What's good for the goose

During the Middle Ages, there was a belief that certain types of geese emerged fully grown from driftwood through spontaneous generation (with goose barnacles being some sort of embryonic form).

This legend was propagated without any sort of critical evaluation in natural history texts by scholars like Gerald of Wales in a manner similar to the Google AI.

British Library Royal MS 13 B VIII

While this myth was challenged by Frederick II in his treatise On the Art of Hunting With Birds, it wasn't really until the 18th century when it became fully discredited.

Biblioteca Vaticana Pal. lat. 1071 f. 14v

In 1/72 scale plastic, I think the only live goose may be from the Linear-B Roman Market set, but I was hoping to find some options from HO scale manufacturers.

Busch makes two sets of geese (wild and domestic) that are repaints of the same models, but they look more like ducks to me. Faller has a set of Hens, Ducks and Geese, and Woodland Scenics has a set of Geese & Chickens. I don't have any of these sets because they are rather pricey.

The geese that I do have are from Preiser, Noch, and Merten.

The Preiser set is of Ducks, Geese & Swans (14167). Even for HO scale, the swans look tiny, giving me reservations about the size of the geese.

Based on the size of the birds, I identified a total of four geese in two poses (one hissing, one swimming), however it is very possible that I miscategorized some of the geese as ducks.

The Merten sets include Geese and Ducks on Land (724), and Geese and Ducks Swimming (736). I think that both sets are now available from Preiser.

The figures come attached to sprues (at least for the original Merten releases), so there is the risk of damage or loss during removal unless you have a deft hand at working with such tiny parts.

Based on body size and neck length, I identified six geese in each set. I think that there is one duplicated pose in each set, but I'm not 100% sure. Again, there is the possibility that a couple of the birds I thought were white ducks are actually geese.

The Noch set is of Chickens & Geese (15772).

There are eight geese in the Noch set; four standing (three poses), two flying (two poses), and two swimming (one duplicated pose).

Looking at all the geese together, the Preiser bird look small. The Merten goose is larger, its body close in size to the Noch goose, but its neck is shorter, while the Noch goose is the largest.

Preiser, Merten, Noch standing

Meanwhile, for the swimming poses, the Prsiser goose is very small, while the Merten goose appears larger than the Noch goose.

Preiser, Merten, Noch swimming

I wish there were S scale options to compare with, but out of all the models, I think the Noch geese are probably the closest to being compatible for use with 1/72 scale figures.

It's been a while since I've seen a goose in real life, but when I think of how big they should be, images like these come to mind.

To Pastures New, James Guthrie, 1883

The Goose Girl, Stanley Royle, 1921

Die Gänsemagd, Paul Hey, 1939

In any event, most adventurers probably don't give geese a second thought when it comes to danger, though players of Where Winds Meet consider them creatures that should not be triffled with.

Victory and defeat are unpredictable in the Jianghu.

However, perceptions may have changed with the introduction of the Goose Hydra in 5th edition D&D. The monster is derived from the MTG card The Goose Mother, where it is classified as a Bird Hydra.

Google AI claims that the Goose Hydra originates from 3D printed models created by various people in recent years, but monsters such as the Deep Goose existed ten years ago. There are likely even older incarnations.

My own model was created from splicing together the heads of a gaggle of geese from a bag of plastic farm animals that I believe are bootleg versions of Britains figures.

I gave the monster five heads, since it provided the most streamlined look while preserving the integrity of the individual necks for each head.

To Heal or Not to Heal

Chintoys Six-Day War

Chintoys released three 1/72 sets covering the Six-Day War around the end of last year.

I think there were a lot of people who were not particularly impressed with their previous sets for the Battle of Marathon, and unfortunately, these new sets will probably reinforce their opinion of the company's 1/72 scale efforts.

The Israel paratrooper set consists of five sprues of 8 poses, and a single sprue of 4 poses.

The sculpts of the Israeli paratroopers are very soft, but there was minimal flash on the figures for the most part.

The personality figures (from left to right) include Shlomo Goren holding a shofar and Torah scroll, and Moshe Dayan. The poses are based on photographs of them on the ground in East Jerusalem after the territory was seized from Jordan.

I'm not sure if the other two figures are based on specific people, but one is a soldier performing (presumably) a morning prayer recital, and the final figure is a paratrooper with what looks like an SCR-536 (handie-talkie) slung over his shoulder.

The Egyptian Army set was pretty hard to get early on, and was selling for ridiculous prices. The box contains five sprues of 10 figures in 9 poses, and one sprue of 3 poses (although the box says there are a total of 47 figures).

There are two of the advancing pose on each sprue. 

The sculpts are basic and somewhat sharper than the Israelis, but for some reason, the rank and file soldiers are undersized, and closer to 1/76 scale. I don't know why Chintoys always makes one set in each series of figures that are the wrong size.

The single pose figures (from left to right) include a tank crewman and a pilot in a high-altitude flight suit (which I assume is referring to the events described here at Trench Art).

The final figure is an officer, who I believe may be Abdul Munim Riad since the sculpt appears clean-shaven, and the pose reminds me somewhat of the statue dedicated to him in Martyrs' Square, Port Said.

The Jerusalem defenders set consists of four sprues of 9 poses, and one sprue of 3 poses. The figures represent the Jordanian Arab Army with some wearing shemagh, and some wearing berets.

These sculpts were the roughest of the lot, with a lot of flash that needed extensive clean up.

Its not clear to me who the personality figures are, but the figure standing at ease is reminescent of pictures of King Hussein I (although the sculpt doesn't appear to have a moustache).

I think the figure with binoculars might possibly be Habis Majali, though I doubt he would have been in the field with rifle and bayonet, so I'm probably mistaken. The final figure is a soldier firing a pistol.

Overall, I would say the sets are as some people have critiqued — not up to modern standards. However, as someone who already owns thousands of plastic soldiers that are not that different in terms of appearance, I'm not too bothered by it. To me the more upsetting thing is the incorrectly scaled Egyptians.

Grumman USPS LLV

The Grumman LLV has been the standard mail delivery vehicle in the U.S. Postal Service since the 80s. It was preceded by the Jeep DJ, and is currently undergoing a glacial process of being phased out for the Oshkosh NGDV.

For some reason, I can't seem to recall the jeeps even though I'm sure that I must have seen mail being delivered during the time they were in service. All my memories seem to be of the LLV, but maybe it's just recency bias.

Even in 1997, over a decade after postal jeeps had been retired, they were still fresh enough in the mind of most people (other than myself) that the movie The Postman retained the Jeep DJ from the book, instead of updating it to a LLV.

KiNSMART makes an officially licensed keychain model of the USPS LLV with pull-back motor in 1/72 scale. I ended up buying a box of 12 because at the time, the price was practically the same as buying two single models.

As far as dimensions go, the length and height are pretty much spot on for 1/72 scale. The width measures about 29mm but should be about 26.4mm, so it is too wide. The wheelbase is also too long at 37mm instead of 35.4mm.

The models do not have the front and rear crossview mirrors that are installed on the USPS LLVs. Also, from what I understand, there are no USPS LLVs with an identification number that starts with "5".

It would have been nice if they made opening doors like on their larger scale versions instead of having the pull-back feature, but all in all, it is still a decent representation of a USPS LLV.