Cats are creative beings. The more cats you interact with over time, the more unusual behaviors you witness. I’ve known and cared for probably 3 dozen cats over my lifetime and Lily is the first one I’ve known who carries her toys around in her mouth. When she thinks no one’s looking, she’ll go to her toy basket and choose one. She picks it up carefully in her mouth. Then she cries out as she approaches me, drops the toy at my feet, and looks up at me as if waiting for my reaction. I think it’s cute and I always praise her.
I notice that she only brings her stuffed toy animals to me and only when I’m alone working in the morning in my office. She’ll also scatter toys around my bedroom door overnight while I’m sleeping. I’ve also found her toys in her water dish or next to her kibbles bowl. So why does she do this?
Like I said, I’ve never had another cat with this behavior. The closest to it was when my 
Persian cat, Crystal, brought a dead mouse into my bedroom. I woke up to see her sitting proudly next to the bed with the mouse at her feet. And according to what I’ve learned about Lily’s behavior, she is actually emulating what Crystal did that time. It’s hunting behavior. She doesn’t have access to actual prey, so her stuffed toy turtle, kitty, moose, possum, lambie, teddys and so forth become her prey. Oh, as we speak, Lily just brought me her baby otter, dropped it at my feet, mewed, and sat down waiting for praise, which of course she got. She’s so cute when she does this.
But, as I said, cat behaviorists believe this isn’t a game she plays as much as it’s her latent hunting instincts kicking in. Her mother must have shown her this behavior when she was a wee kitten living in the attic of a barn.
According to experts, when Lily brings her toys to her food bowl, this is similar to bringing prey to the nest and when the toy ends up in the water bowl, she is most likely drowning it. So it isn’t necessarily Lily’s sense of love for me—she isn’t blessing me with her favorite objects, it’s probably her instinct to hunt and feed her family (me) that kicks in when she does this activity.
Ooops, she must know I’m writing about her this morning, she just brought me her baby owl. This time she sat down at my feet and continued to cry until I petted her. Well, no matter the reason why Lily does this, I think it is just darned cute, except for the fact that my office and the hallway leading into my office are constantly cluttered with her “prey.”
Love it