Review and photos by Suspsy; edited by bmathison1972
Some years ago, back when I was living in a condominium smack dab in the middle of downtown Ottawa, Ontario, I was walking home from the gym when I decided to take a shortcut through a parking garage. Lo and behold, I came across a large red-tailed hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) in the midst of devouring a common rock pigeon!
Review and photos by Suspsy; edited by bmathison1972
In 1926, in northeast Queensland, Australia, a group of boys happened upon a large, flightless bird and decided it would be fun to chase it. During the pursuit, one of the boys, a 16-year old by the name of Phillip McClean, tripped and fell to the ground.
I’ve been intending to write a review of this figure for quite a bit now, but until now, schoolwork and other real life issues have gotten in the way of that. Anyway, let the review commence:
Brood parasitism, the act of relying on other individual animals to raise young, is easily one of the most interesting strategies that has evolved in animals, with it appearing in insects, fish and birds.
The griffon vulture (Gyps fulvus) is one of the most widely distributed of the old world vultures, ranging throughout Asia, Europe, and small portions of Africa. As such they also represent the archetypal vulture; the kind you might see perched on a tombstone in an old western movie, despite being visually dissimilar to the new world vultures of the American west.
Editor’s note: beefing up both birds and Bullyland by brontodocus!
This walk-around covers the Bullyland Animal World Bearded Vulture (or Lammergeier) Gypaetus barbatus (Linnaeus, 1758). Length is approx. 89 mm, wing span (if the wings were fully stretched out) approx. 170 mm, so the scale would be between 1:11 and 1:14 based on body length and 1:14 – 1:16 based on wing span.
Walk-around of the Safari Ltd Wild Safari Wildlife 2016 roseate spoonbill, Platalea ajaja (Linnaeus, 1758); item No. 224829. Total length is difficult to estimate but may be around 127 mm if the figure was fully stretched out. Bill length is 32 mm and wing chord is 50 mm so the scale is approx.
Today I am reviewing the great white pelican, Pelecanus onocrotalus Linnaeus, 1758 by Papo, which was released in 2011 as part of their Wild Animals line. The figure was simply marketed as ‘pelican’ but it most-likely was inteded to represent P. onocrotalus. I decided to review this figure now because I recently replaced it in my Synoptic Collection with the 2016 figure by Schleich.
So for my next foray into Animal Toy Blog I am going to discuss a full set of ten figures from a relatively new set from Safari Ltd, released in 2017 (but I only just discovered it…go figure). I’m going to come out and say, there will be brief parts (in point format) and longer parts (paragraphs) as I will discuss the toob figures individually (save two).
Yowies are small plastic figures sold blindly in chocolate-wrapped capsules, similar to Kinder Surprise toys. They originated in Australia in 1995 as a publishing brand by Cadbury and Kidcorp. The first four series consisted of 50 figures each represening species endemic to Australia. The figures had to be assembled and were often quite stylized.
Welcome to the Animal Toy Blog. Since I have the honor of posting the first review, I thought I would pick a figure that just arrived in the mail today, the tawny owl, Strix aluco Linnaeus, 1758, which was released by Schleich in 1999.
For those of you that know me, you know I am a professional parasitologist and entomologist, and historically my collection has focused on arthropods.
