Scanner keyboard = new Scanner(System.in); String v1 = keyboard.nextLine(); String dog = "dog"; String cat = "cat"; String llama = "llama"; String result = v1.replaceAll("(?i)dog ", ""); String result2 = result.replaceAll("dog ", ""); String result3 = result2.replaceAll("(?i)cat ", ""); String result4 = result3.replaceAll("cat", ""); String result5 = result4.replaceAll("(?i)llama ", ""); String result6 = result5.replaceAll("llama ", ""); System.out.println(result6);