Rotating Toys/how Many Out At Once?

[AmyTheKittyMommy]

I have heard it’s important to rotate toys to keep cats interested. According to what I’ve read, this means keeping interactive toys like wands put away except during scheduled playtimes, and only leaving a few toys like mice or balls out at a time and switching them every so often.
I do have a closed toy box I can keep the excess toys in, but I was wondering, how many toys is good at a time? I have two kittens, and I know kittens always need to play, so I bought a twelve pack of mice, a bunch of balls, gathered tons of toilet paper tubes and rolls of crumpled paper, etc, but I’m aware it is a bit much.
Is there a good number to leave out for them? Also, am I correct in assuming I should have some toys scattered throughout the house?
Thanks.

 

[Neo_23]

I keep a bunch of toys scattered in areas that I know get high traffic from my kitten. Things like wands and stuff I'm not worried about keeping tucked away because cats usually don't play with wands by themselves (well, at least mine doesn't). But, I keep some balls and mice around the house, a tunnel, some more mice on his cat tree, and I also have two stuffed animals that I put around the house that he likes to play fight with (he's an only cat, so no cat buddy to play with). I also have one of those senseit cat ball tunnels that he can play with by himself, and he goes through phases of being interested in it. I've noticed that it's not so much the novelty of the toy itself but where it is and how it is played with. But every cat is different. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, I don't really "hide" toys, I kind of just leave them all around and he decides which one he's interested in every now and then.

I have also stopped buying toys because I realized that I can pretty much make any household item into a toy for my kitten, so when he gets bored I just make something new/find something new around the house for him that's safe to play with. Speaking of which, I wouldn't leave any toys that have small parts or dangling strings laying around the house, especially with kittens. Anything that is small enough to be swallowed is a hazard.

 

[AmyTheKittyMommy]

Okay! I’ll just spread the toys out more then, as opposed to putting them up. I have any toys with strings (like wands) put up just because of ingestion/strangling risk.

 

[di and bob]

I throw out about 6 little mice, 3 balls and 2 kickeroos for my bunch. (4 cats) then in about a week I pick them up and exchange them for basically the same thing that has been in a bag of loose catnip. Shake them off in the bag before you take them out. The cats smell the catnip and are all lined up waiting, catnip makes a big difference in how interested they are in the toys!

 

[susanm9006]

I have always had a shallow toybox for my cats and kittens and they dig out whatever interests them. Just the process of fishing something out occupies them and I never ceased to be surprised by what gets dragged out in the middle of the night. I would encourage you to continue buying a variety on inexpensive commercial toys as well as homemade. Cats vary in which toys really interest them and finding out what toys they really really love will help keep them active throughout adult hood. My seven year old still gets up during the night and plays hard with her cat springs or ball collection.