I remember doing that old ant farm kit when I was little (too long ago now, I know) and saw this new-style ant hill next to that ant farm on a store shelf. That old ant farm hasn't changed in (okay, I'm admitting it here) over 30 years! The new dome-like style of this one, and the idea that we could see what the ants were doing both above ground and below ground appealed to us. We did buy both styles though - my kids wanted to try them all (the AntHill was the better of the two, even though I admit to rooting for the old-school style out of pure nostalgia. I won't say anything bad about the ant farm one here, I'm not here to knock it. The ants lived a lot longer in the AntHill, is all). The ants tunneled out the flat "underground" side of the habitat, and foraged for the food we put in on the rounded "aboveground" side. Very cool! The instructions had some ant facts and a few good links to information on ants and insects on the web. Our ants lived to finish tunneling, and were just kind of resting with their project all completed, so we planned a picnic-trip to the park and released them there with one last chunks-of-sandwiches buffet. Fun, educational and interesting - everything I was hoping for when I opened my wallet to buy this one.

Having live stinging ants in my home is definitely outside my comfort zone. That being said, this was a great product for my kids. All of them, 2 to teen loved watching the ants dig and tunnel. Even my squeamish self enjoyed watching the tunnels develop. Ants are truly amazing workers. Among the ants that arrived only two were dead. The one draw back was this. The product said the ants would live 2 to 4 weeks. They survived much longer, necessitating caring for them longer than I expected.

We bought this ant hill at the Imaginarium and ordered the ants with the prepaid form. When the ants arrived the majority of them were dead with only ten out of fifty survived the trip to Alaska. I immediately emailed the company and didn't hear back from them. A week later another set of ants arrived. It would have been nice to have a reply to the email but they were very quick in sending the replacement ants at no charge. Both my kids, 5 and 2 years old, love to watch them digging their tunnels and talking about what they are up to. Unfortunately because of the cold weather for mailing our ant hill sits empty waiting for spring. I would definitely recommend this product to anyone with an interest in bugs.

The Customer Service at this Company was terrible. The larvae were sent to the wrong person and then they refused to replace them. I was hung up on and just treated as though I owed them something. Buy something else if you don't want your child to be disappointed.