An indoor cat is safe, warm and fed, and often profoundly under-stimulated. In the wild, a cat spends much of its waking day hunting: stalking, pouncing, foraging, climbing to a high lookout. Take all of that away and the instinct doesn't disappear. It comes out as boredom, over-grooming, food-gulping, 3 a.m. zoomies, scratched furniture, or a cat that sleeps 18 hours because there's nothing better to do.
The fix isn't more toys. It's the right kinds of work.
Feline behavior research keeps pointing at the same idea: cats are happiest when they get to perform the behaviors they're wired for. You can recreate almost all of them indoors with three things.
1. Make them forage for food
Free food in a bowl is the least interesting thing in a cat's day. Slow feeders, lick mats and snuffle mats turn a 10-second gulp into 10 to 20 minutes of licking and sniffing, the slow, nose-led work a cat is built for. It paces fast eaters and is naturally calming.
2. Let them hunt
The stalk-chase-pounce sequence is the core of a cat's day. Wand and motion toys that move like erratic prey, plus puzzle feeders that make them solve for a reward, give that drive a target, so your ankles and the sofa stop being the target.
3. Give them height and a view
Cats feel safest looking down on their territory. A window perch (their own 'cat TV') or a wall climber adds vertical space and a lookout, especially important in apartments and multi-cat homes.
Rotate a few of these, ten minutes at a time, and most 'problem' behaviors get quieter on their own. That's the whole idea behind Indoor Tiger: everything we make falls into forage, hunt, or watch.
Indoor Tiger sells enrichment products, not veterinary care. If your cat shows a sudden change in eating, grooming or behavior, talk to your vet.