The Sobo, Katamuki and Okue Biosphere Reserve also known as was created in 2017. It incorporates the 1965 quasi national parks of

Sobo Katamuki Prefectural Natural Park (Ōita) was a Prefectural Natural Park in southern Ōita Prefecture, Japan. Established in 1951, the park spanned the municipalities of Bungo-ōno, Saiki, and Taketa. In 2017 it was incorporated into the Sobo, Katamuki and Okue Biosphere Reserve. ...

(also previously known as the

Sobo-Katamuki Quasi-National Park was a List of national parks of Japan, Quasi-National Park in Ōita Prefecture, Ōita and Miyazaki Prefecture, Miyazaki Prefectures of Japan, Prefectures, Japan. It was in 2017 incorporated in to the Sobo, Katamuki and Okue Biosphere Reserve. E ...

, ) and

Sobo Katamuki Prefectural Natural Park (Miyazaki) was a Prefectural Natural Park in northern Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan. In 2017 it was incorporated into the Sobo, Katamuki and Okue Biosphere Reserve. Established in 1958, the park spanned the municipalities of Hinokage, Nobeoka, and Takac ...

Geography

The reserve derives its name from

Mount Sobo is one of the 100 Famous Japanese Mountains. The mountain lies on the border of Taketa, Ōita, Taketa and Bungo-ōno, Ōita, Bungo-ōno in Ōita Prefecture and Takachiho, Miyazaki, Takachiho, Nishiusuki District, Miyazaki, Nishiusuki District i ...

(), () and , also known as Mount Ōkue (). The Quasi-National Park borders two homonymous Prefectural Parks, namely the

and

Geology

The landforms of the Biosphere Reserve are the heavily modified result of volcanic activity over the last 14 million years. A massive eruption about 13.7 million years ago involved the Okueyama Volcano-plutonic Complex, and measured 8.0 on the

Volcanic Explosivity Index The volcanic explosivity index (VEI) is a scale used to measure the size of explosive volcanic eruptions. It was devised by Christopher G. Newhall of the United States Geological Survey and Stephen Self in 1982. Volume of products, eruption c ...

.Daisuke, Miura; Yutaka, Wada (2007)
"Middle Miocene ash-flow calderas at the compressive margin of southwest Japan arc: Review and synthesis". ''The Journal of the Geological Society of Japan''. 113 (7): 283–295. doi:10.5575/geosoc.113.283
Retrieved 8 August 2019. This formed the almost rectangular Okueyama Caldera with the eruption of an estimated

dense rock equivalent Dense-rock equivalent (DRE) is a volcanologic calculation used to estimate volcanic eruption volume. One of the widely accepted measures of the size of a historic or prehistoric eruption is the volume of magma ejected as pumice and volcanic ash, k ...

(DRE) volume of leaving a caldera orientated to NW to SE that was by in size. Further eruptions over only a few million years formed the smaller more elliptical Sobo Caldera which was by in size on a NNE to SSW axis with a DRE erupted volume of and the Katamukiyama Caldera again on a NW to SE axis which was by in size with a DRE erupted volume of . Later, most recently about 90,000 years ago, mainly the lower lying land was modified by

pyroclastic Pyroclast, Pyroclastic or Pyroclastics may refer to: Geology * Pyroclast, or airborne volcanic tephra fragments * Pyroclastic rock, rock fragments produced and ejected by explosive volcanic eruptions * Pyroclastic cone, landform of ejecta fro ...

deposits from the

Aso Caldera Aso caldera (also known as Asosan, the Aso Volcano or Mount Aso, although the later term usually is used related to its currently active vents) is a geographical feature of Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan. It stretches 25 kilometers north to south a ...

to the west whose eruption was .

Biosphere

There is a large amount of farmland in the large transition zone but the more rugged buffer and core areas are important flora and fauna habitats.

Flora

In the lower core and buffer areas the cover is by

old-growth forest An old-growth forest or primary forest is a forest that has developed over a long period of time without disturbance. Due to this, old-growth forests exhibit unique ecological features. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Natio ...

including Japanese beech and ''

Tsuga ''Tsuga'' (, from Japanese (), the name of '' Tsuga sieboldii'') is a genus of conifers in the subfamily Abietoideae of Pinaceae, the pine family. The English-language common name "hemlock" arose from a perceived similarity in the smell of it ...

''. ''

Rhododendron kiusianum ''Rhododendron kiusianum'', the Kyushu azalea, is a species of flowering plant in the family Ericaceae, native to Kyushu, Japan. It is a parent of a large number of hybrid dwarf azaleas, drawn from the naturally-occurring Kurume azaleas used in ...

'', Japanese gentian and the

Japanese maple ''Acer palmatum'', commonly known as Japanese maple, palmate maple, or smooth Japanese maple (Korean: ''danpungnamu'' []; Japanese: ''irohamomiji'' [] or ''momiji'' []), is a species of woody plant native to Korea, Japan, China, eastern Mongol ...

grow in great numbers. At higher levels, the vegetation changes from evergreen (glossy-leaved) forest to

conifer Conifers () are a group of conifer cone, cone-bearing Spermatophyte, seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the phylum, division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a sin ...

forest and then to Suzu-take and beech closer to mountain summits. A rare plant '' Angelica ubatakensis'' is found in the Sobo mountain range.

Fauna

The southern range limit of the , the

Japanese serow The (''Capricornis crispus'') ( 羚羊) is a Japanese goat-antelope, an even-toed ungulate. It is found in dense woodland in Japan, primarily in northern and central Honshu. The serow is seen as a national symbol of Japan, and is subject to p ...

lies in the Sobo mountain range. The Sobo salamander, a new species, was found here in 2014. The Japanese national butterfly, the great purple emperor, an endangered species, has been seen. Rare sightings have been made of the

Asian black bear The Asian black bear (''Ursus thibetanus''), also known as the Asiatic black bear, moon bear and white-chested bear, is a medium-sized bear species native to Asia that is largely adapted to an arboreal lifestyle. It is distributed from southeast ...

. Japanese dormice and

sika deer The sika deer (''Cervus nippon''), also known as the northern spotted deer or the Japanese deer, is a species of deer native to much of East Asia and introduced to other parts of the world. Previously found from northern Vietnam in the south t ...

are much more commonly seen.

References

External links

Sobo, Katamuki and Okue Biosphere Reserve (pdf)
{{coord missing, Ōita Prefecture Parks and gardens in Ōita Prefecture Protected areas established in 2017 2017 establishments in Japan Bungo-ōno, Ōita