Sometimes cats do things that remind us they’re essentially furry little wise-beyond-their-years toddlers.
I love this story about a four-year-old cat named Lucas and his favorite toy in the whole world, a stuffed leopard he’s been cuddling and playing with since he was a kitten.
“I got the toy from my local zoo, along with a few other stuffed animals,” Alana, Lucas’ human servant, told The Dodo. “He usually leaves my stuffed animals alone, but he wouldn’t leave this one alone.”
As any cat servant knows, our felines are pretty rough on toys, especially if cats knead on them and drag them around the house.
“He’s had this toy for probably four years, and it ripped because of wear and tear,” Alana said. “My grandma moved in with us last year, and really loves Lucas. [She] saw that his favorite toy was ripped, so she sewed it back together for him.”
As you can see from the photos, little Lucas was curious and entranced by his grandma’s patch job, happily purring as she handed it back to him almost as good as new.
Buddy’s favorite toy is a small stuffed bird from a wand toy.
He still likes “hunting” it, then laying back and batting it around after he catches it. (And I use the word “catch” loosely. He likes hunting games because his instincts drive him to stalk and pounce, but he doesn’t know what to do once he catches up with his “prey.”)
He drags it around when we’re not playing with it, and sometimes I find it near his food bowls.
Like Lucas’ leopard, Buddy’s bird is ripped, worn and often soggy with cat saliva. What’s your cat’s favorite toy?
Pain In The Bud 
Aww, this is so cute… Well, my Holly used to LOVE her little blue mouse. We called it her “Baby”. She’d carry the thing around in her mouth from room to room. She’d bat it and chase it. She’d toss it down the stairs and fetch it. But for some reason all of the sudden she grew bored with it and now wants nothing to do with it! Baby is now left untouched. Sometimes she plays with a raffia ball, but she needs it to be moving. She’s past the stage when they’ll play by themselves, she needs something to be moving to capture her interest.
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Have you tried washing it? Maybe a scent she doesn’t like got on the toy somehow. After washing you can mash up some catnip so it’s ultra-fine and “marinate” the toy in the ‘nip for a few hours. I’ve done that before when reintroducing toys, and it works really well.
I’ve had some luck with those toys with a ball in a track that the cat can bat around. Buddy sometimes plays with his track toy at night when I’m sleeping. It’s relatively quiet and can keep ’em occupied for a while.
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One of our two cats carries toys around the house in her mouth like a dog. Her favorite is a squeaky grey mouse which she brings to me as a present and occasionally dunks in her water bowl.
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Ah yeah I’ve noticed that dunking toys in the water bowl thing as well. I wonder what’s with that? A good question for cat behaviorists. Bud loved to knock his water bowl over until I upgraded to a wide-base, shallower water bowl that is virtually impossible for him to flip, but he still plays with the water.
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Big Buddy,
My cats don’t know what to do with the real, live (dead) things they bring in the house, either.
If they aren’t dead, I take them away from the cats, and either release them or, if injured, take them to the wildlife rehabilitation center for treatment.
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Or maybe you’ve got some compassionate kitties 🙂
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My beloved kittie (back in SG) used to do this. She would walk in and drop all manner of creatures (chameleons, shrews etc) beside me, as if to say, “I come bearing gifts. Now where’s my salmon?”
That’s how I ended up with a slew of other pets (and ran out of salmon very quick)
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Her way of saying “Salmon now, or these poor creatures become my lunch!” Sounds like salmon is to her as turkey is to Buddy.
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Haha, yeah. She loved her salmon (more than tuna), just like her cat servant/consigliere. She used to make all sorts of funny noises when munching on it. I miss her a lot but she’s in a better place now, where salmon grow on trees and rain from the skies ❤
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