Above the rice field where the frogs croak, a handful of fireflies light up the night with a bright red streak. The beams of four flashlights illuminate the water of the stream, swollen by the rain of the last few days. A voice bursts out: ” I have one ! » The marauders regroup, wading in long strides. A few moments later, Sumio Okada pulls from his test tube not one, but three giant salamanders with flat heads, brown skin covered in viscous mucus and very small legs compared to the rest of the body. “I’m going to show you something I’ve never shown anyone other than my family and a few scientists”, announces Mr. Okada. After identifying the salamanders using the chip inserted under their skin, he uses a water pump to make them regurgitate and collect the contents of their stomachs. A way for him to better understand their diet.
This forty-year-old researcher is one of the best animal specialists. Residents of Tottori Prefecture in western Japan happily call it “Okada sensei” (“Professor Okada”). You have to see him in action, lit by his headlamp, meticulously recording his observations in a notebook dogged by humidity. Knowing what the salamanders ate allows him to assess the quality of their living environment. And as with every expedition, his observation is bitter: food is scarce in the area, and it is one more threat to this amphibian that the International Union for Conservation of Nature has placed on the list in 2022. “vulnerable” species. “Every time I come here, I have a knot in my stomachconfides in a low voice Mr. Okada. Due to road construction work next to the river, the salamanders are no longer able to reproduce. This place was one of their last reserves, and it is in danger in turn…” Basically, it is the disappearance of a world that he documents day after day in his notebook: that of rural Japan and its rivers, its heavy-framed houses and their rice fields.
Despite everything, he continues his investigations, slipping the three amphibians into a pipe that looks like a gutter in order to measure them. All three are of average size – 80 centimeters for the largest. Far, therefore, from the largest wild specimen ever observed: 1.36 meters, 26 kilos. Another particularity of this giant salamander: its longevity. It could live up to a hundred years due to its low activity and its metabolic capacity to regenerate. This is also one of the explanations of its local name, hanzake (“han” for “half”, “zake” for “torn”): “This refers either to its immense mouth, which opens from one side of its rounded head to the other, or to the fact that, according to certain legends, a salamander even cut in two is capable of reconstituting itself”details Juliette Ako Sato, a Franco-Japanese who founded an association for the protection of this amphibian and accompanies the professor in his research.
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