I love the way I can go out and spend good money on a neat toy and my kitties don't touch it, yet I take something free (rolled up aluminum foil or milk twisty) and they have a ball with it. They are just too funny.

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That's so true, Dana

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I have some small soft balls... not kitty balls,  my scrap booking balls, but lots of them, those are their favorites... They like to play football  with them, pick them up in their mouths and throw them up in the air... and then the fun begins.

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My Tigger found a rubber band somewhere the other day - I was about to take it away from him (sure don't want him to swallow that!), but then watched him for a while with it.  He'd catch it on a fang and a claw - when it popped of the claw it hit him in the nose, but when it popped off the tooth it went zinging away and he'd run and chase it, then start all over again.  Eventually I did pick it up, and gave him his mousie instead so he wouldn't be too upset.

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My cats like to chase eachother, or nothing. Lol. They go crazy chasing things that I can't see. They have a few toys, but they rarely go for them. They enjoy hanging off their cat tower and having fights for the top of it. 

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My cheerio is good at spinning around so fast with the laser pointer, and she will chase sun spots where the sun comes into the house, or if I get a flash light out she wants to chase the light.

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Karai kun is crazy about laser and flashlights too. He loves shadows and reflections. He loves to play with string, but we can't leave it out or he will eat it. I'm sure most of you know how that's not fun for a few days. He also loves golf balls. One time my husband bought a laser ball, because he's crazy about laser, and was into balls at that time. He looked at us as if we were stupid, when we gave it to him. One of his favorites is a mouse that I crocheted for him and filled with catnip.

Amai chan loves mice, especially furry mice. Her favorites are the ones off of a bungee cord. Karai "separated" the mice from the cord. Amai also likes things with feathers. I'm allergic to feathers, but I can't say no. She also has balls of rabbit fur that she loves. At night, while I'm asleep, she piles these toys on me. She also sleeps on me, but I think she thinks I'm bored, and brings me toys, so I will play with her. Sometimes the toys are on the floor, on my side of the bed, and sometimes they are in my shoes.

Something they both do is bring us mice. They call to us, with the mice(toy) in their mouths, and come find us, whereever we are, and drop it near us, and "mememeow" at us. Then we tell them thankyou, and what good babies they are. They are sooo pleased with themselves.

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Gretchen, your kitties are very special to bring those toys to you like that. That is very special !

Marylee, mine LOVE paper bags, and boxes too, plus the laser toy of course, and toy mice if they are around.

Yes, be careful  of string.  Or thread. I had a kitty that had green thread tied in a knot behind her tongue. It was a serious, plus expensive operation getting it out of her intestines. If it was a short thread he could have snipped it, but it went all the way down . She survived with lots of prayers too. They put that string in a vile, and when I opened the cap it stunk up the whole vets office.

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Here it is. Don't know why but they all love these things.

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my cat likes 2 play with balls he loves it

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My little guy has a basket full of stuffed mice, dangly toys, jingle balls, toys galore.  So what does he do?  Pulls the whole basket off the shelf, upends it, sets the now empty basket right side up, and hops in! 
He also loves to start of the morning with a wrestling match and a round of 'pounce on anything human that moves'. Hubby and I are his favourite toys of all time.

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Judy   that sounds about right! One of mine loves to attack your feet when you walk - in fact, it's the one in the picture sneaking up on that plastic ring.

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Campbell loves to play with string or shoelaces and he has a toy mouse which he chases when he is full of energy and wants to play 

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Blackcat, be careful with the string. The going price to remove it from the intestines goes areound 7 tp 800. I got off cheap with 400.00 several years ago, and that is because they sent her home because she would not get comfortable with the IV in her.

Deb, mine always liked those, especially because they are so light, but I have a plastic eating Spit fire here, so I have to get rid of all of them. The tough thing here too is that a few of them tear at the cat food cases, and then start eating the plastic.

Laser pointer is their favorite, but they love toy mice, and also boxes and bags to crawl into. Catnip goes over big here too. Winky likes to catch whatever I throw to the trash can, and she also likes to bat food around the room.

