Sbell's recent finds!

I have realized that I don't have a thread on here for when I get new stuff! So it is time to fix that, since I just came back from a trip to Florida and found a few great things (and left behind a lot of terrible things).

First off, I found a ridiculous number of rays--and this doesn't even count my kids' stuffed animals...

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The big one is a ray from Sun Wai. The species isn't particularly obvious, but I think it is sort of representative of a Blue Stingray Dasyatis chrysonota. It's a water squirter, but it never will be! Most interesting is that it has not one but two barbs on the tail.

Second, I picked up some new sets of the Club Earth rays set. My origial ones were more pearlescentin colour, but these would be more 'bright'. They are also stickier than the pearl ones, so I'm hoping that they dry out soon.

Finally, although we avoided Sea World, they did have 2 gift shops in the airport--and apparently Sea World has manufactured their own figures! I don't collect marine mammals, which dominated, but they did have what might be the nicest Spotted Eagle Ray I have--and an odd coloured Leopard shark.

I also found a few dinos:
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Two of those are Battat re-release dinos, a Ceratosaurus and Amargasaurus. Only available at Target, and since that chain only lasted a few months here in Canada, I had to get them while there! Plus, my son found a 4D puzzle 'raptor' model, which is clearly based on the Ornitholestes from Walking with Dinosaurs.

Congratulations

Great!

I didn't know Club Earth is still producing models. You have probably the answer but I think I already saw these rays but painted.

The Spotted Eagle Ray looks a lot like the Safari Ltd one, isn't it?

Beautieful additions, i hope to find some day the rays too :) Big congratulations :)

Those Battat dinos are just magnificent

And I lovce those little coloured rays, - there are so many kinds of rays,, but 99% of the models are stingrays

I hope you had a great trip to Florida ! It sounds like heaven now, as temperature is creeping down here, and the leaves are blowing away

Kikimalou wrote:

Great!

I didn't know Club Earth is still producing models. You have probably the answer but I think I already saw these rays but painted.

The Spotted Eagle Ray looks a lot like the Safari Ltd one, isn't it?

I've never seen the rays in a painted, solid form--several years back I got the set, but it was still a 'stretchy' set. If they ever did make painted ones, I would love to have them, but I don't know of any.

And the ray is totally unique--similar in bulk to the Schleich, but better sculpted.
Safari:
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Schleich:
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Sea World:
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And yes, it was much niceer there than it is here--although the locals were wearing long pants and sweaters! It was 'only' 28C or so every day!

I like these rays too :)

Very nice acquisitions

You were down here in Orlando? Ah, I know a store in Cocoa Beach (about the closest beach to Orlando) that you might have enjoyed- The Dinosaur Store. I love getting to go there and ogle the dino stuff and great rocks.

Sbell said- And yes, it was much niceer there than it is here--although the locals were wearing long pants and sweaters! It was 'only' 28C or so every day!
Yes, if it was the past week, it was chilly to us! As a native Floridian, anything below 85F is long pants to me, sleeves below 80F! Guess it all depends on what you're used to. I always thought people who swam in the winter were nuts, and am most comfortable at 90F. I like 95F!

pipsxlch wrote:

You were down here in Orlando? Ah, I know a store in Cocoa Beach (about the closest beach to Orlando) that you might have enjoyed- The Dinosaur Store. I love getting to go there and ogle the dino stuff and great rocks.

Sbell said- And yes, it was much niceer there than it is here--although the locals were wearing long pants and sweaters! It was 'only' 28C or so every day!
Yes, if it was the past week, it was chilly to us! As a native Floridian, anything below 85F is long pants to me, sleeves below 80F! Guess it all depends on what you're used to. I always thought people who swam in the winter were nuts, and am most comfortable at 90F. I like 95F!

I would have liked to see that! But we were pretty busy the whole time, and I had no opportunity to hit any neaches at all (did get out to the Kissimmee swamps though).

sbell wrote:

I've never seen the rays in a painted, solid form--several years back I got the set, but it was still a 'stretchy' set. If they ever did make painted ones, I would love to have them, but I don't know of any.

