Toropical drift seeds and fruits were collected on beaches in Aichi prefecture, central Japan. Most of the survey points are on the Pacific side of Atsumi Peninsula. The survey period was from 2008 to 2019, and 45 species were confirmed. The amount of drifted fruits and seeds of tropical origin was found to be related to the number of typhoon landing and the direction of the Kuroshio current.
Habitat and sea-dispersal on three non-maritime plants growing on the coast were studied. Three non-maritime species are Persicaria senticosa (Meisn.) H.Gross (Polygonaceae), Rumex japonicus Houtt.(Polygonaceae) and Torilis japonica (Houtt.) DC. (Apiaceae). It has been described that these species usually grow on roadsides, around cultivated areas, forest edges and the like. However, these plants also frequently grow on the shingle beaches. Floating experiments of the disseminules in seawater and previously reported studies of seedling populations on drift debris show that disseminules of these three species can float in seawater for at least several days and disperse by sea currents. The results suggest that these non-maritime species maintain their own populations on the coast and may have
coastal ecotypes.
Although it has believed that discinid brachiopods are rare along the coast of the Japan Sea, the shells were massively washed up on Hamakurosaki beach at the coast of Toyama Bay, concurrently with the construction of an offshore breakwater. After the shore becomes sheltered by the breakwater, brachiopod shell strandings are very rare on the back beach, but still stably commonon the surrounding beaches. The presence of abundant shells suggests that discinid brachiopods are not rare in the coast.
Molluscs drifted on the coast of Okushiri Island are examimed. Drifted shells are collected from eight sites in early May 2012 and late June to early July 2017. The Okushiri mollus can fauna is composed of 75 species of shelled molluscs, one polyplacophor, 28 gastropods and 46 bivalves. The fauna is almost dominated by cold-water species and eurythermal species. The fauna contains seven warm-water species such as Phalium flammiferum, Spondylus cruentus and Solecurtus dunkeri etc. Appearance of warm-water species are attributed to the combination of the Tsushima warm current, which transports warm-water taxa northward and especially the higher trend sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in winter.
A predatory drill hole was found in each of the two drifted dead shells of Lingula cf. reevii collected on the Asa River estuary, Sanyo-Onoda City, Yamaguchi Prefecture, Japan. It was presumed that the hole was drilled by naticid gastropod (probably Paratectona ticatigrina), and from the morphological characteristics observed in the well preserved specimen, the drill hole was equivalent to ichnospecies Oichnus paraboloides.