What To Look For When Choosing A Catnip Cat Toy

While we all love to spoil our pets, a quest for a new catnip cat toy for your beloved feline can prove to be a daunting task. With aisles full of toys that come in all different shapes, sizes and colors, it almost seems like the cat toy market spends more money catering to the visual likes of the human, instead of what our felines prefer to play with.

With aisles full of big toys, little toys, feather toys, toys with catnip and scratch toys, just to name a few, you would think the kitty care aisle in your local pet store would be a cats dream, but its can sometimes be a pet owners nightmare. As a pet parent to three kitties of my own, I know all too well how hard it can be to satisfy the finicky kitties in my clan. I must admit I have a small graveyard of toys of kitty past, some that have been well loved, while others have been around for ages, yet look like they just came out of the package.

Even though our house is covered in kitty toys, there is one tried and true toy in our household and that is the catnip cat toy. No matter what form it comes in, my kitties always love to play with them, usually to the point that they end up soaked with kitty drool. But I have found that not all catnip cat toys are created equal.

One thing I have learned in my years of kitty ownership is that catnip does in fact have a shelf life. Since catnip is a dried herb of sorts, its potency will decrease as it is exposed to air. This pretty much means that the longer the catnip cat toy sits around, the less likely it will be that kitty will take an interest in it because the catnip smell will not be as strong to them. So when it comes to choosing a new catnip cat toy for my kitty clan there are a few things that I like to look for.

1. A cat toy that requires the owner to add catnip to the toy when they get it home.

These toys commonly have a Velcro closure in the back where you can pour the catnip in. I love this type of a catnip cat toy because you can keep refreshing the catnip for as long as the toy remains in good playing condition. But these toys may not be good for those who have some form of an allergy to catnip as it actually requires the owner to touch the kitty nip, as well as increases the chance of having catnip strewn across the house as it naturally falls out of the toy.

2. A catnip toy that is made to order with fresh catnip.

Another type of catnip toy that is becoming more and more popular on the web comes in the form of a handmade catnip toy. I have taken a liking to these types of cat toys as they come with the kitty nip already in them, and the handmade element that goes into each toy ensures that no two toys will be exactly a like. What I like to look for when buying these handmade cat toys is that they are made to order. This guarantees that toy contains the freshest possible catnip which will ensure hours of fun for your beloved feline.

As you may have already guessed, freshness is of the utmost importance when it comes to choosing the right catnip cat toy for your kitty clan. If for any reason you are unable to confirm the age of the kitty nip in a toy that you are considering buying, it may be best to pass on it and purchase something else cause we all know that our kitties will stick their nose up at an inferior catnip cat toy cause they only want the best and its our job to give it to them.