Cat feeder for EXTREMELY food motivated cat

November 26, 2014 2:10 PM

Does anyone have recommendations for a cat feeder for a very, very food motivated and intelligent cat? It needs to be basically impossible for her to break into. Ideally this cat feeder would also be able to dispense canned food. It's fine if it only dispenses 1-2 meals. This needs to be available in Canada.

Not kidding about the food motivated... she broke the last one I got and she has also broken into cupboards to steal treats, cat food, human food (yogurt??!), and leftovers in the past.

I'm in Toronto so something I could get in person here would be great, but I can also order online if they ship to Canada.

If it's cheap, that's fantastic, but I'm at my wits' end with this cat so my budget can stretch a lot if the product is truly amazing.

Thanks!

posted by sea change to Pets & Animals (8 answers total)

I asked my partner, who currently lives in Toronto and spent several years working for a pet store.

She's got nothing. The one you linked is what she would have suggested, but clearly that hasn't worked for you--and I've been trying to think of something for dogs (which have more products I'm familiar with) that you could adapt which might be sturdier, but so far no luck.

I don't suppose that maybe the sort of toys that make the animal work to actually remove the food might be useful? There's stuff like the Kong Wobbler for cats that might slow her down a bit so she has slightly less energy to get into the cabinets? Or does this absolutely need to be a timed-dispense thing?
posted by sciatrix at 3:37 PM on November 26, 2014

This is also supposed to be both very very durable and also fairly difficult for the cat to get kibbles out of, which might be helpful?
posted by sciatrix at 3:56 PM on November 26, 2014

Thank you, sciatrix! Unfortunately the timed part is really important. The cat is incredibly loud and persistent about getting fed and I've assuaged it a bit by being as strict as possible with mealtimes, but the timed machine helped more. (Before she destroyed it.)

Frustrating that there's nothing available here! If anyone has suggestions in the US I'll take those too, for whenever I get a chance to visit next...
posted by sea change at 4:40 PM on November 26, 2014

My wife is a veterinarian. She rescued a cat off the streets and was using a very similar feeder, this one, which Snuggs learned to pry open and eat all the food. She took two very heavy medical textbooks and put them on the feeder's lid to weigh it down. Problem solved.
posted by zyxwvut at 5:59 PM on November 26, 2014

Yeah, we researched this a while back and it seemed like almost every feeder had reviews from a bunch of people saying the cat/s broke into it or it just plain didn't work or broke easily. Except this one. It's expensive, but it's a great cat feeder and is nearly impossible to break into, plus they show off in their online gallery a bunch of ways that people have modified the machine to further protect it if needed. It's available on Amazon too.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 11:34 PM on November 26, 2014

I went with this one. I've had it for years with no malfunctions or break0ins. It is really hard to get into, the bad side is, that the amount of food is not very exact. When it is very full, it gives out more food than when it is almost empty. Overall, it would be hard to know exactly how much your cat is eating.

I'm ok with the issues, because I have two cats. Also my extremely food motivated shelter cat has calmed down considerable about food. He gets wet food every night and the dry food comes on a schedule. He doesn't eat ALL the food anymore. He got fat but has lost some of the weight having moved to a place with stairs to run on.

ps is it's a bitch to program, but I found it worth it! no more meowing to get food!
posted by Gor-ella at 6:25 AM on November 27, 2014

Thanks all! Lots to look into.
posted by sea change at 6:18 PM on November 29, 2014

treehorn+bunny, I ended up going with the one you suggested. So far, so good!
posted by sea change at 7:36 PM on March 4, 2015