In Japanese high mountains, glaciers advanced during the Last Glacial period to form cirques and mo-raines. The chronology of these glacial landforms is important for examining landforms development in the high mountains and for reconstructing the Last Glacial paleoenvironment. In high mountains, however, it is difficult to find the key tephra layers and/or radiocarbon samples for dating. There-fore, weathering-rind thickness (WRT) of gravels (Fig. 4) has frequently been used for dating mo-raines and debris slopes. Recent studies in Japan have also determined the age of glacial and pen-glacial landforms using the WRT, yet little attention has been paid to the statistical significance of the dating. This study discusses the glacial fluctuation history of the northern Central Japan Alps on the basis of the statistical interpretation of the WRT values. Eleven moraines in five cirques were se-lected for the analysis (Fig. 3-a-c).
The measured WRT values are large for lower moraines, but small for higher moraines. In addi-tion, the WRT values have no correlation with the depth of the granular exfoliation pits developed on gravels, which reflect the effect of denudation on gravel surfaces (Fig. 7). Thus, the WRT values depend not on the difference in the denudation process but on the age of the moraines.
In the study area, two moraines were dated at 35ka and 25ka, respectively, using tephrochronolog-ical methods (Yanagimachi, 1983). The relationships between the ages and the WRT values for the two moraines can be expressed as:
W=4.33×10^-2 t^0.50
or
W=10.26log (1+1.36×10^-4t)
The ages of the other undated moraines can be estimated by the substitution of their WRT values into these equations (Fig. 6; Table 2). The moraines can be divided into three groups according to their estimated ages: ca. 35ka, 1.9-2.6ka, and 11-12ka. This grouping is confirmed by the Kruskal-Wallis test, which is a nonparametric statistical method (Table 3).
Based on the WRT values and the mathematical errors involved in the WRT method, the ages of the glacial advance stages are determined as follows (Fig. 8) 1) Inagawa Stage, the early stage of the Last Glacial Age; 2) Nishisenjojiki Stage, around the Last Glacial Maximum; and 3) San'nosawa Stage, the Late Glacial. The age of the third stage has not been determined in previous research in the Central Japan Alps. The stage can be correlated to the Younger Dryas stage, because glacial ad-vances in Japan are known to have occurred during the colder substages of the Last Glacial Age.

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Geographers, economists, social scientists and other researchers in various study domains have been attracted to the topic of diffusion of agricultural innovations. In recent decades, many agricultur-al innovations are taking place and their diffusion is more rapid than ever before. This causes difficul-ty in specifying the patterns and processes of the diffusion of agricultural innovations among re-gions and farmers. The present study attempts to identify the diffusion processes of a newly intro-duced strawberry variety, Nyoho, at both region and community levels in Tochigi prefecture.
Nyoho, which was developed by Tochigi Prefectural Agricultural Experiment Station in 1982, is a highly market-oriented variety. Without any special treatment, the new variety enables farmers to ship earlier than other previous varieties, especially before December when strawberry prices are the highest. In addition, Nyoho has higher quality than the other varieties : glossy scarlet color, hard flesh, and sweet flavor. Those characteristics gave farmers the incentive to plant the new variety in-stead of the previous varieties.
In Tochigi prefecture, Nyoho was largely introduced in 1984 and had completely replaced the other varieties in six years. One of the reasons for the rapid diffusion of Nyoho is that local governments and agricultural cooperatives encouraged farmers to introduce the new variety through lectures and demonstrations of experimental fields. As a result, most farmers became aware of Nyoho in the very early period of its diffusion.
Nyoho also spread widely to other strawberry production areas in Japan, except for the Kyushu Region, where another variety, Toyonoka, dominates. Nyoho was immediately accepted in 1985 in the main strawberry production areas of the Kanto and Tokai Regions. At present, the variety shares the greatest portion of acreage in those strawberry production areas.
Because it is not possible for farmers to replace previous varieties with Nyoho all at once at the com-munity level, the introduction and adoption stages are separately analyzed in this study. The introduc-tion stage is defined as the period when farmers begin to cultivate Nyoho in a part of their strawber-ry fields. The adoption stage is defined as the period when farmers completely replace the preceding varieties with Nyoho. In the Mikuriya and Tsukuba districts of Ashikaga city, the Tochigi Agricultur-al Experiment Station or the agricultural extension station recruited some innovative farmers to plant experimental fields with Nyoho. Those farmers are considered to be innovators in the diffusion process. They were followed by early introducers who had observed the innovators' trial closely. In gen-eral, the innovators and early introducers had a great deal of experience in strawberry cultivation and are operating a relative large acreage of strawberries even today. In addition, they managed their farms with large numbers of farm workers and emphasized the position of strawberry produc-tion within their farm management. It is also worth noting that the innovators and early introducers had a longer trial-to-adoption period than later introducers of Nyoho.
In the Mikuriya and Tsukuba districts, we observed differences in the rate of adoption of Nyoho in dif-ferent communities. Those differences may be explained by two factors: the presence or absence of in-novators in each community, and close communication among farmers in the early period of the diffu-sion. It might be difficult, however, to draw conclusions about neighborhood effects on the diffusion process of Nyoho.

