Early bloomers spoil traditions

It's a custom almost as old as Christmas. All over Japan, millions of people this weekend will stock up on beer and sake, grab plastic rain sheets and karaoke machines and get sozzled beneath showers of cherry blossoms.

The hanami (flower viewing) party underneath Japan's beloved cherry tree is a calendar mainstay and has survived, claim some experts, 1600 years of natural disasters, war and urbanisation. Now it faces new problems: global warming and premature balding.

The white and pink blossoms are associated in the Japanese psyche with the cycle of life and death and the sound of millions of beer caps being twisted open.

The trees bloom with the movement of warmer weather across the Japanese archipelago from south to north, signalling the arrival of spring and the start of a new academic and business year.

About 1.5 million blossom worshippers make the pilgrimage every year to a single venue - Ueno Park in the centre of Tokyo - to view the 1100 cherry trees, the majority in March and April. The trees are so revered it is illegal to snip off a single branch.

In Tokyo, older Japanese remember early April as the beginning of the hanami season, but increasingly the blossoms are appearing before the end of March, a phenomenon many blame on warmer weather and the urban heat effect.

In some parts of the capital cherry trees bloomed 10 days early this year. "The weather has gone mad," says 72-year-old Tokyo resident Kyoko Ishii. "It used to be one thing we could depend on in this city."

Accurately predicting when the blossoms will bloom is a science and is taken seriously in Japan. The Meteorological Agency, which publishes the forecasts, was overwhelmed by calls from irate people last year after it missed the date by four days. It has since splurged on a new climate model, including an advanced meteorological supercomputer.

Millions of Japanese eager for a break from corporate drudgery follow the forecasts closely in March when the agency begins to report the advance of the sakura zensen or cherry blossom front across the country.

Because the trees bloom for just seven to 10 days, a bad call can ruin the best-laid plans. The unpredictable weather has persuaded several insurance companies to sell weather derivatives hedging against losses caused by rain or blossom no-shows to hotels, bars and restaurants. A private agency has begun offering competing predictions and has staked its reputation - mistakenly - on this being an average year.

Tokyo and other Japanese cities have sweltered through some of the hottest summers on record since the 1990s, and 2004 was officially the warmest year ever. Just to add to the climatic confusion, this year's winter defied agency predictions by being the coldest since World War II.

In response, the agency has shortened its sample period from 50 to 30 years and pushed back its early warning signal - the date tree buds start developing - by 10 days.

The changing weather is just one of the problems looming for the national tradition. Many of the cherry trees were planted after the war and are nearing the end of their lives; only replacing the trees would keep the tradition alive. And the trees have been plagued by a mould called witch's broom which can strip them of blossoms and even kill them off unless treated.

The prospect of Japan's national emblem dying doesn't worry some hanami revellers.

"If the cherry trees were to die out tomorrow people would find some other tree to drink under," said resident John Konno.

- INDEPENDENT