Nature Sites / Okinoshima Town
From Kamo Bay you can see Matsushima Island, an island formed by rhyolitic lava and home to subalpine plants Japanese thuja (Thuja standishii) and fringed galax (Schizocodon soldanelloides var. soldanelloides). The reason these subapline plants grow here at 0 m elevation is unclear. However, it is thought that these plants took refuge here in glacial periods when Oki became a peninsula, and remained even after it became islands again, adapting to the environment thereafter.
