My cat does not catch running toys, she runs with them

Question

I think my cat has play issues. When it's play time she's got alot of toys to chase , i throw toys for her and she runs after them. The issue here is that she never catches her prey/toy. Once the toy stops on its own, my cat either stops running or continues at full speed even though she knows the toy had stopped. She even runs past the toys she'd seen just stop. How do i make her catch her so called prey and not just ignore it?

Answer 1

Did you just throw it? Have you ever try to rapid move it in front of it? This could probably help if your cat isn't "trained"!

I have a (fat) sterilised cat that don't love to play so much, but when I use a fake mouse attached to a string (or just a simple string works as well) it goes crazy and love to chase it over the couches. What I understand is that cats love to chase something that moves like a prey; something that stops shortly don't work for them. In fact, apparent death works very well.

Your cat, like all domestic animals still have the predatory instinct: all you have to do is make it remember!

You can start from a simple string, playing with it, but remember to not force the cat. When you see interest you could increase the duration of the game, slowly. When it loves to play for more than 5-10 minutes it probably understands its role in the game, so you could begin to throw a wool ball. The cats love it because when they touch it, the balls continue to roll and they continue to play with it (till it will lose interest, of course).

I'm sure that your cat could do lot of progress, but you have to be patient. This is the secret when you work with animals!

EDIT: Of course, if your cat loves to play with your hand, you could also try first with this one