The best figure of every species, according to Halichoeres

[Megalosaurus]

Nice critters.
I really love the non-dinosaur prehistoric collections.

[Appalachiosaurus]

"Chinasaurs" was never about toys being made in China, it is a term used for those bargain bin toys that only have "China" written on the bottom of them.PSNO isn't Chinasaur because it is brand name.

[Flaffy]

"Chinasaurs" was never about toys being made in China, it is a term used for those bargain bin toys that only have "China" written on the bottom of them.PSNO isn't Chinasaur because it is brand name.

Meh, I always refer chinasaurs to the dollar store chunks of toxi plastic that vaguely resembles a dinosaur.
I never understood how it was offensive, is it offensive to Chinese people or Chinese Companies?

[SBell]

Some Mesozoic aquatic bilaterians!


Fish prey accessory to the Bandai Pteranodon. The pterosaur is pretty ugly (does anyone want it?), and honestly this fish is pretty middling, but there's so little out there (though this year has been comparatively good with a whopping two new actinopterygians). I'm calling this one cf. Gillicus based mostly on its overall shape and the fact that it occurs in the same chalks as Pteranodon. If it's Gillicus, it's around 1:75.

I remember trying to figure that one out. Given the size and the age range, I figured it is more likely to be Cladocyclus than Gillicus, based primarily on size and age range. Although it is pretty non-descript either way, but it's pretty obviously an ichthyodectid of some kind.

[Halichoeres]

I remember trying to figure that one out. Given the size and the age range, I figured it is more likely to be Cladocyclus than Gillicus, based primarily on size and age range. Although it is pretty non-descript either way, but it's pretty obviously an ichthyodectid of some kind.

Cladocyclus might make more sense from a size standpoint, but I don't believe it's known from the Western Interior Seaway, occurring instead in the earlier Santana formation. Of course, five million years and a few thousand kilometers are not insuperable for marine taxa.

@Appalachiosaurus and FlaffyRaptors: I don't think everyone who uses the term "chinasaur" necessarily means any offense by it. However, I don't think that most people use it in the very narrow sense that Appalachiosaurus suggests. Cheap consumer goods can be made anywhere; it happens that right now in the US and Europe a lot of them come from China, but once upon a time it was Japan or Hong Kong, which was not at the time under Chinese rule. A few years hence it will probably be Vietnam or Indonesia or, I don't know, Senegal. I think the term as normally used conflates Chinese design and manufacture with low quality. It is possible, even probable, that actual Chinese nationals will find it less objectionable than I do. But I persist in finding it objectionable because of the equivalence implied between Chinese origin and shoddiness. The lack of a name brand can be captured less carelessly (although yes, you lose the catchiness of the assonance). I personally use "dime-o-saur," although I suppose people might object to the fact that not all countries use currencies that can be subdivided into dimes.

[Appalachiosaurus]

I really like "Dime-o-saur", has a nice ring to it! However, I don't really think anyone considers everything made in China bad (PNSO proves that). Nobody has complained about it before, and I am sure we have had a few Chinese users around here.

[DinoLord]

I'm from a Chinese family and don't find offense to the term. There has certainly been a long history of low quality toys coming from China, much to my chagrin as a child when my parents could not see the difference between the nondescript chinasaurs and better toys like Jurassic Park and Safari. But the term may be outdated as Chinese companies like PNSO up the ante.

Neat that the Eryon is in a pretty large scale. One can easily imagine it representing a 1:1 figure of an immature individual.

[Halichoeres]

Thanks for those perspectives! When I was a kid from a Mexican family in the Southwest, you could find cheap toys made in Mexico. If there were more major toy factories there, and a term like "Mexisaur" came into use, I think that it would rankle me. By extrapolation, I figured any equivalent portmanteau was something to avoid.

On the Eryon: for sure! I think most malacostracans are continual molters, so unlike insects, there's potential for basically identical youngsters.

[Flaffy]

I'm Chinese and I use the term 'Chinasaur' all the time. I don't take offence to that. I usually refer 'Chinasaur' to low quality, toxic or bootleg figures, but not necessarily made in China .

[DinoLord]

On the Eryon: for sure! I think most malacostracans are continual molters, so unlike insects, there's potential for basically identical youngsters.

That's what I had in mind for sure. At least in the freshwater aquarium hobby the various shrimps and crayfish basically look like progressively bigger versions of themselves after hatching.

[Halichoeres]

I'm Chinese and I use the term 'Chinasaur' all the time. I don't take offence to that. I usually refer 'Chinasaur' to low quality, toxic or bootleg figures, but not necessarily made in China .

Fair enough! I'm still not comfortable using it myself, but I'm not going to go picking fights with people who do. I appreciate the input.

[Halichoeres]

Amniotes of the Triassic!


