Plush collection (New here)

[Advicot]

Which species is the Disney heron plush?

[BlueKrono]

My latest shipment from China, too bad one of the seller messed up with my order and did not sent me my Grey Reef Shark and Irrawaddy Dolphin, which is quite a pity since both are rare items to be found.

@jytou85

What company makes the green pufferfish?

[jytou85]

Which species is the Disney heron plush?

That's Ono from "Lion Guard", which is based on a Western Cattle Egret but stylized for cartoon effects so some features are not so accurate, such as the black and yellow banded legs, yellow flight feathers and tail. When this arrives, it happens to be a bootleg Ono, but I am still quite satisfied with the details.

[jytou85]

My latest shipment from China, too bad one of the seller messed up with my order and did not sent me my Grey Reef Shark and Irrawaddy Dolphin, which is quite a pity since both are rare items to be found.

@jytou85

What company makes the green pufferfish?

That pufferfish is purchased from a shop called "Soft Time Toy", it appears to be a local Chinese shop that is specializing in soft toys. They appear to sell realistic species (wild and domesticated), which includes some products produced elsewhere and sold by the shop. But a number of very nice plushes I purchased here has their own brand label and the details were quite amazing, I bought a number of fish species and a sperm whale here before. In this shipment, the pufferfish and the horseshoe crab is from this shop, and the details are amazing. I however failed to find the shop from AliExpress for international buyers, it appears in the Chinese home version of Taobao.

[jytou85]

My ray collection

Rays by jytou85, on Flickr

For the time being, the top most Bowmouth Guitarfish is my largest Malaysian wildlife plush. This CRITICALLY ENDANGERED species is supposed to be more greyish, but this plush is only available in 4 rather least realistic colors. I think this variant looked most natural. Despite the inaccuracies in colorations, the details were amazing. This species is also known as the Shark Ray for partially resembling sharks than other typical rays.

Next to it only the right is a Whip Ray from Wild Republic, did not seemed to be targeted for specific species, but it was said to be sold in Maldives as souvenir. One of the most similar species i terms of shape (less so in terms of colorations) for a Maldives Whip Ray should be the Pale-edged Stingray, a species that occurs also all the way to South East Asia, including Malaysia.

Below these 2 were 3 variants of Manta Ray, which was once collectively considered as 1 species but now split into 2. The blue one of the left appears to be based on the National Geographic one and appears to be a bootleg from China. The upperparts pattern does not resembles either those of Giant Manta Ray or Reef Manta Ray, I personally placed it as Giant for the size compared to the other 2 in my collection.

The grey one is from National Geographic Ocean series, simply marketed as the Manta Ray. It has no details on the upperparts to help in identification, such pale fully grey morph is known in both species. Since this is supposed to be under the Ocean series, so technically should be the Giant Manta Ray, also known as the Oceanic Manta Ray. The Reef Manta Ray is a reef species that is generally not oceanic. So it make sense that this is a rare grey morph of the Giant Manta Ray.

The one of the right is showing upperparts pattern of a Reef Manta Ray, due to the wider dark central parts and a more Y shaped pattern than a T with a narrow stem for Giants. This is not branded, possibly a Chinese bootleg?

Next is the blue spotted ray, the Spotted Eagle Ray is a widespread species and these Pacific Spotted Eagle Ray has different spots than the ring-spots in the Atlantic population. This Pacific population is sometimes considered a distinct species. The Atlantic Spotted Eagle Ray is also seen in the plush market. This species, especially this form, is also featured in Nemo series as Mr Ray.

The last one was my first ray, the Bluespotted Ribbontail Ray, a rather common ray in aquariums, and a rather nice looking one.

[Advicot]

Very, very nice

[jytou85]

Very, very nice

Thanks

[jytou85]

After sharing the rays the other days, let's move to sharks.

Sharks by jytou85, on Flickr

I managed to find a number of sharks, including the large Great Hammerhead that I received today. It is color wise not that accurate, but definitely a great one from size and the head shape best resembles a Great Hammerhead. I don't quite like the added patterns on the shark, but it is quite hard to find this CRITICALLY ENDANGERED species in the market.

Besides it is a tiny Scalloped Hammerhead, also CRITICALLY ENDANGERED. This came from a local gift shop chain, called KAISON. This was my first shark plush.

Below it is a Great White Shark with the label of "Encyclopedia Britannica", I believed it might be a gift item for the encyclopedia.

