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Cardboard Cat Craft Creations (a food puzzle and more!) –
A toilet paper roll food puzzle. A food puzzle for every budget! You can do so much with toilet paper rolls or paper towel rolls. Left: a one holed food puzzle. You can make it as easy as you’d like with as many holes as needed. Right: a catnip dispenser! Cats can forage for other […]
Cheese Crate Foraging Box
This DIY food puzzle is basically a homemade version of the Peek-A-Prize box, only more challenging because it has fewer openings. Start by placing cardboard inside to create a flat bottom. Expand holes as needed to accommodate your cat’s paws. Then place food and toys inside for an easy DIY foraging game! If you wish […]
Gettin’ Tipsy! Plastic beer bottle food puzzle.
Gettin’ Tipsy! Who knew? Apparently Bud Light is available in plastic bottles! What that means is that when you party, so do your cats! When someone brought these to a gathering they quickly became a must have item, just so that they could be made into a foraging toy! Now, when you entertain, you can […]
DIY Fun Board!
Once again, there’s no need to dig deep into your wallet to provide your cat with mental stimulation and food-puzzle-fun! Here’s a great video showing a simple but versatile fun board – plus cute footage of two cats using it!!!
Recycled box = difficult DIY puzzle
1. Poke hole in a cardboard box. This is a ridiculously easy puzzle to make and it happens to be disposable and recyclable so it’s great option for shelters. Square objects, as a rule, are quite difficult. It is not recommended to frustrate your cat so please only offer this style toy if you cat […]
Parker vs Tupperware
This video just goes to show how incredibly easy it is to DIY your own food puzzle. Quick, simple, and inexpensive!
@nashtrashkitty on Instagram gets DIY
Do you do Instagram? I guess we should more often! Just found someone cool to follow! Alyssa is a designer and cat-mom who does a cool website, featuring some of her DIY projects, including a homemade food puzzle that can be made a little more challenging with some cardboard! Check her website out at www.thisisalyssa.com or on […]
Ice, Ice Baby!
It really can be this easy to get your cat started! Some cats are very slow starters and need to be gradually eased into the concept of working for their food. Some families also cannot afford the fancy stationary foraging boards not knowing if their cat will take to using them. This is our compromise! […]
Pretty, functional, and DIY BABY!
This beautiful blue food puzzle is a rolling tube made with a 3-D printer. The dimensions of the puzzle and holes can be changed to suit your cat’s needs, diet, and challenge level! (Right now it’s set to “Science Diet size”). You can download the files HERE.
Fumbleboards and Fummel boxes OH MY!
This is a fantastic webpage inspired by Helena Dbalý’s wonderful book, Playtime for Cats. The page is in German, but I used Google Translate to get the gist of the ideas! First idea: DIY multi-puzzle foraging boards, incorporating toilet paper rolls, egg cartons, bowls, and cups to inspire foraging behavior in your cat. Once you get the […]
The Wine Box Food Puzzle
“Hmmm. What’s in here?” Any ole wine box will do to make this super easy and cheap foraging toy. Watch to see how these three silly’s utilize this object. They are pretty hilarious. It helps if you have long legs for this one! Similarly you can use any compartmentalized box such as a beer caddy […]
A Harry & David pear box!
What an easy and cheap (let’s be honest these are generally free as they are often given as gifts) food puzzle! Simply take the lid off and sprinkle kibble inside. To increase difficulty place other objects inside the compartments to serve as an obstacle. It really cannot get much easier than this folks!
A Nestle Quick container? Why yes!
Gus so nicely demonstrates the difficulty of oddly shaped items. When full this object can be quite heavy making it difficult to manipulate. For Gus it is no problem! Eating this way has helped Gus loose weight. Please share this video if you know an overweight kitty who could benefit from learning to forage for […]
Three quick n easy food puzzles from Your Cat
Looking for three simple food puzzles you can make for your cat? Here are complete instructions on three different types of puzzles: a stationary board, a rolling feeder, and a peekaboo box style feeder! Thanks to Your Cat Magazine for the great ideas!
Twine, cardboard tubes and a rock!
This is an earthy, natural style food puzzle. The rock provides some weight to keep it all in place. Some cardboard tubes were used along with a little garden twine to keep it all together. It’s a little rickety but a fun impromptu puzzle. *Know your cats! Leaving string/twine unattended could result in a cat […]
Something Outta Nothing!
This video shows Willow foraging from a protein shake container. You truly can make a food puzzle out of just about anything in your home and the goal here to show you how to do that! It is nice to offer a variety of commercially available and homemade puzzles. Remember this is not only a […]
More DIY – an egg carton can be a food puzzle!
It really is a simple as taking an egg carton and putting some dry food in the cups! It will slow down your cat’s eating, and if they are nimble with their paws, they can fish food out of the cups! Here’s another nice example from catstuff4aussies.weebly.com
Stimulating Cat Food Bowl
This is a nice homemade take on the Stimulo – by suspending cups from the lid of a cardboard box, this puzzle can be used for either fishing food out, or directly noshing from the cups! With some great videos too! Instructions available from the always handy-dandy Instructables website!
DIY Wooden Foraging Tower
We love seeing how people get creative with homemade puzzles, and sometimes people get fancy. Making this puzzle requires some wood-working skills, but can easily be customized to your own preferences and your cat’s needs! Brought to us thanks to Goug via Instructables – all the details you need are HERE!
Brown Paper Bag Foraging
1. Get a plain brown paper lunch bag. 2. Fill with food. 3. Gently twist close and offer to your cat. Foraging toys do not need to be fancy. They simply need to vary to continually peak your cat’s interest and be appropriate for their skill level. Remember that foraging is not just a feeding […]
A Toothbrush Case –
You really can make a food puzzle out of just about anything! These objects can increase or decrease in difficulty depending on how many holes you make and how full you fill the toy. When there are only a few pieces left it can be challenging whereas a full toy is much easier. This is […]
Glam Cat Stationary Puzzle –
This is a simple, yet creative way to make a homemade puzzle box/stationary feeder for your cat. Glam Cat shows you step by step how to turn an ordinary food storage container into a food puzzle – and one that you can adjust to your cat’s skill level by adding obstacles or changing hole sizes […]
Ikea Hack Chair Puzzle –
When is a chair not a chair? When it’s a food puzzle! Check out this blog post where Ingrid shares how she turned an Ikea chair into a food post and scratching pad! Complete instructions are included. For the crafty cat parent!
A tennis ball can be a food puzzle!
Tennis balls aren’t just for dogs any more! For a quick and easy food puzzle, you can use a Xacto knife to cut a hole in a tennis ball – voila! Brought to us by the Frederick Cat Vet in Maryland, which also has some other DIY ideas for creating food puzzles on their webpage. […]
Interactive puzzle feeder – City landscape
Have a 3-D printer? Then you can turn a regular food bowl into a foraging challenge!! Thingiverse, a website dedicated to sharing resources related to 3D printing, has a template for creating your own city landscape that you can place in a food dish for your kitty to eat around.
Turn plastic bottles into food puzzles
Plastic bottles are one of the easiest sources for food puzzles – just get in that recycling bin! The plastic is usually thin enough to cut easily, and you can make several with different sized holes to give your cat different levels of challenge. This website, La Loca De Los Gatos, has a nice source of instructions […]
The DIY Hunter Feeder –
This handmade puzzle is not only functional, it’s beautiful! The nice thing about a DIY stationary puzzle is that you can adjust the width of the space between the bars to adjust for your individual cat’s paw size and agility! The hardest part of this puzzle is the human element! It requires some tools, including […]