Kyoichi Mori (

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

: 森恭一 ''Mori Kyoichi'') is a

whale watcher who assisted

Tsunemi Kubodera is a Japanese people, Japanese zoologist with the National Museum of Nature and Science. On September 30, 2004, Kubodera and his team became the first people to ''photograph'' a live giant squid in its natural habitat.Kubodera, T. & K. Mori 2005Fi ...

in taking the first photographs of a living

giant squid The giant squid (''Architeuthis dux'') is a species of deep-ocean dwelling squid in the family Architeuthidae. It can grow to a tremendous size, offering an example of abyssal gigantism: recent estimates put the maximum size at around Trace ...

in its natural habitat. He is a member of the

Ogasawara Whale Watching Association The Ogasawara Whale Watching Association is an association that regulates whale watching in the Ogasawara Islands. Since 1989 the Ogasawara Whale Watching Association has been conducting research on and educating people about whales. The Ogasawara ...

and specialises is

sperm whale The sperm whale or cachalot (''Physeter macrocephalus'') is the largest of the toothed whales and the largest toothed predator. It is the only living member of the genus ''Physeter'' and one of three extant species in the sperm whale famil ...

Giant squid

In late 2002,

came to

Chichi-jima , formerly known as Peel Island, is the largest island in the Ogasawara Islands, Ogasawara archipelago. Chichijima is about north of Iwo Jima. The island is within the political boundaries of Ogasawara, Tokyo, Ogasawara Village, Ogasawara Subpref ...

, a part of the

Bonin Islands The Bonin Islands, also known as the , are an archipelago of over 30 subtropical and tropical islands, some directly south of Tokyo, Japan and northwest of Guam. The name "Bonin Islands" comes from the Japanese word ''bunin'' (an archaic readi ...

archipelago, with the desire to film the giant squid alive in its natural habitat. Kyoichi, a native of Chichi-jima was able to provide locations of sperm whales that he had tracked, and, since sperm whales are known to feed on giant squid, the belief was that they could follow the whales to the squid. Kudobera and Mori succeeded in taking the first photographs of a living

in its natural habitat on September 30, 2004.Kubodera, T. & K. Mori 2005. ''Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences'', 272(1581):2583-2586.

References

Living people Year of birth missing (living people) {{Japan-bio-stub