Ayu (Freshwater Fish Pictorial Book, Series 1, revised by Yujin)

Author’s note: Back in 2015 I wrote a series of walkarounds depicting and describing the breadth of the Yujin Freshwater Series, AKA Yujin Primary Freshwater Fish Pictorial Book. At that time, each species was described in brief, each figure was described in brief, and a number of photos were included. Some were updated with variants as I found them in my hunts—or updated when I learned more about them! With the changes to the organization of the Animal Toy Forum, it seemed appropriate that I would move each of these descriptions to the blog instead. I will re-post the original preamble in this first reblog, and link back to here in subsequent re-blogs, along with further information that I learned in subsequent years. My timing on these will be affected by 1) the sheer number of figures, and therefore posts; 2) my wish to not overwhelm the blog all at once with so much fishiness; 3) my ability to track down and reincorporate the photos through the blog; and 4) the time it will take to copy, paste, edit, and reblog about 25 old walkarounds! I’ll intersperse photos here to keep it fresh!

Fair warning, these won’t be my usual verbose posts (this one notwithstanding) but instead, are pretty image focused. Also…please forgive the photos because, again, 2015 with a very different camera. I’ll also post the figures in set-number order, instead of posting order, since it probably makes more sense that way!

From the original posts (with some edits):

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 a few 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. 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 models 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.

One other thing–when I give the lengths of the living species, I will be using the TL from Fishbase.org for consistency. Some of them seemed high, but I’ll assume Fishbase knows what they are doing. And the scales will be rounded and approximate! [b]EDIT later…[/b]–Or not. Fishbase has had some strange, unrepeatable numbers, so I will be using the length given on the figure’s paper for consistency. Unless the FB one is more interesting. When there are more than one, I will use the higher values.

Addendum To Original Company Info

So, in the years after writing the above (with some minor edits) I was able to make clearer sense of this collection from Yujin (and also complete the set n terms of species, at least!) In total there are 2 different series (referred to as ‘Books’), Book I was released in four different forms, and Book II was released in 3 different forms (I am still not certain of the years). Book I originated with 13 main figures with Book I first edition, and in the follow up Book I reissue (probably to coincide with the first Book II release); these releases also had at least 3 secret chase figures. Book I Revised followed with 14 figures (one of the secrets from the original/reissue) plus three secrets (one a repaint from the original, two are repaints of a different model to represent an existing different species!). So far, that’s three releases…

Book II was released in an original version (no reissues) with 16 main figures and 3 secret figures. Book II revised followed with the same numbers of figures, with two original secret figures in different paint (to varying degrees) and one different secret, another repainted figure. Upon the release of the two revised editions, there was also a fully complete display box edition that included every revised model, plus the secret models from both revised series, plus the secrets from Book I reissue and Book II original issue. On top of that, there were at least four more figures only from the box set, all repaints of existing models—and I think one of those might have been some kind of special offer as well. These latter four are the hardest to find, and by far the most expensive.

So now, the fish!

This figure is the Ayu, also called the Sweetfish, Pleccoglossus altivelus, number 01 from the first series. This is a fish found in East Asia, in Japan, Korea and eastern China. They are seasonally anadromous, heading to sea upon hatching, wintering there, and then heading back up stream. Given the name ‘sweetfish’ it’s probably not surprising that they are a food fish, with a sweet aroma to their meat. TL of the Ayu is 30cm.

This model is about 5.5cm long, making the figure roughly 1:5. It is in a straight-but-curving pose, as expected from a quick-swimming species. On the base, the rod goes in at a slight angle, giving a bit of rise to the fish (although it could just as easily be descending if it were turned). I have the figure on the tree-stump base. The figure is a pretty lively one, with fairly bright eyes and distinct colours. Ayu have shown up from several Japanese makers including Kaiyodo and Colorata. Like most Yujin fish figures, but not all, this figure is a single piece model.