It is a long-awaited iconic moment in the country. cherry blossom season, sakura in Japanese, opened in Tokyo. The Japan Meteorological Agency gave the official starting gun on Tuesday.
Every spring, crowds flock to admire the Japanese cherry trees and their pink and white blossoms, revered in the country for centuries.
“Today, March 14, we declare the flowering of the sakura in Tokyo,” a Japan Meteorological Agency official said from the Yasukuni-jinja shrine in the center of the capital.
early flowering
As Japan extends in latitude, flowering, although brief between the opening of the first buds and the flight of the petals, lasts for several weeks throughout the country, generally from late March to April.
However, it is in Tokyo that the Japanese weather agency officially launches the season. The date is not set, so the institute surveys 58 landmark trees in the country to announce the news, including those at the capital’s famous Yasukuni-jinja shrine.
As soon as five flowers can be counted, the season begins, the Japan Times reports. However, in recent years, flowering has been particularly early.
global warming in question
According to the Japanese meteorological agency, it arrives ten days earlier than normal this year. An unusual situation, but one that tends to normalize since since the beginning of the observations in 1953, only 2020 and 2021 have seen such levels of precocity.
“We had hot days in March,” the agency explains, adding: “Climate change may also have played a role.”
Rising temperatures accelerated bud growth. Flowering should be complete within the next week, according to the weather agency. The flowers peaked in April, coinciding with the start of the new academic and professional year. But the flowering has started earlier and most of the time the flowers disappear before the first day of school, reported as early as 2021. The Guardian.
important database
In fact, researchers from the UK Met Office and Osaka Metropolitan University in Japan say the climate crisis and urban warming have brought the flowering period forward by eleven days. In 2021, cherry blossoms in historic Kyoto peaked on March 26, the earliest full bloom date in 1,200 years.
Dates from cherry blossoms in Japan have become one of the most important sources of information on the effects of climate change on plants. The data set is exceptionally detailed and goes back further in time than any other known database of plant bloom times, due to the cultural importance of cherry trees in the country.
In fact, it is a spectacle that attracts many visitors every year. In 2019, more than eight million tourists visited Japan during the season to celebrate the hanamithe admiration of flowers, especially with the picnics organized in the parks.
Source: BFM TV
