Bears are extinct in Kyushu??

February 1, 2025

The other day, I went hiking here in Fukuoka. (I've written a newsletter on where I went before, so feel free to check that out here if you're curious!)

While I was out, I was thinking about how it's nice that I don't have to worry about running into a 熊クマ (kuma // bear) since there are none in 九州 (kyuushuu // Kyushu)… and how I almost didn't believe that when I first heard it.

After all, there's an entire prefecture here called 熊本くまもと (kumamoto // Kumamoto), which could be translated to "bear origin".

You're telling me there are no bears in a place called "bear origin"??

I mean, just look at 熊本くまもと's ゆるキャラ (yurukyara // mascot character), くまモン (kumamon // Kumamon):

I looked up what type of bear くまモン is, and it turns out he's(he?) based on a ツキノワグマ (tsukinowaguma // Moon bear, Asain black bear), which is this adorable creature right here:

Let's take a second to appreciate the name of this bear. Here are the kanji:

月輪熊
"Moon ring bear"

If you're like me, you might also be in the middle of realizing that the Pokemon Teddiursa and Ursaring are based on this bear. In fact, the Japanese name of Ursaring is リングマ (ringuma), which is a pun mixing "ring" in English (リング [ringu], 輪 [wa; the kanji in the bears name above]) and クマ (kuma).

Gotta love the Pokemon puns.

Speaking of which, we have a lesson about Pokemon and how their names are puns on NativShark. Once you know to look for them, you'll see them everywhere:

Pokémon in Japanese

↑ I love stuff like this. I grew up playing Pokemon and I'm still making so many connections I didn't know existed thanks to learning Japanese ^^

If the above lesson is tough for you, I wouldn't worry about it. With enough clicks of the Study Now button, you'll get there eventually and have all the tools you need to understand it:

If you haven't started your learning journey yet, you'll need your account first! You can make one for free here:

From there, you can go on a Pokemon-pun-hunting journey… and then realize Pokemon is full of puns in English too

Anyway, what happened? How are there no bears in 九州きゅうしゅう (kyuushuu // Kyushu) but there are in the rest of Japan?

Well, it turns out there used to be bears in 九州きゅうしゅう. But…

Textbook Casual

2012にせんじゅうに年ねんに環境省かんきょうしょうの方かたが絶滅ぜつめつ宣言せんげんを出だしている。

The Ministry of the Environment declared their extinction in 2012.

Sentence from TBS News Dig. (Referring to 九州 specifically.)

And the chances of them coming back are incredibly low.

The only way to get into 九州きゅうしゅう without swimming is through one of a few major bridges in 下関しものせき (shimonoseki // Shimonoseki) that link 山口県やまぐちけん (yamaguchiken // Yamaguchi Prefecture) to 福岡県ふくおかけん (fukuokaken // Fukuoka Prefecture)... which are all in highly populated areas. Bears won't wander there.

The only way aside from that is swimming, and bears aren't known to swim the long distances required.

And thus, the last recorded traces of live, wild bears in 九州きゅうしゅう were in the year 1941, with only one exception in 1987, where a bear was found in 大分県おおいたけん (ooitaken // Oita prefecture). But after a DNA analysis, they concluded the bear was unlikely to be a descendant of the original bears here, meaning that it was likely moved by someone instead of having swum its way over.

Aside from that, there have been various supposed sightings, but they're all unconfirmed. And in 2012, bears were declared extinct in 九州きゅうしゅう, as we saw in the Japanese sentence above.

As for why they're extinct, it's a bit less clear.

Some explanations I found pointed to how 九州きゅうしゅう is a tough environment for bears to live in. Apparently, the terrain is a bit too mountainous for how much bears travel around in their territory, and a higher ratio of man-made forests compared to the rest of Japan means that there is less food (notably どんぐり [donguri // acorns]) for them to eat.

So yeah, if you're hiking in 九州きゅうしゅう, you don't have to worry about bears.

Of course, there are other dangerous animals you should be conscious of, such as イノシシ (inoshishi // boars), スズメバチ (suzumebachi // giant hornets), and サル (saru // monkeys). And poisonous snakes such as マムシ (mamushi // pit vipers).

But not bears!

たまんない

I was looking around some Phase Two lessons and saw one from Milestone 18 on how you can use たまらない to say something is "irresistible".

The lesson also included this:

It's a good one to try to use the next time you take a sip of your favorite beverage or such ^^

Be sure to check out the rest of the examples and get a firmer handle on it here! ↓

Saying something is 'irresistible' with たまらない

NativShark goodie bag

NativShark Units

4 new Units have been added to Phase Three!

As always, these Units are filled with vocab in unique contexts, any relevant new kanji, and natural conversations called Dialogues at the end, all of which are designed to get you functional in Japanese as efficiently as possible.

These Units also feature the following lessons:

Happy hiking,
Ty & the NativShark team