PetSafe Busy Buddy Tug-A-Jug - Treat-Dispensing Dog Toy - Slow Down Eating - 2 Cup Capacity - Lower Separation Anxiety - Cleans Teeth - Easy to Wash - Multi-Sensory Stimulation - Purple, M/L

We have a highly energetic one-and-a-half year-old pitbull mix, Zulu, who began displaying symptoms of allergies and chewing on his paws. Despite going for walks each morning to tire him out, my husband and I would come home to see he'd damaged his paw pads from all the chewing. (Yes, this is a severe veterinary issue and he's now on immunotherapy shots, but we were in the process of trying various medicines and specialty diets before resorting to the shots.)Anyway, when we'd bandaged his paws, we needed something to keep him occupied during the day so he wouldn't be sad in his 'comfy cone.'I read various articles online and came across this toy. I was very excited about it, but when I bought it and gave it to Zulu, he didn't seem to care. I tried treats and food... But he wasn't interested. He'd look at it, try to paw it, and give up almost immediately. It wasn't until we switched to a different, smaller pellet food for his allergies that he began having success getting the food out and wouldn't stop playing with it! (The food, if you're interested, is Simply Nourish Limited Ingredient Diet.)When my parents visited, my mom saw how happy Zulu was playing with it and bought an extra small and small one for her two dogs (a teacup poodle and miniature dachshund). The small was too big for them, so she donated that one to Zulu. They play with the extra small one at times, but don't seem nearly as interested as our dog.Surprisingly, despite being a medium-sized dog, Zulu likes the small one more, but he will play with both.I strongly suggest this toy for a high-energy, food-motivated dog. It evidently provides fun mental stimulation and is really entertaining to watch!I would order a size based on the toys your dog likes to play with, not necessarily the size of your dog. Despite ordering a medium/large, I should have known that Zulu would prefer a small because he loves all small dog toys.Don't give up hope if your dog doesn't initially show interest. Try different foods and encourage play by batting at it yourself!

I have an aussie (now a little over 1 year old) who has solved every puzzle he's been given within 30 minutes from the time he was 9 weeks old. I bought this to slow down his eating and make feeding time a little bit more challenging. It definitely does that, and seems durable enough (the threads are a little annoying and we'll see how the plastic holds up, but for now it seems decent). That being said.. even for a smart dog who loves puzzles, the rope made getting the food out difficult enough that he would just give up and not eat. Even for me, trying to show him how to do it, it was challenging to get any food to come out. It may work with REALLY small kibble, but for us, it made more sense to just remove the rope completely. With the rope removed, it does its job beautifully.A few bullet points:* It's durable enough for a relatively gentle dog, but a large dog that likes to throw things everywhere/chew aggressively would probably break it quickly - My boy likes puzzles and is fairly gentle when solving them even though he's NOT gentle with his normal toys, and it's fine for him.* With pretty standard sized adult/large breed kibble, the rope makes getting food out WAY too challenging and frustrating for the dog. If you don't have tiny kibble, I would go into it expecting to have to cut/remove the rope (which is difficult).* It is LOUD when it hits things. It's plastic, not rubber, so if it bangs into walls or furniture it makes a lot of noise.

I bought this for my working GSD, who is food motivated and very easily bored, as a way to feed her meals. I have several other feeder toys (wobblers, ufo “flippers”, puzzle boards, snuffle mats, rolling balls, weighted/balanced rollers - you name it) that I switch up every few days, as she enjoys the variety and becomes bored if the same one is constantly given. She loves all of them and has never had trouble getting kibble out of even the most challenging toys.However, she played with this one for about 10 minutes before giving up and becoming completely disinterested. It was too difficult for her. The only way to get kibble out of this (particularly if your kibble is large) is to push the rope into the bottle and flip it upside down or sideways without letting the knot inside the bottle block the food from dispensing. Pulling on the rope at all will cause the knot in the bottle to block the opening. I’m sure you can imagine that this is a bit of a hassle, especially if you’re a dog with no hands. It seems impossible to me for a dog to pick this up in their mouth upside down and somehow prevent gravity from pulling the rope down and blocking the opening. I’ve included images of the opening when the knot is blocking it and when it’s pushed inside the bottle - there is barely space for kibble to come out. The third picture is after I took the rope out.It’s been about a year since that purchase, and I found this sitting abandoned in the closet last night. After another attempt at using this in the intended way (and failing), I was able to cut the rope off of it; and while this makes it by far her easiest toy feeder, that’s better than it being a piece of junk in the closet. She’s now able to nose it around on the floor and dispense the food like a rolling feeder.That said, it does have its merits. It’s incredibly durable, and held up to being slung into the wall, tile floor, and down the stairs (and STILL didn’t dispense food) with very little signs of wear. The bottom bit that screws off so you can insert the food is great, not too loose but very sturdy. It also holds a large amount of kibble and is great for dogs who eat a couple cups of food per meal. But I honestly don’t believe that any dog, unless extremely food motivated, could reliably get food out of this. I would also be careful purchasing this if your dog likes to “kill” their toys by vigorously shaking and thrashing them around. My dog loves doing this with plush toys... and apparently this bottle. In a last ditch effort for food, she enjoyed grabbing the rope and swinging it against the wall and furniture as hard as she could in the same manner. Honestly? I’m surprised that it didn’t leave a dent in the wall.All in all, I would only recommend this to the absolute extreme end of intelligent or food motivated dogs. Most average dogs will have trouble with it or lose motivation, in my opinion. And definitely skip this toy if you think your dog would use it as a tool of destruction.