Tennis balls: contestant number five

Up to number five already, wow.  It seems like I have as much fun finding 'em as Elka does chewing them up.  I read somewhere (and I really do too much reading, sometimes, if I can't remember my sources!) that for a dog, chewing something is satisfying an addiction, much the same way having a cigarette is for a smoker.  I remember reading that line, and looking up at Elka, who had a tennis ball between her molars, sticking out the side of her mouth, and was chewing on it with her eyes half closed (this was a sport tennis ball, before I knew better).  I watched her for a moment and thought "Yup, that sounds about right."

I do want to mention that I do realize the point of doggie tennis balls is the playing, not the chewing.  But, Elka likes chewing on them, and I'm sure many dogs do.  If the label suggests you're going to get "Hours of fun" from their "sturdy" toy, I want to know what the actual play to destruction ratio is more likely to be.  I haven't been scientific about this, obviously, but have a general idea of how long it takes.  So far, the Tractor Supply tennis ball lasted the longest.  All of them have been about a dollar each.  This next victim was in the $1 section at Rite Aid, for the three pack.

Out of the package, just holding them in my hands, I could tell that these were going to be brief.  There was a lot of give when you squeezed them, though they were the smelly kind.  Elka gest very excited when she sees tennis balls come out.  If we're outside, she knows it means she gets to gallop around like a lunatic, chasing the balls and bringing them back to be thrown.  If we're inside, she knows that, however briefly, she'll have free reign on the thing with her DoberJaws.  

I didn't get any action shots.  I just kept an eye on her and cycled the new one in when I thought the old one was close enough to having enough.  It took about fifteen minutes total, so I guess five minutes a ball, give or take.  

The yellow one is held together by its fuzz, but you can see that it isn't exactly round any longer.  The rubber in it is cracked entirely in half.  The orange one is self explanatory, and I may have thrown the blue one away before I thought to get the group shot.  I think Elka "Pacman-ed" it, so it would have been nice to have a picture of for her "Faces" series.  Interestingly, these tennis balls didn't even bounce very well.  I thought that was kind of odd, because bouncing or even "bounce predictability" (in the case of Kong and Zogoflex toys) is often a marketing point.