And below the Great White is a blue looking shark with almost equal length tail lobes, so not a requiem shark it seems, I personally take it as a Shortfin Mako, since it looks bluish.

The supposed biggest shark is right below, the Whale Shark. I am not sure why blue seemed to be a common color that is picked for the Whale Shark but actual whale sharks are never so blue and is more grey. But this one looks cool enough.

Next to it is an adult Tiger Shark. Common Tiger Shark plush I saw before are really depicting the barred juveniles, that gave them the name. The adults show blotches instead. The coloration is bit odd, a bit too brown instead of grey. This is from a favorite Chinese brand of my "Soft Time Toy", a reasonably nice brand for wildlife plush, many of their products are very nice.

Below the Tiger Shark is a Blue Shark, a nice realistic plush from WWF.

Next to it, a cute little Zebra Bullhead Shark, seemed to be made for Japanese export market, perhaps some souvenir in a Japanese aquarium. I actually ordered a cute Zebra Shark instead of this and the seller missed it up and sent me the wrong one. It is a pity that the Zebra Shark went out if stock and I realized the Zebra Bullhead Shark is also recorded in my country, so I kept it.

Finally at the lower right, a Black-tipped Reef Shark from Wild Republic. This plush is reviewed here and identified as a "Blacktip Shark". I personally think that it should resembles the Reef Shark better due to the larger degree of black tip on the dorsal fin although the distinctive pale band separating the black tip with the rest of the dorsal fin is absent (It is said to be rather faint in some individuals). The black on the trailing edge of the tail is way too thick for a Black-tipped Reef Shark but the Blacktip Shark do not have such black training edge and had more of a separated black blotch on the tips of the 2 tail lobes. So technically speaking, most features still points more towards a Black-tipped Reef Shark than a Blacktip Shark. Both species occurs in my country, so perhaps it can try to role play a different species from time to time?

[AnimalToyForum]

Very nice collection. What is the colourful pattern on the top of the big whale shark's head? A logo maybe?

[jytou85]

Very nice collection. What is the colourful pattern on the top of the big whale shark's head? A logo maybe?

It seemed to be a colorful pattern of a water splash, probably they get it confused with a real whale or that is purely a decorative sign, or the branding logo. The brand label shows a whale, so it might be generically used on all their products perhaps as a logo indicating a whale's blow.

[AnimalToyForum]

Very nice collection. What is the colourful pattern on the top of the big whale shark's head? A logo maybe?

It seemed to be a colorful pattern of a water splash, probably they get it confused with a real whale or that is purely a decorative sign, or the branding logo. The brand label shows a whale, so it might be generically used on all their products perhaps as a logo indicating a whale's blow.

Yes, that makes sense, I see it now, a whale blow logo. What is the name of the brand, do you know?

[jytou85]

Very nice collection. What is the colourful pattern on the top of the big whale shark's head? A logo maybe?

It seemed to be a colorful pattern of a water splash, probably they get it confused with a real whale or that is purely a decorative sign, or the branding logo. The brand label shows a whale, so it might be generically used on all their products perhaps as a logo indicating a whale's blow.

Yes, that makes sense, I see it now, a whale blow logo. What is the name of the brand, do you know?

Chinese brand with no English names, the Chinese is pronounced as "Wan Wu Shang Zhi". The wordings that is used is somewhat translated as "Fashionable Toys" as a pun to the proverb that is pronounced in the exact same way that means "Addicted in playing until they lost their motivation is doing others more proper things (like work) in life". I think that is a really funny punny name, and is also a bit scared of the second meaning behind it, are they mocking that plush collector like me, would eventually lose myself in the world of plush?

[jytou85]

Starting from a few species, over the years, my collection has expanded a lot and I now have at least 100 species of Malaysian wildlife. I tried to lay them all out on my bed, but it seemed to be a little cramped, and some other variations of the same species had to give way and stay in the closet.

Malaysian wildlife by jytou85, on Flickr

Malaysian wildlife by jytou85, on Flickr

You can see that marine creatures, fishes and mammals are quite dominant in my collection, taking more than half of the bed!

Some of these are marketed exactly as the species, some of them marketed to a genus level, and not quite down to a species, some were marketed as something else but the features points to another species. Some were not labeled when I get them, with uncertain ID and technically "identified" by me to be something I needed. And of course, 4 of the bird species were my own DIY products after finding it difficult to find Malaysian bird plushes.

