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avatar_sbell

Langsdorf’s Goldfish (Yujin - Freshwater Fishes Series 2, second release)

Started by sbell, June 27, 2015, 08:04:50 PM

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sbell

This walk around is part of my series of the Yujin Freshwater Fish series. Part of this will be repeating this same introductory and concluding info because copy-and-paste is easy, and it keeps things consistent.  So feel free to only read this once (or never...) as well as the stuff at the end. My main motivation is that Yujin does not have many walk arounds on this site, which is a shame because they make some great models. It is also an attempt to flood (!) the site with some fishes, because there simply have not been enough lately. ;)

One other thing--when I give the lengths of the living species, I will be using the length given on the figure's paper for consistency. Some of them seemed off, but they seem close—often better than my original usage of the Fishbase TL (unless the FB one is more interesting...). When there are more than one, I will use the higher values. And the scales will be rounded and approximate!

So now, the fish!

This figure is the Langsdorf's Goldfish (or Ginfuna in Japan), Carassius langsdorfii (according to Fishbase; most sources refer to it as the subspecies Carassius auratus langsdorfii ), number 16 and the first definite model from the second series. This is the first of several cyprinids in the series, and probably the least familiar of the ones made. Information about this (sub?)species is difficult to determine. From what I can tell, it is a 'cryptic' species in East Asian waters, primarily from Japan but possibly also parts of China, Korea and the Taiwan. From what I have been able to determine (using translated Japanese sources) this species is gynogenetic, meaning that the entirely female population only requires male input to activate the eggs. In which case, this fish is truly unique. Otherwise it appears to be a more or less normal 'goldfish'. The Yujin model (and other sources) states that the length is around 30cm, although 15-20cm is more normal.

This model is about 5 cm long, making the figure roughly 1:6 scale (or as large as 1:3 using the common size of 15cm). The one that I have is painted as a captive fish, in a yellowish-brown colour fading to silver on the belly. This appears to be a natural pattern, as it would offer some camouflage to avoid getting eaten pretty quickly in a stream! It is a bright little figure, very goldfish-like, and looks like ones you would see in many shops; it is realistic to pass for a very small live fish! It is also in the morphology of a less-modified fish (gynogenesis may make creating strains and breeds more difficult) so the fins are short, and the body more carp-like with big shiny scales. The base is the grey wood stems. I am not aware of any other Langsdorf's Goldfish figure; that said, it is possible that there is a different one in the Yujin Goldfish set (a separate set) but I don't have any from that series, so I don't know.

Pictures:








I refer to this one as the bowhunting tournament pose--a hole in it, tossed on its back...but it's easy to see the detail that Yujin puts into every side of the models (and can often see the numbers in the photos).


For those not familiar, the Yujin Freshwater fishes were released as two series of fish, for a total of 32 fish figures. This number includes at least 3 secret figures (whose numbers remain in sequence--all figures are marked somewhere with the number) but does not incorporate a number of re-issues and repaints; there was at least one complete reissue (from which mine all come so far). The original releases, from what I can find, had yellow papers; the second release used light blue for the Series I and black for Series II. The entire set, with all variants and secrets, is actually available as a boxed set on YAJ (for around $300!), but individual figures can be found there or even on eBay for a variety of prices (the secrets & specials are of course the most expensive). Myself, there are still two or three species I don't have, but I haven't put a lot of effort into changing that...

Another nice thing about these Yujin fish model is that, like most Yujin releases, almost all of them come with a natural base and acrylic stem to display them (the Series II has a few exceptions). There are 4 or 5 bases used, plus a few unique ones for some specials. When I received mine several years ago, the fish+acrylic stems were not directly associated with the bases, so I just went with whatever worked (so if you have one or two, and the base is different, now you know why--I couldn't find a way to be sure if the bases were specific). All of the bases are based on environment--wood stems, gravel, river rocks, silt+plants, that sort of thing. Most are monochromatic, but a few are painted differently (again, often for the specials). In fact, if I wanted to get really pedantic, the bases themselves are labelled with letters based on the style, but I won't.


Jetoar

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