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In the study of the traditional perception of space in Japan, the aspect of direction has long been the focus of researchers' interest, and research findings in this area have accumulated. However, con-cerning the aspect of length, very few explanations and case studies have been reported ; for exam-ple, when one is building a small shrine facing in the northeast direction, it is possible to select for the site any single point on the endless line which extends in the northeast direction from the main house. Very few traditional standards are reported which judge the good and bad luck of a location by the direction from and the distance from the main house, other than the northeast direction. Very little is known about the connection between length and the auspiciousness of a site.
But there are some measures of fortune using length in the Okinawa and Amami regions. We intend to clarify how the idea of telling fortune by length is reflected in real landscapes.
The traditional measure for telling fortune by length is called “Karajaku” in Okinawa. The “Karaja-ku” measure contains eight scales- Zai (_??_=luck), Byo (_??_=ill luck), Ri (_??_=ill luck), Gi (_??_=luck), Kan (_??_=luck), Kyo (_??_=ill luck), Gai (_??_=ill luck), and Hon (_??_=luck) -and it is used for, jud-ging the good or bad luck of the width of a house gate or the entrance to a tomb. We cannot find the “Karajaku” measure in the Amami region, but there are some rules for judging the good or bad luck of a length by the carpenter's square instead of using the “Karajaku”measure. We conducted a survey in the village of Hateruma Island, Okinawa Prefecture, and the village of Yoro Island, Kagoshima Pre-fecture, to find out how the measure for fortune by length is utilized. The two villages have a common landscape of the stone walls surrounding private houses. In the village of Hateruma, Oki-nawa, the traditional measure is said to be used to determine the width of the house gate. Measuring the gates, we found that 71 percent of them were of the width judged lucky by “Karajaku”.
In Yoro, Amami, it is said that one side of the housing lot including the entrance gate is considered as the “Karajaku” itself, and the entrance could be placed on one of the eight scales of the measure, which is regarded as lucky. In other words, it is a method of design which determines the location of the gate in proportion to the scale of the traditional measure. Actual measurement showed that 66 percent of the gates are of the scale judged lucky.
It is clear that the luck of the location selection is based not only on direction but also sometimes on length. While the use of the “Karajaku” traditional measure is almost exclusive to Okinawa, the ex-istence of the standard for the perception of space makes it inappropriate to focus only on the percep-tion of direction in research on the location selection.
However, people in areas other than Okinawa have been practicing telling fortune by direction, and the connection of fortune to length may not have existed in these areas. It is noteworthy that while at the back of the carpenter's square eight units are indicated, which is the same as the “Kara-jaku” measure, very few instructions have been passed down from the old days for the use of the meas-ure. While the direction may have been the criterion for the standards in almost all cases of the prac-tice, in research we must also look at the aspect of standard by length.

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