[Advicot]

Lovely, lovely collection, some of the birds on the top make me jealous like the pigeon, red footed booby and the Hansa rhinoceros hornbill especially

[jytou85]

Lovely, lovely collection, some of the birds on the top make me jealous like the pigeon, red footed booby and the Hansa rhinoceros hornbill especially

The Great Hornbill is from Hansa too! And I have a little Hansa Eurasian Tree Sparrow standing between the Great Hornbill and Great Cormorant.

[AnimalToyForum]

But where will YOU sleep!? 
Great plush collection.

[jytou85]

But where will YOU sleep!? 
Great plush collection.

The plush will have to go back to their closet after the photo session.

Plush closet by jytou85, on Flickr

The lowest level here is where I kept my Malaysian wildlife plush but they had evidently grew a lot and now overflowed to the upper level. Other compartments are reserved for other plushes, including other birds, mammals and also non-wildlife plushes, such as Angry Birds. Space is a huge problem for plush collectors for sure as I had to dedicate the whole closet for plushes, almost exclusively.

I will pick some plushes from the closet from time to time to accompany us, one to a few at a time. So, ya, we still have a nice bed to sleep on most of the time.

[jytou85]

Got 2 new balaenopterids recently.

Balaenopterids by jytou85, on Flickr

My recent purchases are the two balaeonopterids on the top, they don't seem to be targeted to be any exact species, but being rather featureless, perhaps are some generic species like the Sei/Bryde's complex. The larger one is designated as a Sei Whale that is said to be hard to distinguish from Bryde's Whale. The Bryde's Whales are indeed once misidentified and considered to be Sei Whales before they were properly discovered to be distinctive. Bryde's Whale itself is a complex of species it seems, the forms that is found in my country is the smaller form that is often split as Eden's Whale. Collectively Bryde's Whales are identified to have 2 rostrum ridges that is absent in other balaenopterids. This feature is of course absent in this plush, but the plush is being rather soft, so it is possible for me to create those ridges whenever I felt like doing it, for photography perhaps. I purposely chose the version with pink underparts to represent the Bryde's (Eden's) Whale as the whales are known to develop conspicuous pink blush on the underparts when they are actively feeding, more than other balaenopterds would (Minke whales sometimes develop that pink too), many photos of Eden's Whale feeding in the Gulf of Thailand show obvious pink underparts. The plush is available in 3 sizes (80cm, 55cm, 35cm) and 4 color variations, the other 2 are grey top and green bottom (erm...) and blue top and white bottom. I picked the 55cm as Sei and 35cm as Eden's (Bryde's) Whale, the comparison of size is roughly similar to size comparison between the large Sei and largest Eden's.

My most realistic balaenopterid is the one in the middle, a Common Minke Whale, northern subspecies. The white band on the flipper is a diagnostic feature for the species I would say the details were amazing. I was just slightly disappointed that they choose a blue coloration instead of a dark grey one, it would be cool if they take note on the color accuracy as well.

At the bottom left, a balaenopterid I got from a local gift shop, it is simply sold as a "whale" and is my earliest balaenopterid in possession. The whale is having a dark blue back and dark greyish throat to breast. Since it is blue and the underparts are so dark in color, only Blue Whales are going to have such dark underparts, so I designated it as a Blue Whale.

Finally, the bottom right is a Humpback Whale with a label of the species, part of the McDonalds - National Georgraphic Kids Happy Meal series in 2018. This series are some small, not that accurate looking plush from National Geographic kids. You can notice that they don't even add a dorsal fin to it! If not because of the label and the obvious shaped pectoral fins, most of them are likely gonna identify this as a Blue Whale, and indeed, some shops seemed to label it as "Blue Whale", despite the ID written on the label.

The only local balaenopterid missing for me is the Fin Whale and Omura's Whale. Both are likely not produced in the plush market, as both species shows a feature that is so distinctive which is the asymmetric patterns which lead to them having dark lips of their left and white lips on the right. This feature will not appear on generic whale plushes. And I guess this complicate things, especially for a smooth factory manufacturing flow for being asymmetric. I have no idea if I will ever be able to find such characteristics eventually or would I eventually need to create them by myself. If they are indeed made available as such plush, hopefully they make it in multiple sizes, and I can designate the big one as Fin Whale and the small one as Omura's Whale (also known as Dwarf Fin Whale due to the similarity of this unique feature)