Kaiyodo Asahiyama CapsuleZoo Swimming Penguins Walkaround

I got this figure as part of a lot, and since I don't collect penguins, it's now for sale on my Ebay [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] . But before I sold it, I wanted to be sure to do a turnaround, since I haven't seen much info about this figure before, and thought other collectors might be interested in seeing it. I think it's exceptionally beautiful, even considering Kaiyodo's already stellar lineup, and was almost tempted to keep it despite it not fitting in with the rest of my collection. I believe that these are a Gentoo (bottom) and banded (top) penguin. They're both native to the Falkland Islands, so it would make a lot of sense. If anyone knows for sure, feel free to comment below.

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That's a fabulous piece! Both in scientific terms as well as a decorative subject. Thanks for sharing that masterpiece with us before selling it.

Lovely penguins

Beautiful pair of penguins and great photos. These penguins aren't on the Toy Animal Wiki yet. Would you be happy for me to put some of your photos there?

Roger wrote:

That's a fabulous piece! Both in scientific terms as well as a decorative subject. Thanks for sharing that masterpiece with us before selling it.

Thanks, I'm glad you enjoyed it!

widukind wrote:

Lovely penguins

Thank you, I agree.

rogerpgvg wrote:

Beautiful pair of penguins and great photos. These penguins aren't on the Toy Animal Wiki yet. Would you be happy for me to put some of your photos there?

Thank you, and of course, my turnarounds are always free to use on the wiki.

Thanks. They are now on TAW. I'd also think they are a gentoo and banded penguin. But which banded penguin? Humboldt or Magellanic? My feeling is that it looks most like the Humboldt penguin. (Penguinworld.com says: Humboldt Penguins lack the second dark breast band found in Magellanic Penguin and have more extensive areas of bare facial skin.) But it looks a bit different from Kaiyodo's other Humboldt penguin (which looks more typical): [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

rogerpgvg wrote:

Thanks. They are now on TAW. I'd also think they are a gentoo and banded penguin. But which banded penguin? Humboldt or Magellanic? My feeling is that it looks most like the Humboldt penguin. (Penguinworld.com says: Humboldt Penguins lack the second dark breast band found in Magellanic Penguin and have more extensive areas of bare facial skin.) But it looks a bit different from Kaiyodo's other Humboldt penguin (which looks more typical): [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I agree. If they wanted to make a magellanic they surely wouldn't miss the second band once it is their most distinctive feature. Chinstrap and African penguins are quite similar but I'd go to the Humboldt.
Humboldt penguins are not native from Falkland Islands but their breeding region covers all the West coast of South America. It is also much probably a piece representing the Penguin Aquarium of the Asahiyama Zoo, thus I believe it is not that important that they ocur in the same region.
Curiously, if I only used the head painting to determine the species, it could be quite hard to tell the species once I think it doesn not match any particular species of banded penguin. It even looks somewhat like the chinstrap but not correct either. Fortunately the gentoo is quite easily identifyiable with its headphones.