indestructible plush dog toy?

July 26, 2005 10:05 AM

They can put a man on the moon, but they can’t make an indestructible plush dog toy? My dog loves the stuffed animals, but is extremely rough on them. Even the best ones are unstuffed or decapitated within a couple of weeks. Any leads on durable furries?
posted by found missing to Pets & Animals (18 answers total)

Indestructible plushy toy? Ha!

Our dog tears through plushy toys in moments, but a compressed nylon bone lasts him months of happy gnawing. Cleans his teeth, too. Look for "nylabone"; good stuff.
posted by ook at 10:28 AM on July 26, 2005

It really boggles the mind how many pet toys in the market don't appear to have been tested on pets. My *chihuahua* can destroy a lot of plush and rubber toys, and she's 8 pounds. She does OK with Booda stuffed toys (she loves her kangaroo!), but I think they only come in small sizes. What size dog do you have, found missing?
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 10:35 AM on July 26, 2005 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: He's a shetland sheepdog, about 20 pounds.
posted by found missing at 10:43 AM on July 26, 2005

The good folks at Lab Tested haven't given any plush toys a terrific thumbs-up yet, though you might find other good ideas and recs for plushies that can be safely shredded by your dog.
posted by junkbox at 10:48 AM on July 26, 2005

We bought out golden retriever an I-Qube a few years ago, and it's still in one piece. It's about the only plush toy that's lasted - it may be because she's more interested in pulling the balls out of the box, although we've used the balls for fetch, and she's not shredded them (yet).
posted by hamfisted at 10:58 AM on July 26, 2005

My dog enjoys dissecting the plush toys to extract the squeaker. Sometime this can happen in minutes. Have you seen the Kong yet? Our dog loves it and you can't destroy it. I second the nylabone too.
posted by trbrts at 11:11 AM on July 26, 2005

My miniature schnauzer can rip through some stuffed animals in minutes, others can take a few weeks. But she will kill it before going for its sweet spots (the eyes and ears). The best toy rememdy I have found is stocking up at garage sales freebie boxes.
posted by rhapsodie at 11:18 AM on July 26, 2005

I'm always a bit jealous of other dog owners who have dogs that carry around their stuffed toys like pets of their own. Ours is also in the dissambly camp, ripping the seams and tearing out all the stuffing. I'd happily keep buying more cheap stuffed toys but I'd be worried about that stuffing being eaten.

We use Kongs, tennis balls, Nylabone ring, and Nylabone Galileo. I'm assuming the bits of ring that get chewed off (because he's through that thing in about 3 hours - ie, not finished it but has cut through) are okay, if it comes from Nylabone.

Rope toys are apparently dangerous.
posted by stevil at 11:29 AM on July 26, 2005

My mother buys stuffed animals for 75 cents each at Goodwill and gives those to her dog. You'd probably want to run them through the washer before giving them to the dog.
posted by hootch at 11:45 AM on July 26, 2005

My parents dog just *loves* to pull the stuffing out of plush toys, which makes a horrible mess. The best solution we found was to get plush toys that were UNSTUFFED, very similar to these. They're unstuffed, and they usually have a velcro opening in them somewhere. The opening is great for hiding squeakers or treats, or just watching your dog try really hard to get inside :) Either way, the dog loves them and they hold up really well.
posted by geeky at 11:53 AM on July 26, 2005

You might try the canvas 'dummies' that folks use to train retrievers. I don't have any personal experience with them, but they look to be very durable.
posted by box at 1:17 PM on July 26, 2005

My dog had a Booda hedgehog for several years. She tore it many many times and pulled much of the stuffing out. However, each time, it was put back together and sewn. The more it was sewn the less frequent the tearings got. I think sewing it left it all well reinforced in all the right places (since the sewing went where the tears emerged).

However it's worth noting that the tearing was the result of her grabbing a leg in her mouth and swinging her head back and forth wildly. Once it was torn she would pull the stuffing out, but it didn't seem to be objective to get at the stuffing. Maybe if it had been the toy wouldn't have lasted as long.

When not swining her head wildly, she did carry it around like her own little pet.
posted by duck at 1:49 PM on July 26, 2005

If your dog is an aggressive chewer like mine, you may want to stay away from the stuffed animals. Otherwise, you'll always be cleaning up messes. When we adopted our Berner, he came with his own teddy bear which we tossed. We don't want him chewing on our son's toys so we've just eliminated them from the bin of acceptable dog toys. He's learned and only occassionally slimes one of the stuffed animals in the house.

I heartily second kongs or other heavy duty hard chewing toys for dogs like both of mine. Though, I have to laugh at the virtually indestructable bit. We recently had to throw out a nyla bone which they had snapped in half. The kong products have lasted much longer for us.
posted by onhazier at 2:38 PM on July 26, 2005

Response by poster: Thanks for these great suggestions. I'm going to look into a number of them. I have to say, though, that my doggy is partial to the furry toys. For some reason he doesn't spend much time with the hard chewing toys. And, he is so cute when he follows me around the house carrying his stuffed squirrel, or whatever.

Don't you just LOVE DOGS???
posted by found missing at 2:46 PM on July 26, 2005

Go round. I play ball with my dog nightly, and a felt ball can last for weeks on end. This is partly due to the nature of the playing; I'm constantly taking the toy away and giving it back, and during play time he'd rather fetch than gnaw. But generally speaking, the balls have shown more durability than most plush toys. example

Also consider hanging onto the destroyed toy. My dog loves the "carcass"--once he's torn a plush toy to bits, he'll continue to play with it for days. It's like he's proud of the effort.
posted by werty at 2:51 PM on July 26, 2005

All you have to do is search MeFi (that post happened to be my second one after I joined). Here is there page regarding stuffed toys.
posted by Doohickie at 3:32 PM on July 26, 2005

Coddle your family pet dogs all you want, but if you have a hunting dog - pointer, setter, retriever - it should have a 'soft mouth" and never chew what it is fetching.
posted by Cranberry at 3:37 PM on July 26, 2005

My dog enjoys dissecting the plush toys to extract the squeaker.

Oh, yeah, it's all about the squeaker. The plush toy is really just fancy wrapping. Does yours spend minutes positioning the toy in his mouth just right so that he can walk around the house going SQUEAKSQUEAKSQUEAKSQUEAKSQUEAK for the subsequent half-hour?
posted by mendel at 7:54 AM on July 27, 2005