International Playthings Llc Wild Science Fantasy Island

Its made of a thin plastic. The bottom is hollow and it gets dirty very quickly. The betta did use the bubble and that's where he stayed most of the time. I took him out and put him in a larger tank because it couldn't keep a good temperature and it seemed to be too small. It seems very cheap and easily breakable. The fence part is a flexible plastic not a hard fence. The fence post is a cheap plastic and the yellow top is a foam piece. The ant tunnel was just a hassle and not worth the time. It took us over an hour and a half to get the tunnels cut and put on. Yes you do have to do some measurement and cutting. Also trying to get the food and water tubes connected to their chambers was a complete disaster. The tubes wouldn't stay open and the chambers wouldn't stay in their place. We cracked one of the chambers trying to get it to stay in. It is just not worth the time, aggravation, and money.

We got this for our son. The "ant-o-sphere" came with two bottom halves. The top half was supposed to have air holes. We tried to communicate this problem with Wild Science three time via there "contact us" part of their website. They did not responsd at all!!! They didn't even acknowledge that we had contacted them. Just for the record we DID check my spam folder. My son is terribly disappointed.

We have owned the WildScience Fantasy Island for almost a month. At first, it seemed like an excellent home for our new Betta fish - It has three shallow ponds and a sky pod for our Betta to explore. It comes with different colored gravel and there is even a place for water plants. The whole thing is encircled with red tubing where the ant colony lives and works. Very cool and provides for endless opportunities to observe and learn.But, after about three weeks in his new home, our Betta stopped eating and was kind of lethargic. We went to the pet store where we had bought our Betta and they suggested that it might be because he is too cold. We tested the water and it was only 68 deg. (Our house temp is between 68 and 72 deg during the day and 68 at night). We immediately moved our fish to a small bowl which we set on a heating pad and within hours our fish perked up, began swimming around, and started eating again. (Phewffff!) He is still in the small bowl, swimming and eating, but we can't move him back to Fantasy Island because it is too cold. He won't survive there....at least not until summer .... In hindsight, we'd have been better off with a small aquarium with a heater and a separate ant farm.As an aside -- we also found it a bit difficult to keep clean and required a water changes every 2 or 3 days or it starts to smell.So bottom line -- it is a very neat idea, but don't buy if you can't maintain the water at the right temperature in your home.

Great idea, but so cheap. Our plastic cracked the first day and began leaking water after our beta fish was in there. If we were not home, we would have lost the fish. We had to empty everything and caulk the cracked section. We don't have a tray to set it in and wish he company had provided one for when it gets bumped for spills.We did move half the tank into a sunny window to keep water temp up. Otherwise, we were going to add a heat lamp above habitat.

For a product that has "Science" in its name, this is HORRIBLE science. How about something that teaches kids how to PROPERLY care for animals/fish? Bettas *can* survive in small spaces with horrible care, that's why people do it. But it's not optimal. And this setup is too small, too difficult to clean (with no way to establish a proper biofilter - how bout teaching kids about the nitrogen cycle and why it's important for keeping fish?), and next to impossible to heat (bettas are tropical fish and water that is too cold stresses them). All of these things add up to an extremely stressful environment for bettas (or paradise fish), and the likely outcome is that the fish won't last very long before becoming a victim of fin rot or other bacterial infection. If you are looking into buying a betta, and want to teach your kids something about science/fish, do some research. Buy them an appropriate home (5+ gallons with a proper filter - either a hang on filter or a sponge filter - and a heater to keep the water at around 80 degrees). Teach the kids about ammonia/nitrites/nitrates, and learn how to start and establish the cycle before adding the fish. Consider adding live plants and learn about the components of keeping them healthy too. Ultimately it's a better education to DO IT RIGHT. This kit is an abusive/cruel setup for bettas, and as such is BAD SCIENCE too.

I though this was really good have not had one problem with it. The ants and fish seem to love it. The best ants are sugar ants and the best fish are fancy guppy. Again I think this product is really good and you should buy it.

This amounts to animal cruelty - much too small for a betta fish to live in. Really horrible. I'm disappointed that this is allowed on the market.

That setup is just cruel to the poor fish. He needs a much larger tank to be happy, and some surface air to breath!