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I have a funny short story about toys and one little kitten - the character in the photo in my previous post. That's Pumpkin - aka- Puckie. Puckie, as some of you know, was found on Thanksgiving Day in 2007 on a major highway. She was about 5 weeks old - maybe - she was just a tiny little thing and in pretty bad shape. We kept her in a crate so she wouldn't get stepped on and the other cats wouldn't think she was a mouse (yeah! - she was that small!) She had balls, and little stuffed animals and other little toys - but her favorite? Her poops in the litter box!!   She'd get in there and scoop them out and toss them into the air and then pounce on them when they hit the floor (that's the other reason she was in a crate). Thankfully, she only played with the ones that were on the dry side from the litter absorbing the moisture.  And, thankfully, she's grown out of that habit, but she's still a trash monger. I guess she lived oout of trash cans to survive because she thinks that trash cans and the paper in them are a prize worth fighting for! Her and our other feral, Luna - they both get into the trash and take the paper - and like yours, Donna, the plastic - then they run off with it as if one of the other cats was going to come after them to take it!   Puckie also had a shoelace adventure - only it went all the way through with the strong laxative the vet gave her so we avoided the next step, which was surgery.

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That's funny, Judy. Kind of like a raccoon washing the food before eating it.   My crew likes to drop just about anything they pick up to play with into the water bowl. I find all kinds of things floating around in there.

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Hi I have 3 cats.I have never found a toy they like more than the ring from milk jug. My babies Skip,Bobblehead and Bubbles teasing each other to no end.

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I understand where some of you are coming from. I stopped buying toys for my Sage because she would rather play with a q-tip or a tuft of hair from my brush. She's not fond of catnip. She does love to tantalize my dog though...

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3 of my 4 cats don't really play with toys, other than the laser pointer. They all go bananas for that! Cujo, our youngest (he will be 4 this summer) is still into playing with everything. I've bought conventional toys but he destroys them in minutes. So I don't bother anymore. His most favorite toy is his stuffed dog. Once u find out why ur gonna get a good laugh out of it. When he was a kitten, his hormones kicked in very early & it was too soon to get him fixed. So I called the vet & asked what I could do for the poor guy since he was so frustrated he would cry & cry & hump our legs! So the vet said to give him a stuffed animal. I had this stuffed dog that at the time was 3X the size of Cujo, but it had Luci's scent on it since she used to sleep with it, & Cujo is in love with Luci. So I gave him the stuffed dog. Well he went to town!! He even bites the ear to get a good grip!! After he got fixed I thought that it would stop but he started humping the minute we brought him home from the vets! The vet said that it's because he's a dominant cat & he'll do it forever. I've never heard of a cat humping before, just dogs, until I met my hubby. HE had a cat that humped a stuffed rabbit! I told him that it must be something he's giving off!! LOL! So Cujo drags this dog all around the house, does his thing, & then puts it back under the chair in the bedroom where we keep it. His second favorite toy is a kid's stuffed football. When he first started playing with it it was bigger than he was! Now he'll carry it around & howl & cry & make a big production out of it, as if to say "look! I've got my football!". Then he'll drop it, get affectionate for a minute & then walk away. His other toys include beer caps & elastics (which he catches right out of the air) rolled up old guitar strings with the ends taped, & the little plastic rings off of juice bottle lids. Oh, & he has a thing for plastic. Cujo, Wiener & Wormi all have a thing for plastic, but Cujo's is the worst 'cause if ur not careful he'll eat it. He likes to chew on harder plastic bags, like the ones from the liquor store, or the toilet paper plastic wrapping. Wiener just licks it & rubs his nose on it until he sneezes, Wormi will tear apart empty cigarette bags (we get our smokes from the reserve so they come in a bag instead of packs) so I have to make sure that all plastic is out of their reach. That's pretty much it for toys. The older cats just seem to sleep a lot so they aren't really interested in playing as much as Cujo. He's still loony tunes.

