Asian swamphens

I made these birds about 3 weeks ago but did not paint them until today. Here they are on the new addition of the diorama, a pair of Asian swamphens. These birds are very colorful and closely related to the other coots and swamphens found all over the tropical and temprate areas of the world. Earlier in the winter I purchased a male/female pair of live Asian swamphens but they can not spend the winter here without a heated hutch for the winter so they will not be here at the house until the spring and I am in the process of heating a barn for them and the Sonerat's jungle fowl that I have also coming in March. I will post photos as soon as they are here.

For now here is the pair I sculpted
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It's great Phil, I hope we will see pics of the real ones soon.

The more I look at your work the more I ask myself : Is Phil still make bushes and trees for his animal dios or making and buying animals for his plant dios ?

They are gorgeous Phil!! How do you make their legs?
Look forward to seeing the real ones too, they are beautiful birds.

That is fantastic ! I am full of admiration !

I adore those birds, what a stunning colour. They remind me of the little "Cordon Bleus", small finces, that I used to breed.
There are at least 3 sub-species, but one has that incredible blue colour. We call them "butterfly-finches".

So you are going to heat a whole barn for your birds? I really like that
One mor thing to look forward to in spring : pictures of your birds

Kikimalou wrote:

The more I look at your work the more I ask myself : Is Phil still make bushes and trees for his animal dios or making and buying animals for his plant dios ?

Thanks Kiki, my goal is to make a tree or plant that looks like the ones that the professionals make. If I don't make it myself I always say in the post that I didn't. In the scene above the only thing I did not make is the tall grasses in the front. in the post of the scene I write this but here it is about the swamphens. Lots of them look like trees or flowers that you can buy because I copy the methods of others, some who have taught me how to do it and others that I have bought a tree or plant and taken it apart so I can go backwards and make one. The biggest imporvements have come in the way I make the foliage for the different plants. I started with buying the toy brand and model railroad types, then I began to make trees and plants like the model railroaders do. I was happy with this but it never looked real so I began reasearching better looking model trees and plants and found Selkirk Scenery. I love this product, but still it only looks real on the smaller flowering type plants so I kept looking and contacted Danny and started buying his smaller trees and special ordering custom trees from his sculptor. Finally I found dollhouse miniature makers and several of them (3 have been so helpful I can't believe they were so free with their methods and secrets) taught me to make the trees and flowers that you see on the diorama as it is now.