What Is Singing the Song?

image from Wikipedia

During the daytime I hear cicadas droning on and severe lingering heat is forecast for the week ahead. However, I feel the sign of autumn among their voices. In the evening I hear higurashi (evening cicada, Tanna Japonensis) singing.

Actually they started to appear as early as from June but they can be heard most often when the temperature drops or when it becomes cloudy around this time of the year usually in the evening or early morning. Because of this, higurashi is a word associated with autumn in poetry.

Speaking of clear, beautiful voice, I remember when I heard the song with a beautiful resonant tone in the wooded hills in Tenkawa, Yoshino, where a clear stream ran nearby. I thought it was a birdsong. To my great surprise, a friend of mine said it was a frog! A frog?! What came to my mind was the memory of the croak in chorus from the rice paddy fields as a child. 
Anyway, why don't you listen to this first.

I was so ignorant but I knew this was a species of frog called 河鹿蛙 (kajika frog), endemic to Japan.

As you might think, contrary to its beautiful voice, the appearance is sober and rugged and develops protective coloration dapple. Its natural habitat is temperate forests and streams. The beautiful song is courtship display during April to July. However, their desperate courtship doesn't always pay off because of fewer population of female ones. It’s not an easy job to find mates for them as well.

みたらい渓谷(Mitarai gorge) in Tenkawa with several falls, huge oddly shaped rocks and crystalline water in the stream is my favorite destination. In autumn this area turns into a breathtaking tints. (autumn last year)

It was slightly raining and the raindrops made tiny splashes on the clear quiet water. It was really like water fairies were dancing merrily on the water.

This is a suspension bridge called 哀伝橋 ( sorrow passing bridge). This secluded mountain area in Yoshino was and is a religious homeplace for Shugendo practitioners but at the same time it was once a refuge for political losers who attempted a comeback but in vain. It has been steeped in a wealth of history and legends. 

Now it has become a popular place many hikers visit all through the year. At downstream basin, families or people on holidays were having fun in the river though it was a bit cooler to bathe.