Melissa & Doug Magnetic Wooden Fishing Game and Puzzle with Wooden Ocean Animal Magnets

I bought this puzzle for my 18 month old son 3 months ago as a development toy to work on his eye hand coordination and memory. Out of the package this puzzle arrived as expected: the puzzle pieces were in good shape, great quality and were easy to remove and re-insert. The magnet that was attached to the wooden stick worked great with the puzzle pieces: strong enough to the lift the pieces out of the puzzle yet easy enough for my son to remove the pieces from the magnet by hand once he has lifted them from the board. What I love about this product: I really enjoyed that the pictures of the puzzle pieces were not on the board once the pieces are removed. It was great to watch my son develop over a three month span as he went from just removing the pieces (eye hand coordination) to being able to put the puzzle pieces back without needing a picture as a guide (memory). I also enjoyed that the sea creatures are different colors so we could call out colors and watch him figure out which piece to remove. What I didn't like about this product: nothing to report here. Overall I would highly recommend this quality product to anyone looking for a fun puzzle that will help their child with early development skills. In fact after having this puzzle for three months I went out and bought a different Melissa and Doug magnetic puzzle (the bug one) for him to play with.

I wasn't sure how much my 2.5 year old would like this toy but we borrowed it from a friend and she seemed to love it so I splurged and got one. So far she comes back to it every so often and plays with it. I think it is a great toy for developing hand eye coordination in an interesting way. We also had been reading a lot of books that mentioned fishing and this was a simple way to show her what fishing was like. We used all the animal shapes and figures to teach her about ocean life and she would fish for each animal and call out its name. It was fun because we would make a big deal of the catch--yay! You caught a crab! Are you gonna eat him? No! Throw him back in (and she would put the puzzle piece back in). You can have a lot of fun with this in that way. The quality of the toy is very good. The only annoying thing is that the fishing rod has almost gotten lost a few times. So now we just keep it separate and out of reach--and give it to her along with the puzzle if she is going to use it. Problem solved. It's also nice because in order to catch the piece you not only have to hang the rod over it but hover directly over the magnet dot--something to strive for and a skill to develop. I think it's good and a great toy!

We have a few of these puzzles from Melissa and Doug and my kid loves them. The pieces fit nicely and its very fun to have a little fishing rod to get them out. The magnet holds the pieces good enough for him to get them off without just falling off. The rod isn't too heavy for him to handle but the only thing about it is that kids like to get wild from time to time and its very easy to swing around and bonk him in the head. The magnet side is pretty solid so it can hurt...so just beware of that. Other than that, there is nothing bad to say.

The best! I bought this for our 3 year old for Christmas and he plays with it everyday! Despite hundreds of dollars spent for the toys in his toy box, this is his favorite toy.

This toy will be a joy to my niece. It's hand crafted and made in the U.S.A and is solid. The price is absolutely worth it. The wood is thick and won't be breaking anytime soon. The metal snaps on the fish are well placed with no gaping. The stick is wood with a string nicely knotted on the stick. The magnet is encased by a solid piece of plastic. So the magnet cannot fall off and be ingested. The string is just long enough for the child to have fun "fishing" while remaining plenty short enough to prevent it being wrapped around the chills neck. A great toy to say the least. You won't be disappointed in it. If your child still loves to put things in their mouth then they still need supervised while playing with this as the pieces themselves as well as the stick are small enough to get in their mouth. The pieces themselves can't be swallowed at all but the stick could end up down a wind pipe. This is the case with most toys though.

I got this toy when my daughter was 2 years old because she showed a lot of interest in sea creatures. She already turned 3 and she still loves this toy. It looks like quite a simple toy and I had doubts at first if it would interest her and hold her attention for a long time but surprisingly it did. She would spend hours playing with it fishing everything out then putting it back again making up different stories while playing with it. Once she got bored fishing she would just take the fishes and pretend they were talking with each other and another big surprise was the shark was her favorite because she called it the happy shark because it was smiling. She also immediately learned the different kinds of sea creatures teach of them were and also their colors. I also liked that smiles were painted on the sea creatures that are often pictured as scary. I would have given this toy 5 stars if I were only to consider the joy and and learning it brought to my child, however there were some things I hoped could have been improved a little on the safety point of view. The fishing rod is kind of a safety hazard since it has a hard magnet hanging at the end of a rope that a child will definitely be twirling around. It has already hit my daughters head and eyes a number of times and most of our furniture. Damage it may cause will be relative to how hard your child twirls it around. It would have been better if it were made of a softer material or was covered with a foam or of something with a similar material. I would definitely recommend this toy but make sure that you either supervise playtime or educate your child on the proper use of the fishing rod to avoid any injuries just to be on the safe side.

Fun puzzle, my toddler enjoys fishing for the sea animals!

This was my 21 month old son’s favorite Christmas gift. He has played with this more than any other toy since Christmas.

My son showed interest in this type of puzzle at speech therapy so I bought this for him. Him(3) and his little brother(2) love playing with it. Has held up well. I want more kinds.

Excelente juego. A mi niño de año y medio le encanta. Ya tiene 2 meses usandolo y ahora le encanta armarlo. Te encantará para tu chiquitin.

Cadeau pour mon petit neveu. Il est très ludique et sa maman me dit qu'il joue tous les jours avec ce puzzle et qu'il a très vite compris comment il fonctionnait. Prix très intéressant ; article que je recommande particulièrement pour un enfant de 18 mois.

A good chunky, magnetic puzzle set from Melissa and Doug. It gives my 2 year old a sense of pride when he manages to solve the puzzle. Also he loves the fishing line and keeps singing the famous poem 'one two three four five once I caught a fish alive'. Easy to maintain, sturdy, durable, colorful toy that helps in developing cognitive skills. If your baby likes magnets, I would definately recommend to go for this product.

I found it hard to find jigsaw puzzles that were good quality and easy enough for a three year old, even an extremely smart three old year, to use. He got a lot of fun out of this.