Live camera
Waterbirds on Lake Biwa live camera — Nagahama, Shiga
The north shore of Japan's largest lake. In winter it becomes a wintering ground for Bewick's swans and ducks; how crowded the water is tells you the season.
Sample August 2026What you are looking at
What the camera shows is the northern tip of Lake Biwa, from the Nagahama side. Nearly all of the frame is water, and how crowded it is differs completely from season to season.
The lake draws birds not only because it is large but because it is old. Lake Biwa's origins go back some four million years, making it one of the world's few ancient lakes, and that has given it its own creatures and its own water plants for feeding. The northern shore is a run of shallow inlets — terrain suited to birds coming down to feed.
Lake Biwa was listed under the Ramsar Convention in 1993. It covers some 670 square kilometres, a sixth of Shiga prefecture. Mount Yamamoto on this northern shore is known for a Steller’s sea eagle, believed to be the same individual, that returned every winter for more than twenty years.
Only one river flows out of this lake. The Seta, at its southern end, is the single outlet; it changes name to the Uji and then the Yodo before reaching Osaka Bay. More than 14 million people downstream are said to draw on that water, so the whole Kinki region runs on what collects here. The canal that carries lake water over to Kyoto was cut in 1890. More than 60 species are known that live nowhere but this lake.
November to February is the main season. Numbers start rising in late October, and by March they have gone north. Open it outside that window and you get only water.
Morning and evening. During the day the birds are out in the surrounding paddies. Updates come once an hour, so assume you will not catch the moment of take-off.
About this camera
| Place | Nagahama, Shiga |
| Format | Still, hourly |
| Time zone | Asia/Tokyo (UTC+9) |
| Category | Wildlife · Nature |
| Operator | Ministry of the Environment — Internet Nature Institute |
| Terms of use | PDL 1.0 |
The operator's own page
The footage belongs to each agency. This site is an unofficial guide, and each sample frame was copied once per camera under that agency's terms of use.