The Perfect Cat Toy Part 1

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Is there really a “Perfect” cat toy? I don’t really know, but I’d love to find out. Consider this a quest to find that perfect toy– or to make the perfect toy.

If anyone knows me, I’m a devout cat lady, maybe a little crazy too. I’ve had cats for more than 20 years. I’ve dealt with feline illnesses and learned to take a more natural approach than I did when I was guardian to my first kitties. I make my own cat food, which helped my ill cats live healthier lives, and even convinced the vet that my diabetic Dusty lived much longer than her less-than-year-left diagnosis. Dusty happily lived another 11 years, actually, passing away a year and a month before Luna wandered into our lives. I’ve tried so many toys over the years. I’ve had cats my whole life, although there was a bit of a lull between the ages of 3 and 13. My older brother had severe allergic reactions that caused him to faint, so our first cats JJ and CJ, were given away when I was just 3 and without much say in the matter. Over the next decade, I often rescued cats– people had a tendancy to abandon litters of kittens on our front lawn– and finally took some rescues home from my paper route when I was 13. Our kitties never liked the toys we bought for more than an hour or two. Catnip was a mystery to our 2 calico sisters, and it got our older Charteuse Dusty (the diabetic) so disoriented, we didn’t give it to her at all. Our cats weren’t runners, climbers, chasers, or much of anything really except good lap warmers. Now, I realize it may have been the food, but I didn’t know that then.

But my girls now? Luna, our older Tuxedo officially adopted us on a moonlit night in July 2007. She was, by my own estimate, which the vet confirmed, not more than 15 or 16 months old. We first met her when she followed Anthony home from the trainstation, about 10 days before she actually became part of the family; we were leaving for a conference in California the next night, and my mother– a non-cat person– was living with us in our small apartment at the time, so I couldn’t take the cat in. She didn’t have the look of a stray. She looked well fed, though a bit thin, and her coat was glossy and free of fleas. I thought she had just gotten out, or was the anomaly that is the “outdoor cat.” She had no collar, no tags. So, I did tell her, over a meal of roast chicken that if she needed a place to stay, to come back in about a week. I told her my mom would take her to a shelter otherwise. She just looked at me after finishing her meal, meowed, and stalked off. When we returned from our trip a week later, received permission from the landlord to have animals, and got our hands on some precautionary flea items– comb, shampoo, and a natural flea spray– and found Luna 3 days later on our front porch: dehydrated, emaciated, and full of fleas. It took her a good 2 months to get in good health, so she wasn’t very playful at all. Once we got rid of the fleas, got her hydrated, fed, and got her iron levels up– she was very anemic because of the fleas– she slowly, but steadily rebounded and was the most energetic cat I had ever, at that point, had in my family.

Luna doesn’t run or chase necessarily– she’s all for the kill. She went through toys like a knife through butter. Nothing lasted for more than a few days, if we were lucky. Sometimes, she’d destroy a toy the same day we first bought it and presented it to her. Then somewhere along the lines, when finances were seriously thin– which they usually are, but when both my husband and I were out of work– I started trying to make toys for her. They were pathetic– and she chose instead to play with non-toy items around the house, a straw, bottlecap, telephone chord– things kitties shouldn’t play with. Then she lost interest and became a bit of a lump. There were times, mostly at night, when she would spend a good hour or two “playing” in the hall by herself, with nothing at all. She seemed to be wrestling and chasing absolutely nothing. She was going a bit crazy we surmised, unless she was wrestling with the spirit of my dead cat, who passed away next door and is buried under my current spare room window– all of which we seriously doubted.

Then came Sage in an attempt to allay any lunacy in Luna… and we thought Luna had been energetic. Sage was a rescue from a local rescue group. She was born on August 13^th2010 and was presented to the shelter with 2 of her siblings. All of them had distinct markings and reminded me of a friend’s Toyger, or Toy Tiger, a special mixed breed created to look like their big cat relatives. I started doing a little research and spoke to our vet. He felt she was more Bengal than anything else, though he saw a little Egyptian Mau in her. At the time her fur was silver, grey and black. Late in her first year, when she began losing her baby fuzz, her coat took on a more golden color at the tips– she’s a weird mishmosh of grey, bronze, and black with gold or black tips to her fur. Her body proportions aren’t right for a Toyger either, and he pointed out her legs and “belly flap” particular to a few breeds. Our vet emphatically agreed with my thoughts about her being the result of someone’s breeding program. Personally, I think someone was trying to either breed Bengals, trying to create Toygers or another breed all-together. Sage was an undesired outcome of breeding and was lucky enough to go to a shelter instead of simply being euthanized.