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sorry for such a long post! I get carried away when I'm talking about my babies. I'm a proud momma

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My tomcat Minou is not the kind of a player. Once in a while, he gets his five minutes and starts rushing through the house, putting up his back with a plushytail. His nose gets red and his eyes real big and round. Then I know what,s up and you better beware . Nicki likes to play with almost everything. Her mice, balls, her stinkytoys filled with catnip. That drives her crazy. Most of her toys, I find back under a closet or couch and that makes her happy again.

That's so funny about your cats and the kids' socks!  Reminds me of the comic strip "Mutts", where the kitty is in love with his "little pink sock".

I believe "fetch" is somewhat common in cats.  My Jabberwock would fetch anything you'd throw for him that he could pick up, but his favorite was a crumpled up cigarette pack!  Now with Tigger, when I throw a toy he'll run to it, play with it a bit, then run back to me - hasn't quite got the hang of actually bringing it back, but he's working on it. 

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Well.... Boots doesn't play with toys at all.  Liza will play with toys when she "finds" one of the fuzzy mice she lost from the 12 pack I got her for the holidays.  She's really funny running around the house with them, she's my 13 year old kitten.

Stars & Stripes are playing with all the toys we ever got for the other cats.  In fact they love playing with a purple fuzzy ball.  It used to be Jelly Bean's and it is so well used (and slobbered) that we were going to throw it away but the kids got to it first!  They also play with the little fuzzy mice and when they are done with it they drop them in the food bowls.  Sometimes I find 3 or 4 of them in a bowl.  Their favorite one on a string is a 3 inch long orange mouse with the word "Trayf" stiched on it.  For those who don't know, trayf is Yiddish for unclean/not kosher.

Lee

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Lee, your cats get their toy mice inspected by the rabbi???? hehe

That is funny about the growling and the socks. That is the kind of thing some of mine do when I give themn a chicken leg. A raw one, not cooked, as the bones would be dangerous, but when they have something they really like, they pick it up in their mouth and growl and  take off, or stay there and growl while they are eating.

Cindy, mine like crinkled up newspaper balls thrown for them to bat around. If yours are doing the ciggy pack thing, be sure to get the ceelophane off of it or they could die. They eat it, and once they start they can't get it out of their mouth, and it keeps going down, and then mixes with stomach acids, and acts like a glass in the stomach. Be careful of the tops of the pack when you pull it off too.

I have a problem with cats who like plastic, Spit fire has been the worst.

My cats like bags, and cardboard boxes. Problem is that one will like to get into the bag, and another wants to pee on it. After the other cat gets out!

There was a toy I was getting for them every so often, as they tore up the mouse in it. I forget what it is called, but the mouse had a spring thing that if touched it it would get going around in the circle.

Their favorite is th laser pointer. It was good exercise for a while, but now I have a love seat where they use to race up and down the living room.

They also stole one of my earrings. I found it under the desk on the foot part of it.

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I forgot to mention that mine also like the cat dancer toy.

There was a big commotion one time when I had a circular toy with a mouse that goes around in it, I was wondering why they liked it so much this one time, and here it was a real mouse in there going around.

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Donna, that's so funny about the real mouse in the cat toy!  Did one of them finally get it?  My guys don't get ciggy packs anymore, I'm the next thing to quitting (down to 4-5 a day), and the ones I do get are in a box rather than soft pack.

They LOVE cardboard boxes, too, if I leave one out they'll shred it down to the ground.  Only go inside the real little ones, though.

One toy they really like is a glove with super long fingers with little balls on the ends.  Have to be careful when I play with them with it, though.  They don't always stay with the balls and sometimes go up higher and snag my fingers!

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About 7 years ago I made these little toys (they're actually very small pillow looking things). I took some good material and stuffed them with stuffing and a lot of catnip. I have baskets which I keep all their toys and they still continue to take out the ones I made. They love 'em.

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You know the little cat who walks across the top of the threads? Well Molly spotted him last night and I couldn't see the screen for ages while she was pawing at it and trying to catch him I've bought her all kinds of kitty toys but she'd rather have a paper bag, a sock from the laundry basket, Peter's shoelaces......

