Bongo Antelope (Wildlife by CollectA)

Review and photos by Okapiboy

The bongo antelope (Tragelaphus eurycerus) is one of the most beautiful, distinctive, and striking of all antelopes. It is also one of the most popular zoo animals.

So it is puzzling that when it came to toy replica, the majority of today’s top companies haven’t produced one for the mass market. Fortunately, CollectA heard enough request that they granted us with a beautiful figure! I was excited when I first heard that they are releasing one since I am a big fan of all of their antelopes, and the bongo is one of my favorite animals.

Bongo are the largest of the forest antelopes and are often solitary or joining in small social herd. They are found in the  tropical rain forest from West Africa, Congo Basin, Central Africa, all the way to southern Sudan. There are currently two recognized subspecies of bongo: the mountain or eastern bongo and the lowland or western bongo.

Although both are threatened in the wild, the mountain bongo is considered critically endangered. Without a doubt, they are the most colorful and impressive of the forest antelopes, and unlike most antelopes, both the male and females have huge spiraled lyre-shaped horns.

Bongos are shy by nature and are mostly active around dusk or dawn and are always on the alert, ready to run for cover at the slightest sound. Their coloration, a mixture of dark brown, chestnut brown, to almost black, are effective in this type of environment where the dappled light help the animal blend in. The white striping on the body also help by breaking the animal’s shape.  Adult bongos have few predators in the forest, the leopard is one of the few natural enemies in the forest, but lions and hyenas are also potential threats where their territory overlaps. Humans are the major threat to Bongo’s existence in the wild.

CollectA’s bongo, like many of their antelope figures, is a real beauty. It fully captures the majestic and elegant  nature of the animal.The large spiraling horns are beautifully sculpted and are surprisingly hard. While both male and female Bongo have long horns, the males have a thicker, more robust looking horns that are more tightly spiraled while the females tend to be slightly thinner and more parallel. Females are also retain the lighter reddish/chestnut color throughout their life, while the males turn much darker as it ages.

CollectA’s figure is clearly a male in his prime looking at its darker coloration and shape of its horns, but one look under confirms its gender. The color is a deep chestnut with darker shades around the legs and chest area. The distinctive white stripes on the body is nicely painted.

The number of vertical yellowish white stripes on the animal’s body can be variable, but typically range between ten to fifteen stripes, my figure has ten, but I also saw some photos with eleven. In addition, there are also white patches on the legs as well as a single horizontal stripe in the lower neck area that forms a V-shape when seen from the front. The figure captures all of these.

The head is nicely sculpted with lots of subtle details. The white facial markings, like fingerprints, are also variable and on the figure you can see two prominent ones on each side of the head. The area around the eyes is also white, a little more whiter than what you would typically see, but there are photos of animals that show this much of white pattern.The ears are appropriately large and nicely details, you can see lots of hair all around the edges and there is also a white highlight on the tips.

The horns are impressive and captures the twisting motion. There are lots of textures and details along the entire length of the charcoal gray colored horns. The built is appropriately bulky for a male, and one can appreciate why it is the third heaviest of the antelopes.

The legs are well-proportioned; bongos have shorter legs when compared to other antelopes of similar size. The mane-like hair on the back is well sculpted and runs the entire length of the back. The pose is nothing to active, more like a relaxed but alert pose. CollectA later released a baby bongo and it is super cute. Perhaps in the future a female figure will be produced to accompany the calf.

Bongo antelopes, like many animals today, face uncertain future as human population continue to grow and demand for limited resource squeeze them into even smaller space. Fragmentation of habitat results in animal populations that are isolated from each other. Many also fall victim to the ever growing threat of the bush meat trade, and even if they are not the main target, often becomes snared and die.

It is to be hoped that conservation work being done could help save some populations from extinction. Bongos are well represented in zoo around the world and there is a healthy captive population that could potentially save the species if situation in the wild becomes dire.

CollectA’s bongo is a figure  that is worth acquiring and adding to any collection. CollectA really has the biggest, beautifully sculpted, and the most diverse collection of antelopes. No other brand comes even close.

Seen all together side-by-side, it really is an amazing herd! I hope that we will continue to see more antelopes from CollectA in the future. There are still many species out there that don’t have any toy representation and is just begging to be made.

Hope you enjoyed the review and thank you for reading. Take care, stay safe and healthy. Until t he next review, cheers!