Stuffing is the thing that ruins a soft toy. The moment a seam goes, the room fills with white fibre and the toy is finished, and if a dog swallows enough of it your evening is finished too. This one has none in it at all. It is a flat, no-stuff tug ring in the shape of a paw, made to be pulled against rather than opened up and emptied out.

Tuffy's construction is what separates them from an ordinary soft toy. Several layers of material are bonded together, there are multiple rows of stitching where a normal plush has one, and webbing is sewn over the seams so the load falls on the webbing rather than on the thread holding the fabric. Being flat and 22.9cm square, it gives a person and a dog something they can both get a proper grip on. It also floats.

• No-stuff flat construction
• Multiple bonded layers with several rows of stitching
• Protective webbing over the seams
• Measures 22.9 x 22.9 x 2.5cm
• Weighs 160g
• Floats in water
• Machine washable, air dry

One thing worth knowing. Tuffy toys are tough rather than indestructible, and none of them should be left with an unsupervised determined chewer. Tug is a game with rules too: keep it low and level rather than lifting a dog off their front feet, and let go instead of yanking back against a closed set of jaws.

Who it's for: Dogs who love tug and destroy ordinary plush toys, and owners who want the game without the trail of fibre.