toy ideas for cat??

[lavlav123123]

We have had our 10 month old cat for about 2 weeks now. She LOVES playing with wand toys (we have Da Bird and she loves it so much) but she isn't interested in anything else. Doesn't want to bat play balls around, doesn't like little mouse toys.. I even got a battery operated ball with a feather thing that moves on it's own but it just scared her. I hate worrying that she's bored when she's home alone, and I don't want her to get bored with the wand toy. I love playing with the wand toy with her, but I thought she should maybe have some more options... I don't know, I might be overthinking this! What toys do your cats like? Any ideas for me? Thank you!!

 

[losna]

It's kind of blurry, but this is Sinbad's favorite toy:

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• losna
• May 12, 2016

It's an empty tub of protein powder. He just loves rolling it around the kitchen floor. 

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• losna
• May 12, 2016

Also beloved by both of them are paper towel tubes, crumpled balls of printer paper, empty aspirin bottles, and milk caps.

We don't buy them toys any more because they always love homemade/found toys much better. Sinbad has actually learned that the kitchen trash can contains the most amazing toys and if we don't put a weight on the top, he'll pop it open and fish around looking for treasures.

 

[molly92]

I'd say just keep trying random things? My cat mostly only plays with things that I'm controlling (dabird, wand toys, laser pointer, bits of string) but she does love this little mouse toy that's made of neon twine and a feather tail. No other mouse toys or balls or anything get her interest, but she'll bat that thing all around the house at 3 am. It must be just the right size and weight for her or something.

Bottle caps are pretty common favorite "toys" for a lot of cats. If she's really food motivated, a puzzle ball would be a good activity for when you're gone.

 

[PushPurrCatPaws]

CanCor crinkle balls have always been a favorite with my kitty (she's just over a year old now).

 

[cocobutterfly]

Our cat loves playing with toys, but she won't play when she's alone. At least one human has to be in the same room with her, watching her and cheering her on. We even tried PetCube to watch her and play interactively with her through the app, but she didn't want to play alone. Her favorite solitary activity is watching the birds in our backyard, so we set up her cat tree and her favorite chair right in front of our sliding glass window, and we put up three hummingbird feeders in the yard so she can watch the birds fly around all day. I also constantly think about getting her a little feline brother or sister. 

 

[graywing]

Gizmo has a couple mouse toys but they often have to be tossed behind something or in something like a paper bag to get him really excited.  He does really like this one mouse though that you pull the tail and it vibrates.  If I start slowly pulling the tail, he'll hear the clicking sound and often come running.  I've also gotten him dog toys.  There's this rabbit one that makes crinkly sounds he really likes and this other one that's either a dog or a bear (I've never been able to decide).  The bear one needs a good cleaning and I'm trying to figure out what to do for that but at least he really loves the crinkly rabbit, too.  I hold one end of it or the tail and hide it behind me or some other object and let it peek out and then hide again. We've also gotten him ping pong balls.  He doesn't tend to chase them on his own though.  We bounce them first on the floor.  Sometimes he'll bat them in mid-air.  Also putting them in a bathtub or in some other contained place can be fun.  He also has a death star treat toy that's meant for dogs but he really likes.  I don't like letting him eat too many treats though. 

There's some other toys that he really liked but he seems to have lost interest with them for the time being.  I'll probably pull them back out at another time.  There's a whirly gig which he really loved when he was little, a catnip filled pepper, cardboard toilet paper and paper towel tubes, and these little flippy things that I'm not sure what they're called.  They have a shape like a figure 8 that make a neat sound as they go over hard floors. 

I've been wanting to build up more toys so I can rotate them more often to keep things fresh but he's very prone to destroying a toy quickly that isn't well made.  I don't let him have toys with feathers either.  It seems I have a hard time finding toys that are right for him.  Toys that I could trust with Tux just won't always work with him.

I also started on a butterfly garden outside the window he likes to look out of.  I've been thinking of trying to attract birds, too, but I'm worried with how many feral cats there are around here.  And the price of seed is really high right now.  I'm thinking about trying chicken scratch if I do feed birds since I've heard it's much less expensive but I'm still not too sure how appropriate it is for native wild bird species.

 

[ellag]

my cats love wand toys with feathers but they really love little mice made out of real rabbit fur. you can get those pretty cheap off ebay...

 

[govtlawyer]

There are little plastic round and squiggly things.  They come in a pack of 4.  My kitten loves them.  She brings them to me at night and plays fetch.  She hides them and now I can't find any of them.  I found one in my shoe when I put it on last week.

Anything with a wand and feathers at the end.

Laser pointer - both my kitten and older guy go crazy over them.

Finally, I bought a three their plastic contraption with 3 balls which go around a track.  My kitten loves it - my older one gets bored by it.

One more thing - put something valuable on a cleared table.  Your cat will find it within minutes and it will become her favorite toy.