SmartyKat HotPursuit

Worldwise  Inc., makers of SmartyKat toys have a longstanding reputation for making innovating products that meet our pets’ instinctual needs.

And, this is particularly true of their interactive cat toys designed to help cats that lead an indoors lifestyle hone their innate pounce and prey pursuit skills.

Their latest toy called HotPursuit meets all this instinctive feline needs purrfectly.

The battery-operated toy offers a mouse-tail peeping out from under a plastic cover. It shoots erratically around in different directions and can be operated at four different speeds.

So what is the feline consensus of opinion? Well, cats love it!

But as a pet parent, what I really like about this product is that it also tests a cat’s cognitive skills.

According to Prof Nicholas Dodman, head of the Small Animal Behavior Clinic at Tufts University, the way people can gauge feline cognitive skills is in terms of their behaviors.

“Cats are smart and are especially good in their own biological niche. They excel in vision and image permanence testing,” explains Dodman. “Because that’s what a cat does when it comes to hunting for the food in their natural habitat. Anyone who has watched a cat chase a mouse into a hole in a skirting board will know what I mean. They know its in there and have the cognitive capacity to hold that thought. Thus they will sit patiently, sometimes for hours, knowing that it will reappear, says Dodman.”

So in fact the toy is recreating the mouse in-the-hole scenario.

Ziggy will sit for hours waiting for the “mouse” to come out again from under the purple nylon cover. It keeps him very engaged.

I am trying to get him to turn the toy on by himself. He can turn on other similar toys. So we will see if I get that right.

The Product Tester for this review was Ziggy.

This product gets my MUST HAVE stamp of approval.

The Must Have Stamp of Approval is based on my personal opinion and the test experiences of the Reigning Cats and Dogs product testers as well as my personal knowledge of the product category. The Must Have Stamp of Approval is designed to advise pet parents on products that will in some way improve their pet’s health and well being, or, their own experiences as a pet parent.

Manufacturers are welcome to submit information and samples of new and innovative products for testing. The product testing team consists of dogs and cats of different temperaments and activity levels etc in an attempt to cover a lot of bases and produce worthwhile reviews. The team loves what they do and get to keep the products so they can show off to their friends and further spread the word.