My cousin bought one for her dog and stuffed it full of doggy treats. He gave it a couple of disinterested pushes and never played with it again. $30 down the drain.
Look around and you’ll probably find some off-brand versions of the kong toys for much less. I use those and my pooch loves it.
I have a Weim. He can destroy ANY toy on the market today in under 10 minutes. Except for the Kong. Fill it with goodies or peanut butter and you have a happy doggie staying out of trouble for quite awhile. Sure, they are expensive, but worth it in the long run after you consider the cost of buying 100 $1 toys that only last a fraction of the time the $10-20 Kong will last. And the only reason I have ever seen anyone replace a Kong is due to loss, or it sitting out in the sun for a long time and degrading.
Another vote for Kong here. Auggie, The Cutest Dog on the Planet ™, is a Jack Russell / Aussie mix- very energetic! He loves his. I put liverwust in it, and it’s like a doggie pacifier. We actually have two of the, the kind of tube-shaped one and a Goodie Ship. He likes the Goodie Ship better for some reason- I think he lkes the little asterisk shaped holes. He really has to work to get the liverwurst out!
He also loves the knuckle bones that you can get at the grocery or pet supply store- they last for several days, even with an aggressive chewer. And you can add liverwurst to these, too.
We have several Kongs and they are the only toy that lasts over a week in our house. We have a shepherd mix, and she loves to chew. She’s not interested in the Kongs unless they have food in them, though, and if the food does not come out easily enough for her she gets very frustrated and starts barking at it and throwing it against the floor. If she cannot get the food out at all after a while she will bring it to us to get it out for her, or leave it in disgust.
She’s not exactly a patient dog. Kongs are still worth the money, IMO it’s worth getting one for your dog.
My dog was an aggressive chewer and these were the only toys that would last. She loved squeaky toys but would shred them in a matter of minutes. So what I did was put a small squeaky ball in the Kong and she loved that. She could chew on that as much as she liked and the squeaky ball would not get ruined.
Also fun if you have a toy driven dog is the Buster Cube. (see http://www.bustercube.com/ )
It’s harder to work on a hard wood floor type surface, though and not for crate use. Still very amusing.
Two English Mastiffs here. 330 lbs of dog at my house.
They like Kongs okay, and can’t destroy them.
But for chewing enjoyment, they prefer Galileo bones.
I think Galileos are made by the same company that makes Nylabones.
You DO realize the Chubs nickname is a joke, right? Though he is a bit pudgy.
Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll run it by the parental units and see what they think. He’ll eat ANYTHING, and I know he eats green beans because I’ve seen him do it!
His favorite thing to do with a Kong is to retrieve it, so I doubt this would be more than an occasional treat. The hard part would be getting our hands on the medium one, which is really more his size, without him noticing. Because if he sees a human with a Kong, he’s already on the back porch waiting to retrieve.
Funnily, our much-loved neurotic golden retriever does not retrieve. I guess Isaac makes up for it with his retrieve overdrive mode!
Our bassett loves her kong, a bit of peanut butter and she licks forever. A few treats and she tosses it around forever until she gets them to pop out. It’s quite fun to watch and it lasts forever. Unlike other toys it does’t get chewed away.
Mastiff owner here, too. Gracie will shred just about anything, and she’s really not a chewer, she just doesn’t know her own strength. She’s bitten both a Nylabone and a pig leg bone in half. Her Kongs are her very favorite toys. She has the treat one, with little Xs you can wedge cookies into, and the one that sort of looks like a Dairy Queen cone without the cone - that one had a rope that went through it to play pull, but she keeps shredding the rope. (We replace it routinely with heavy nylon cord.)