Sage is non-discriminatory as far as toys go. Being just barely out of kitten-hood, she finds play in absolutely everything. When she was 6 months, we had to get a metal holder for the spare toilet paper rolls because we came home to find kitty bite marks clean through a brand new, unwrapped roll that was mistakenly put on the floor. Sage is a runner, primarily, and a climber. She does like the kill, but is all about the chase.

Having become a recent Jackson Galaxyaddict with his show My Cat From Hell, I scouted around for that wand-feather thing he uses, with the thought that perhaps it will whet Luna’s play appetite again and encourage her to more active play—instead of just wrestling with Sage.

I came across “Da Bird” as it’s called, and found lots of places where I could purchase it. It’s relatively inexpensive, but does range from $5.99 to as much as $15.99 plus tax and shipping. While the majority of the reviews are very positive, the one complaint was that after several short play sessions, the thing was either a)torn to pieces or b)fell apart on its own. They do sell replacement feathers, at about $5 a pop. That adds up. Like I said, finances aren’t my forte. I’ve managed to get by on spending about $65 a month, for both cats in terms of food and litter. Because of the quality of their food, my vet bills are minimal… so I looked around for DIY cat toy articles.

One toy that I did get my hands on was the Go Cat Cat Catcher. After my own DIY toys became too frazzled and since it’s not yet molting season (you’ll understand in a bit), I can’t redo them yet. I also wanted something to attract Luna and get her moving. While watching Galaxy’s show, I saw how even low energy cats were attracted to this toy. It was out of stock on his site– the cheapest price around for the toy at $7.49 + s/h– so I found it a little more on PetCo for $7.99. I posted reviews on both sites because this toy wasn’t what I expected.

In a nutshell, while it does get the cats moving, it’s potentially very dangerous. I can hear the nay-sayers now saying, She’s just a Crazy Overprotective Cat Lady. Not so much. The handle is a pretty sturdy plastic tube with vinyl endcaps. The lure is a small mouse similar in texture to a pipe cleaner, but made from plastic fiber. My only issue with it was the tail that came off in exactly 10 minutes– and was almost swallowed by Luna. The lure is attached to a line, exactly like a fishing line sans hook. The line is the problem. It’s wire, very much like piano wire. Sage took to it immediately. Luna was interested but it took her about a week to actually play with it, but not energetically. She stalks it, pounces, and wants to kill it but the lure is too small and fragile. It’s a chase toy not a kill toy. But, after a few minutes first playing with Sage, she began doing something weird with her mouth. Licking her lips but not in a way that says I’m nervous or uneasy. She was moving her mouth weird and shaking her head around. I understaood when the thing flew up and whacked me across the face. It hurt like hell. The wire was whipping around and may have caught her in the mouth or across the face when she dove for the toy. It’s a great toy to get them moving. But I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who isn’t careful and certainly not to anyone with young children. A child can hurt himself or the cat with the wire on this toy. The wire also has a tendancy to curl and several times it’s entangled Sage. I can just imagine some twit inadvertantly garotting their feline with this thing. I haven’t had the chance yet, but intend to cover the wire with something soft to try to cushion it. I’m more careful about how I play with it with the girls so they don’t get whipped across the face with the wire.

There’s another toy that I’m dying to try, Neko Flies because I’ve heard a lot of good things about it, but can’t really say more until I get one in my handses.

On my hunt for the perfect cat toy, I came across lots of DIY cat toys. Many were really bizarre. I did find one that made an odd sort of sense, while being alarming at the same time. I know the person writing it meant well, but it was all about giving your cats what amounts to garbage to play with—old toilet paper rolls, pizza boxes, pill bottles, and pencils. Granted, it’s not icky garbage—but to give your cat junk, in my mind, is just sending the wrong message to your feline companions. Not only does it tell your cats that junk is an acceptable toy, but also tells them that you can’t take the time to create a toy much more complex than an old toilet paper roll. Pencils and pill boxes were top on the list on this site as kitty toys. I’m sorry, but just because my cats are drawn to batting pencils off the desk, I don’t want my girls to think that pencils are acceptable toys. Ditto for pill bottles and grungy pizza boxes—which, if you’re like my family and LOVE mushroom pizza with lots of garlic—could harbor food residue that might be toxic to felines. Mushrooms can kill a cat and garlic can cause Heinz body anemia. Nix the pizza boxes. Cats cannot tell the difference between the junk condoned here, and household items that aren’t junk. Sure, pill bottles may make a cool rattling sound—but how is kitty to know that this pill bottle has been cleaned out and has dried beans inside and made safe for play, but this one still has dad’s meds in it? Please, don’t go there.

Stay tuned for DIY toys, Home Cattification on a budget, and reviews of other products.

2013-02-16 08:00:33

Source: http://www.green-and-growing.com/2012/08/the-perfect-cat-toy-part-1.html