Ikituski Daigyoran Kannon Statue

The Ikitsuki Island Museum Shima no Yakata is dedicated mainly to the whaling industry in the area during the Edo Period (1603-1868) but also contains exhibits from the "Hidden Christian" culture practiced in the region as well as local farming and traditional festival dances. There is also a quirky section of stuffed fish, produced by the islanders since 1989. There are presently about 400 fish from 250 different species on display, attached to the ceiling by wires in a special room. Coastal whaling in certain defined areas ( Shimonoseki , Wakayama and Taiji in present day Wakayama Prefecture, for example) was practiced throughout the Edo Period in Japan (certainly not everywhere on Japan's long coastline) and the museum's main emphasis is on the Masutomi group of whalers, who hunted whales in Nagasaki's coastal waters for their meat and oil, which was used for bug control on the area's rice fields.