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My kitty is 10 months old, and ever since she was a baby she loved this toy we bought from the dollar store. Its a long piece of white rabbit fur wrapped around a red plastic stick. She would chase that around for hours, and then on her own she would pick it up and throw it in the air and run around with it all over the place. It now has lost its stick, but we tied a piece of string around the end and throw it around and she goes nuts.

She also has a habit of playing with her food. No matter how much we try to stop her, she will paw her food out of the bowl and chase each piece around and then eat it.

But she also plays with paper, sticks, toilet paper rolls, twist ties, you name it, if we drop it, it's hers..lol

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My girl adores, of all things, my bamboo back scratcher. She'll drag it around, or, if I slip it under a blanket, she'll pounce and bite at it. Other toys seem to lose their novelty for her after about a week. The back scratcher is her absolute favorite, I think if she didnt have it, she'd be one sad kitty LOL.

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Some toys you can buy are impregnated with catnip.  You can even get packets of it from pet stores .  My first kitty used to go wild for these toys and play with them for ages.  My last two haven't been impressed at all- maybe no sense of smell!

Does this stuff work for anyone else's kitties?

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Cats do differ in their reactions to catnip.  Two of mine go wild with it, one is fairly indifferent.  I put it in their scratch pads to TRY to keep them from destroying the furniture - helps a little.

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Isn't it funny what they end up liking to play with the most? I bought a catnip spray and all 8 of mine go nuts over it. I spray it on all their furniture and posts and beds and they just go nuts rubbing and scratching after I spray. They seem to like it more than the stuff you can buy to put in toys.

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My cats enjoy playing with things like string, rubber bands and gift bows! They hardly ever touch the store bought toys...

Hi Sheila! In regards to toys with catnip, my cat Josie doesn't seem to care for it. My other cat Sidney really likes it, but just for the first day only. After that, he loses interest.

Here's 3 of them on their furniture ...  zonked after a fun time after the catnip spray 

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Right Claudine, so it's not just mine then.

Deb, I'm guessing the one in the top 'bunk' is boss cat!

It's funny how you can bring home a new toy you think will provide hours of fun and the Special One just walks past it and pretends it isn't there.  Don't give up though!  I bought Molly a 12inch diameter play tunnel made of a rustly scrunchy fabric covering a large metal coil with a ball hanging inside.  She didn't want to know for weeks, but I left it lying around anyway and suddenly one evening she started running through it, rolling in it, pouncing on it, hiding in it.  I think it must be something to do with not wanting to look too impressed by a new toy.

Cats have a cool reputation to maintain - Respect!

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Sheila, you are right about that reputation they must keep !

About catnip, not all cats have the gene, and they say a cat doesn't develop it until they are 6 months old, or a year. I forget which it is now.

Also,  I read that giving a cat catnip more than once a week will make them lose interest.

Deb, the cat furniture is beautiful.

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I read that about catnip, too ... the fact that if they get it too often they lose interest. I use the spray about every 2 to 3 weeks and when I use it, I put it on all the toys and the furniture. Oh - the furniture, Donna ... Dan actually made the scratch posts for them. I bought the big tall one - and we have others like that one, too. They like this grouping the best. My neighbor said I spoil them ... I say NO SUCH THING!!!!  I don't think you can spoil cats!!     And Sheila, yeah, that would be my Luna (or "toons" - "tunes") in the top bunk, and she does pretty much rule the roost. However, the tortie on the bottom (Sugar) can and does tell her what she is allowed to do every so often  

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I've had two torties and let's just say they could be VERY assertive!

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My calico cat Pip (9) totally ignores ALL bought toys but is obsessed with buckets and bags - climb in them, look out of them, heaps of fun apparently, we have developed a morning ritual where i turn a bucket on its side and put a bit of water or food in it and she shoves as much of herself inside to consume it - apparently tastes much better than the same stuff in her stainless steel dish! She will do this several times a day and not get bored!

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That's funny, Debra. Mine love going into boxes and we have a few laying around just for them to play in. When they get tired of one, we get rid of it, wait a couple days, and then replace it with a new one. They go crazy with that one for weeks, then we start the whole thing over again.

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Here's Thelma Lou with her favorite - a plastic ring. She took it to bed with her 

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