主な展示内容 Main Exhibition Content

魚類などの展示

世界の代表的な魚類約550種を系統進化の順に配列・展示しています。この中には普段見ることのできない深海性サメ類のラブカや、全長1mを越えるアカマンボウなど,ユニークな魚類も多く含まれます。これらの標本のうち、ヌタウナギ類、ヤツメウナギ類、軟骨魚類(サメ・エイ類)、およびアンコウ類についてはアクリル水槽による展示を行っており、いろいろな角度からじっくりと細部まで観察することができます。その他,軟体動物や海藻類の標本も陳列され、その中には世界的にも貴重な頭足類(タコ・イカの仲間)の標本が含まれています。

漁船の発達展示

江戸時代から明治初期まで本州と北海道を往復した弁財船(和商船)、明治期に全国各地で使用された和船などの日本の漁船の発達を研究する上で貴重な資料である漁船模型をはじめ、網具模型,釣具模型など約2,500種6,000点を展示しています。

水産加工品などの展示

真珠,貝細工,鼈甲(べっこう)などの水産加工製品、および水産増殖や海洋関係の写真、パネル、模型などを展示しています。これらの中には現在では入手が極めて困難なものもあり、非常に貴重な標本群です。

 

Exhibits of Fish and Other Animals

The museum has arranged and put on display approximately 550 representative fish species from around the world in order of their evolutionary development. This display includes many unique fishes, including the rarely seen deep-sea frilled shark, and an opah more than one meter long. The hagfish, lamprey, chondrichthyes (sharks and rays), and monkfish specimens are displayed in an acrylic aquarium, so that visitors can take as much time as they like to examine them from various angles. In addition, there are mollusk and seaweed specimens, including cephalopods (similar to octopus and squid), which are rare not only in Japan but worldwide.

Fishing Boat Development Exhibit

The museum displays approximately six thousand examples of twenty-five hundred artifacts related to fishing boats. These include fishing nets and tackle, as well as fishing boat models, which are valuable for studying the development of Japanese fishing boats. Examples of the latter include the bezaisen (washōsen), which sailed between the Japanese mainland and Hokkaido from the Edo period (1603–1868) to the early years of the Meiji period (1868–1912), and Japanese cargo boats (wasen), which were widely used during the Meiji period.

Jewelry and Craft materials, and Other Exhibits

The collection includes jewelry and craft materials related to the fisheries industry (including pearls, shell work, and tortoise shells) as well as photographs, panels, and models related to aquaculture and the ocean. This is a very valuable group of specimens; some of these items would be hard to obtain today.