So I may have dreamed of them or there are some models closed to these ones. I'm not a specialist!

sbell wrote:

And the ray is totally unique--similar in bulk to the Schleich, but better sculpted.
Safari:
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Schleich:
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Sea World:
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Thank you for the pics . May I ask you a comparison topic? It would surely be very interesting.

pipsxlch wrote:

........ I always thought people who swam in the winter were nuts, and am most comfortable at 90F. I like 95F!

I so totally agree

Kikimalou wrote:

sbell wrote:

I've never seen the rays in a painted, solid form--several years back I got the set, but it was still a 'stretchy' set. If they ever did make painted ones, I would love to have them, but I don't know of any.

So I may have dreamed of them or there are some models closed to these ones.    I'm not a specialist!

sbell wrote:

And the ray is totally unique--similar in bulk to the Schleich, but better sculpted.
Safari:
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Schleich:
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Sea World:
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Thank you for the pics . May I ask you a comparison topic? It would surely be very interesting.

There is no set of rays as broad as this one (which, in a way, is sad, because it is a very diverse group).

And I can try to put something together for the eagle rays; as far as rays go, spotted eagle rays are probably one of the most common figures (after mantas and generic stingrays).

It is nice to see that you opened a topic for your own additions!

Roger wrote:

It is nice to see that you opened a topic for your own additions!

Thanks. It's one of those things I shoudl have done before, but just didn't get around to!

Roger wrote:

It is nice to see that you opened a topic for your own additions!

So I just received my first commissioned fish models, sculpted by DTF member brandem--casts of which will be available in my store as soon as some adjustments are made!

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They are a West African Lungfish, an African Freshwater Butterflyfish, and a Cuvier's Bichir

(Or, Protopterus, Pantodon, Polypterus), all from Africa...! It just kind of worked out as 3 Ps from Africa...

I also just received some new CollectA animals:

Black tip Reef Shark & Open-jaw Great White Shark
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Leaping Nile Crocodile and Deluxe Spinosaurus!
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Those are all available in the store.

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Congrats on your new additions. That's a fun spinosaurus action shot. :)

Nice new catches, especially the fishes :)

Sean, this project with fish figures is very interesting!
Will you provide us a walk around of this revolutionary spinosaurus? The change is so dramatic that this replica represents an important step in the history of this hobby, I guess.

Congratulation Sean

What I appreciate with the Great white shark is its size, it seems far bigger than other brands great whites. The Blacktip reef shark seems also excellent, could you make a comparison topic with the Safari Ltd one?

The long awaited Spinosaurus is very interesting too, despite the moving jaw are not really convincing for me. It seems the same size as the Carnegie one, isn't it? Will you add the two smaller ones to your shelves? Of course I second Roger for a walkaround

The three Ps are beautiful, did you paint them? I never heard of the African Freshwater Butterflyfish. The scale seems 1:2 or 1:3 for this one. An incredibly beautiful but fierce predator

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The scale varies; it was more about sizing (I suppose I should have out something in there). And no, I didn't paint them, the sculptor did. When we get the designs finalized, they will be painted, and most likely each one will vary a little (especially the butterflyfish!).

The Pantodon is about 1:1; they aren't a huge fish, but they are tough (I have a live one in my fish tank).

The other ones are obviously much smaller scale--the lungfish grows to 1m, and the bichir about 35cm (I have one of those two, an albino one). Both figures are about 10cm long.

And I can see about doing a walkaround. I probably won't be able to get to it until this weekend.

I kept African Butterflies for years, so I'm enjoying that one. They're neat fish; I kept them in more peaceful cichlid tanks with lots of water sprite. They were pretty long lived, good personalities, didn't look for trouble but didn't put up with it either.
Hey Sbell, did you see that line of Portuguese models Roger found with some interesting fish? Several freshwater ones that were intriguing.

pipsxlch wrote:

I kept African Butterflies for years, so I'm enjoying that one. They're neat fish; I kept them in more peaceful cichlid tanks with lots of water sprite. They were pretty long lived, good personalities, didn't look for trouble but didn't put up with it either.
Hey Sbell, did you see that line of Portuguese models Roger found with some interesting fish? Several freshwater ones that were intriguing.

I didn't see that. But now I'll have to find that!

WOW ! Those fish They are fantastic

The spinosaur is wonderful, - somehow I think that the new knowledge about the looks of it "clicks" , -it just seems much more credible

I know very little about dinos, but I am sure we will have to change the perception of many more as more fossiles are found and more advanced research methods develop