The first place to start with poop etiquette in the Shiretoko National Park is the Shiretoko general rules of conduct (PDF backup), issued by the Ministry of Environment. In regards to coastal areas, they state as follows:
In principle, portable toilets should be used, and human, paper and other wastes carried out of the region. In the event a portable toilet is unavailable, paper waste should be carried out and human waste not concentrated in one area. Please follow the procedures below:
i) When along the coastline, dig a hole above the highest point at high tide, in an area without vegetation. Sufficient distance should be kept from fishing huts and other places associated with fishery activities.
ii) Avoid water sources, mires, and areas with fragile vegetation.
Key Points
Using W.A.G. bags and a poop tube is the most sustainable and convenient option for dealing with human waste on sea kayaking trips around the Shiretoko Peninsula.
Catholes are not viable due to the rocky nature of the coastal camping zones.
Pooping in the sea is not officially accepted as a solution on Shiretoko Peninsula coastal sea kayaking and hiking expeditions, but in practice seems to be widespread.
POOP TUBE AND W.A.G. BAGS
To that effect, for our 2024 summer paddle around the peninsula (six days in total), we carried a poop-tube and W.A.G. bags. The idea is basic. Poop in your W.A.G. bag, and store the used bags in the poop tube to keep odors at bay. Attach the poop-tube to the outside of your kayak. Dispose of the W.A.G. bags at a W.A.G. bag deposit bin in the area. In the Shiretoko area, these are the deposit options:
- Rausu-onsen Campground 羅臼温泉野営場 (location) – you don’t need to be staying there to dispose, but you will need to buy trash bags to transfer your WAG bags to (costs 100yen per trash bag).
- Rausu-dake Trailhead public toilets 羅臼岳登山口トイレ (location) – just drop W.A.G. bags in the grey plastic roll-top bin.
The W.A.G. bag plus poop-tube solution does, of course, require you to get relatively up close and personal with your poop. Man-handling the still-warm W.A.G. bag into the tube reminds you of 1) how heavy a poop is, and, depending on how cold your hands are, 2) how warm a fresh poop is, even through two layers of plastic.
Putting the plastic waste issue aside, this is, arguably, the most desirable and sustainable option for managing human waste on a Shiretoko Peninsula circumnavigation.
Incidentally, this is the go-to best-practice for NOLS sea kayaking courses, and has been Leave No Trace best practice for almost two decades.
P.S. Huge props to Timbah for carrying the poop tube on our trip!
A PVC poop tube is easy and cheap to make. Just grab a pre-cut length of PVC tubing, screw end-caps, some PVC cement, and you can put one together in about 10 minutes at a cost of around 2,000yen. We got our supplies en-route to Shiretoko at the DCM Nicot hardware store in Memanbetsu.
See a basic how-to video below for making your own poop tube.
CATHOLES
Rather conveniently, Shiretoko general rules of conduct do, however, allow an ‘out’ for those who “don’t have a portable toilet available” – dig a cathole above the high tide line in an area without vegetation.
We have several issues with this advice.
- It’s unsustainable. Camping real estate is extremely limited along the Shiretoko coastline. If sea kayaking and coastal hiking party numbers increased beyond what are currently using the coastline, this would quickly become unmanagable.
- It goes against best practice. Human waste, if buried, should be buried in organic matter. We can only assume concessions were made here because there is almost no accessible organic matter (soil) along the Shiretoko coastline.
- It encourages lazy behavior. On our six-day circumnavigation, we only saw human waste on beaches once. However, unfortunately the two deposits, replete with plenty of toilet paper (!), covered only with one rock each, were hogging some of the best shade on the camping beach. If those folk had available some W.A.G. bags, perhaps this wouldn’t have happened.
POOPING IN THE OCEAN
The Poop Put, the Float-a-Log, the Fish-food Peace Offering…call it what you may, pooping directly into the sea in the intertidal zone has been a go-to strategy for generations of sea kayakers. Indeed, spurred on by early 2000’s NOLS expedition advice, this was our party’s preferred option during our paddle around Shiretoko. In reality, we only used the poop tube a few times.
It turns out that this practice is more nuanced, tricky, and much more outdated than we had originally thought.
Keen to check if this poop-in-the-ocean practice was within the realm of reasonable behavior on the Shiretoko coast, after the trip we dropped into the Rusa Field House (a Shiretoko information center run by the Ministry of Environment and Shiretoko Foundation) to ask.
“In practice, that’s the preferred option when compared to trying to bury human waste on land,” the staff member said. “For some parties, it’s not practical to carry WAG bags for up to seven or eight days for a large group. In practice, it’s our understanding that most people do poop in the ocean. The rules were created more with the mountainous areas in mind since those areas are more fragile.”
It’s our view that pooping in the intertidal zone has probably been a workable solution in Shiretoko for some time. Realistically, the season is short. Most recreationalists only visit between July and September. Visitor numbers to the remote coastal areas are still relatively few and far between.
That said, it wouldn’t take many more users before the feasibility of pooping in the intertidal zone would wane. The gorgeous Ochiai-wan Cove, for example, wouldn’t handle heavy intertidal pooping.
Above all, however, the practice of pooping in the ocean on sea kayaking trips is outdated to the tune of about two decades. NOLS, for example, arguably the world’s most influential outdoor leadership school, has for a long time taught not to poop in intertidal zones. They do not consider it a feasible option for sea kayaking. Similarly, Leave No Trace (LNT) has advised against the practice since 2001 (see their booklet here | backup).
Timbah followed up with LNT after the Shiretoko trip by email, and got this response.
Despite what your 2003 instructors told you, we never recommend pooping in the water. Too often, the “poop put” is done poorly and the feces ends up washing up on shore. We moved away from the “poop put” around 2005 or 2006. We recommend being prepared to use facilities if they are provided or digging catholes if pulling on shore is a possibility. All kayakers should bring waste disposal systems to pack out their waste if the first two options do not exist.
SUMMING UP
As per Shiretoko General Rules of Use, sea kayakers using the Shiretoko coast should pack out their human waste. W.A.G. bags plus a poop tube is a viable, easy, clean, and odorless solution.
2 thoughts on “Shiretoko Sea Kayak Expedition Pooping”
This is an excellent and timely article on an important and increasingly pressing issue. LNT is the way to go!
Cheers Justin! With more and more people getting out into the outdoors (more info, better gear, burgeoning middle class around the world), responsibility on participants is indeed increasing.