This Hyperodapedon (its belly is actually inscribed with the synonym Scaphonyx sanjuanensis) is supposedly part of the Dawn of the Dinosaurs line. It came from Yahoo Auctions Japan, but I don't know anything else about it. It's about 1:3-1:4. I would trade it for the capsule version if anyone is interested.


With some other Triassic critters for scale. It's huge!


This is more what people think when they think of the Dawn of the Dinosaurs line: the resin Exaeretodon. Mine has a busted top left caniniform tooth. To my mind, that's a minor and tolerable wound. About 1:10.


Paleo-Creatures Atopodentatus by our own Jetoar. An animal this weird deserves lots of figures. Maybe one with the recently described vacuum cleaner head. This one is about 1:10.


Play Visions Cynognathus. A bit larger than the Panini one that it replaced, with a more interesting paint job. It's not very well-proportioned, but it's roughly 1:11.


My Triassic collection is definitely not complete, but I think I've got most of the low-hanging fruit.


Maia & Borges Staurikosaurus from the "Lustige" series, which I've only seen at Urzeitshop, although I don't know the German market well enough to guess whether it's an exclusive. Someone really needs to make a real Staurikosaurus. I guess the CollectA Herrerasaurus would be a decent stand-in, but I would always know it wasn't really intended as Staurikosaurus. If you account for the way-too-short tail, this one is about 1:15.


Now we get back into some really good ones. This is the Favorite Coelophysis from this year's exposition at the Fukui Museum. This is the nicest base I've seen for a Favorite PVC figure. Replaced my Kaiyodo Coelophysis. About 1:20-1:25.


The antagonist to the Coelophysis, Favorite's Redondasaurus. Best toy phytosaur yet, despite a little paint slop around the mouth. About 1:25.


Another good phytosaur: the Kaiyodo Rutiodon. This figure was produced shortly before a major revision of phytosaur taxonomy which removed half a dozen species to other genera, so I don't really know what it's modeled after. For a smallish individual of R. carolinensis, this one could be about 1:40.


I'd hoped for a long time that Colorata would make a Triassic box to follow up on their Cretaceous and Jurassic boxes, but instead they've switched themes. So not expecting a lot more 1:35-1:50ish Triassic critters soon.

[Dilopho]

Most of these animals here I've never even heard of a figure being made for them!

[Silvanusaurus]

Amniotes of the Triassic!

Oh dear, I'm going to have to add this to the 'need but will likely never have' list. Is it soft or solid?

[Jetoar]

Thank you Halichoeres toshow my Atopodentatus  .

[Halichoeres]

Oh dear, I'm going to have to add this to the 'need but will likely never have' list. Is it soft or solid?

It's squishy, a lot like one of the large Favorite Vinyl Models. I think there's probably some kind of cotton or plastic wadding inside. There's a vent hole in the belly.

[SBell]

Most of these animals here I've never even heard of a figure being made for them!

The whole capsule series of the Dawn of the Dinosaurs series is pretty cool--one one of the few where even the skeletons are worth picking up!

My figures are here: https://goo.gl/photos/mw4drojSy2fkyFme7

[SBell]

Schleich prehistoric fish, cf. Potanichthys. About 1:4 as Potanichthys. It's a bummer that it doesn't scale well with any other Mesozoic swimming critters I have, and it's missing its anal fin, but I'm still pretty happy to have it. By far my favorite Schleich figure (yes, more than the Dunkleosteus, and even more than the Kentrosaurus).

Okay, I just got this figure (and the advent calendar...don't judge, it was on sale. My nephews will appreciate most of it).

So...is it Potanichthys, or has Potanichthys been synonymized with Thoracopterus? And then...which higher-level classification is it part of? The references online are all over the place!

[postsaurischian]

This Hyperodapedon (its belly is actually inscribed with the synonym Scaphonyx sanjuanensis) is supposedly part of the Dawn of
the Dinosaurs line. It came from Yahoo Auctions Japan, but I don't know anything else about it. It's about 1:3-1:4. I would
trade it for the capsule version if anyone is interested.

It's not part of the Dawn of the Dinosaurs line. Only a capsule version was made.

By the way Clawmark Toys still has two of the skeletons: http://www.clawmarktoys.com/product-category/dinos/page/6/

[Silvanusaurus]

This Hyperodapedon (its belly is actually inscribed with the synonym Scaphonyx sanjuanensis) is supposedly part of the Dawn of
the Dinosaurs line. It came from Yahoo Auctions Japan, but I don't know anything else about it. It's about 1:3-1:4. I would
trade it for the capsule version if anyone is interested.

It's not part of the Dawn of the Dinosaurs line. Only a capsule version was made.

By the way Clawmark Toys still has two of the skeletons: http://www.clawmarktoys.com/product-category/dinos/page/6/

Do you know what line, if any, it is from?