Design example · you receive the colours of the version shown.
Articulated meerkat keychain: standing or crawling
€19 incl. VAT
€15.70 excl. VAT · key ring included · free shipping in the Netherlands · delivered within 30 days
A meerkat hinged from head to tail. Stand it upright on guard or let it crawl: this meerkat keychain holds both poses.
- 3D-printed for you and carefully packed.
- Printed in the colours shown. No colour choice.
- Key ring included.
- Small parts: not a toy. Not suitable for children under 3.
- Printed after payment and delivered within 30 days. Put a deadline in the comments field; we confirm by email.
- 14-day cooling-off period after receipt.
Order Meerkat
Shape and use
About Meerkat
This meerkat belongs to Biocraftlab's desert animals. The body is hinged from head to tail, and according to the designer the figure holds both a crawling pose and the familiar upright guard pose. It is printed in one piece, with the hinges built in. Designed by Biocraftlab.
We print it in the colours you see in the photos: sandy beige with dark patches around the eyes and a dark tail tip. Hang it on your keys or bag, or stand it upright on your desk. Key ring included. This is decoration, not a toy; not suitable for children under 3 (small parts).
What you get
- Hinged from head to tail
- Holds a crawling pose and an upright guard pose
- Printed in one piece (print-in-place), with the hinges built in: nothing needs to be assembled.
- From Biocraftlab's desert series
- We sell the version with a hole for a key ring (the designer supplies a version with and without a hole).
- Printed in the colours shown: sandy beige with dark eye patches
- Key ring included
How ordering works
- Choose the quantity and enter your delivery address. We check postcode and house number against the Dutch address register.
- You pay the total incl. VAT via Stripe. Shipping within the Netherlands is included.
- You receive a confirmation by email. We print Meerkat in the colours shown and ship the keychain within 30 days.
Want a keychain with a name, text or logo? That is custom work: custom keychains.
Designer and image source
Licensed image by Biocraftlab. Design by Biocraftlab, via Hive. OmniTechs is an authorised seller, Hive ID KMK0U9TA75. You receive the physical product; digital files are not supplied.
Frequently asked questions
Why do meerkats stand upright?
To look out for birds of prey while the group searches for food, and to warm up in the sun after a cold night. More about this in the guide on this page.
What moves or clicks on this keychain, and does it suit keys or a bag?
Nothing clicks: the body is hinged from head to tail. According to the designer it holds both a crawling and an upright guard pose. We print the version with a hole for a key ring, and the key ring is included.
What does it cost (€19 incl. VAT), what colour is it printed in, is a key ring included and when is it delivered?
It costs €19 incl. VAT. We print it in the colours you see in the photos: sandy beige with dark patches around the eyes and a dark tail tip. Key ring included. We print after you pay and deliver within 30 days; shipping within the Netherlands is included. If you have a deadline, put it in the remarks field; we confirm by email.
Animal keychains
Why do meerkats stand upright?
Mainly to keep watch. In the open landscape where meerkats live, birds of prey are their biggest threat, according to Burgers' Zoo. That is why at least one group member is always on the lookout, standing straight up or on its hind legs, while the rest search for food or play. Meerkats also warm themselves in the sun after a cold night.
The sentinel
Meerkats are small carnivores from the mongoose family. They live in southern Africa, in close-knit groups of often more than twenty animals, and eat insects and snakes, among other things.
Research by Tim Clutton-Brock and colleagues, published in Science in 1999, showed that standing guard does not only help the group. A sentinel often stands on a relatively safe, high spot, and animals that had been given extra food stood guard more often. There was no fixed rota: a meerkat mainly went on guard when no other sentinel was standing.
Different alarm calls
In 2001 Marta Manser showed that meerkat alarm calls differ by type of predator and by level of urgency. At low urgency the call sounds more harmonic, at high danger noisier. Playback experiments showed that the group reacts differently to a call for danger from the air than to a call for danger on the ground.
Sunbathing belly-up
After a cold night, meerkats turn their more thinly haired belly towards the sun to warm up, Burgers' Zoo writes. When it is very hot, they instead lie flat on their bellies in the shade, where the ground is coolest.
Features at a glance
- Black patches around the eyes work like a kind of sunglasses: they let meerkats look straight into the bright sun.
- They dig extensive tunnel systems; at Burgers' Zoo the keepers counted more than 30 entrances.
- Only the dominant pair breeds; mainly older brothers and sisters look after the young.
Biocraftlab's meerkat
This figure can take exactly those two poses: crawling in search of food, or upright on guard. That is thanks to the hinges from head to tail. How such a figure is built up layer by layer, and how that differs from other printing technologies, you can read in the knowledge-base article comparing FDM, SLA and SLS.
More background: FDM, SLA or SLS: which process fits your part?.
Design by Biocraftlab, via Hive. You buy the print, not the file.
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