvested in July 2024. A second pen arrived on 1 August 2024, and trials with two pens were planned from November 2024¹⁴.
• Energy: Hokkaido Electric's Shiriuchi Power Station (2 × 350,000 kW, heavy oil) stands in the Motomachi district²⁶¹. The town runs projects paid for by the national grant for areas that host power plants (電源立地地域対策交付金)³⁸. It aims to use more local timber and woody biomass under its Biomass Industry City plan²⁸.
• Tourism: The town recorded 165,700 visitors in FY2025 (150,000 day-trippers and 15,700 overnight stays), 9% more than the 152,000 of FY2024³⁹.
• Population: The population fell 10.4% between 2015 and 2020. In 2020, 39.6% of residents were 65 or older and 8.6% were under 15². The 2025 preliminary count shows a further 12.3% fall⁴.

Traditions and faith: Raikō Shrine is the guardian of the Ōno Tosa Diary and the center of the Araki Daigaku legends¹⁹. Two related folk beliefs survive. The first is Ame-ishi (雨石), a "rain stone" that villagers sank in the river to end droughts. The second is the Ubasugi (姥杉), a cedar with two breast-shaped burls where mothers short of milk came to pray¹⁹. The Ubasugi is the sacred tree of Shiriuchi Park and one reason the cedar is the town tree⁸. At Omonai Shrine (重内神社), 200 steps climb straight up behind the main hall to a shrine building at the top, next to the Omonai Lookout⁵⁰.

Museums: The Shiriuchi Local History Museum (郷土資料館) displays the 14 Important Cultural Property items from the Yunosato 4 grave¹⁹. It runs an "amber pendant" craft workshop based on the excavated amber⁵¹. The Kitajima Saburō Gallery, on the second floor of the town office, has two life-size figures of the singer, a timeline of his career and the jackets of 264 singles¹⁶.

Ainu history in Shiriuchi appears mostly in place names and in early Wajin–Ainu relations, not in a surviving community or facility. The town name and several district names (Kotaniishi, Omonai, Osashi, Yagoshi) have Ainu roots²⁴²³. Wakimoto Fort fell in Koshamain's War of 1457. In the 1551 settlement between the Kakizaki and the Ainu, Chikomotain of Shiriuchi was named representative of the eastern Ainu. Ships from the east then saluted by lowering their sails off Shiriuchi⁷. The town's local chronicles also mention Ainu figures such as Homakai and his son, who were said to have helped survivors of a 13th-century uprising⁷. More recently, the town invited Ainu residents and groups to comment on its forest-management plan under the Ainu Policy Promotion Act⁵². No dedicated Ainu cultural facility was found in the town.

• Imabetsu (今別町), Aomori Prefecture: The opening of the Seikan Tunnel in March 1988 made the two towns neighbors across the strait, and they became friendship towns in August 1990²⁷. The towns still meet for exchanges such as gateball tournaments, and Imabetsu's Arama (荒馬) folk dance was on the 2026 Summer Carnival program²⁷¹⁷.
• No international sister cities were found.

• Kitajima Saburō (北島三郎), born 4 October 1936 as Ōno Minoru: enka singer, known for hits such as "Namida-bune" (1962) and "Kita no Ryōba" (1986)¹⁵. He received the Hokkaido Citizen's Honor Award in 1991¹⁵ and was named an honorary citizen of Shiriuchi in October 2017⁷⁴.
• Matsumae Hiroko (松前ひろ子): enka singer from Shiriuchi and a cousin of Kitajima. She came back after an eight-year recovery from a traffic accident⁷⁵.
• Shima Akino (島あきの) and Azusa Chikako (梓智香子): Shiriuchi-born enka singers who appeared at the 40th Summer Carnival in 2026⁴⁶.
• Yokoyama Chōran (横山朝覧): leather-craft artist and painter from Shiriuchi. The town museum held a special exhibition of 37 of his oil paintings and 16 leather artworks in 2011¹⁷. His oil paintings are shown at Yagoshi Sansō, according to a 2021 town tourism leaflet, which spells his name 横山明覧⁵³.