Anyone have experience of automatic cat feeders?

We use 2 because we have 2 cats and the person who feeds them tends to be a bit erratic and forgets to come at their usual mealtimes.

We have one circular one with 6 sections which we fill with dried food. We set it to open 3 times a day, at times when they might be hungry. The person coming in only needs to refill it and restart it (one button to press) every 2 days. It's a little tricky to set initially but the times don't need to be reset unless it's switched off. The interior rotates, so uneaten food goes back under the cover when it moves on.

We also have one with 2 sections that takes an ice pack to keep wet food fresh. It's fairly easy to set and we usually fill the sections and set it to open at times different from the round one. The person coming in would need to replace the icepack, especially in warm weather.

We've been away for a couple of weeks at a time and the cats have been fine. They've also survived with just the automatic feeders for a weekend.

They give us peace of mind that there is something for the cats to eat if the person doesn't turn up for some reason.

Yes we use it over a weekend period if we go away. Works perfectly. Dried biscuits are best, wet food gets very messy. I'm not sure which cat gets to the trough first, but ours fetch their own takeaways when they are hungry anyway.

It's called catmate btw.

Who has an automatic cat ?

Not me Lucca, but we do have one that teleports!

We had one for our previous cat. It seemed to work well but I would only use it for brief overnight stays. We gave it away when the cat died (18 years old) thinking we would never have another one. However......we now have Molly,
What we do find useful with Molly is an electric drinking fountain. She never seemed to drink out of her dish but would try and drink from any glass of water left on a low table, from the sink etc. Since we had the fountain she only drinks from that.

I tried one once and the cats absolutely refused to play!

Your cat will come to no harm only being fed once a day for two days.

Probably. he will leave some of the food until he hears a key in the door then gobble it down and be fast asleep before the cat-minder comes in.

If a cat is not absolutely certain when the next meal is going to materialise, he will be careful to spread his intake out.

We had one when we had a cat and it worked perfectly. We had trial runs in the run-up to our night away to observe the cat ? and also to ensure that it worked .

He “got” it straight away , no problem.

Surprised to hear these work. I know someone who left his cat for several days and the mechanism jammed the first mealtime. When he returned the poor cat had been unfed the entire time.

watermeadow that is what would worry me.

Might try something like this for my DH to stop hom eating between meals. ?

Hom = him. Oops!