Automatic Feeding Bowls- Recommendations please

[Susanne (urbantigers)]

My catmate ones work fine, and I dont have a Mosi 

Thank your lucky stars!    (sorry mose!)

[tigerbaby]

I like the sound of yours Susanne. Will keep my eyes peeled for them in Lidl, as sometimes they get the same products back on sale again.

We have a Catmate 50, which serves 5 meals over a 72 hour period. We don't use it very often but it's good for if we go away on a fri-sun. The clockwork dial is annoying indeed, I once set it for 9am and it didn't upen until 11.30. However, Jameson is not fed on set times anyway so for him/us it hasn't actually been a problem.

I always leave a big bowl of bisquits out before I leave, a bowl of water and also a single bowl of wet food for that day (if I go away in the morning - with the feeder set to open up another portion for tea time)

Catmate 50 was £34 on Ebay.. I've seen them for £45 in the petshops but lately I think the price has dropped to £39.99

[Gill (sneakiefeline)]

My catmate ones work fine, and I dont have a Mosi 

They are always in the same place as where I left them and it doesnt really matter if they dont open at same time, tend to have two feeders opening one side at same time, I think................I know its all very complicated to set up to try and get the three pairs of feeders all opening at what seem to me to be the right times.

As I am not there when they open and suspect the cats arent either its all hit and miss cos we dont have set feeding times, just sorta when I get up and in the evening and they graze all day.

I leave loads of bowls of biscuits around the house too and some biscuits in a feeder.

They so hate me going away and dont even like me going out for a day at the beach..........sigh

[Susanne (urbantigers)]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/TRONIC-ELECTRONIC-DIGITAL-CAT-DOG-PET-FEEDER_W0QQitemZ300253287873QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item300253287873&_trkparms=72%3A984%7C39%3A1%7C66%3A2%7C65%3A12%7C240%3A1318&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

[Susanne (urbantigers)]

I have ones that are identical to this one, except for colour

http://www.chinavasion.com/product_info.php/pName/automatic-pet-feeder-with-lcd-clock/

I bought them for £9.99 at Lidl    They are Tronic make (or something like that!).  Ebay usually have some for sale.  More expensive than £9.99 but I'd pay up to about £35 for one if I couldn't get it for £9.99.  They are digital, serve up to 4 meals, have a good sized opening for the food and are quite heavy and solid.

I used to use the catmate ones but I had 2 major problems with them

1.  They are clockwork dial which means it's very difficult to set 2 or more to open at the same time.  You have to line up the line on the dial with the arrow on the lid - you can only really estimate it.  That means that one is going to open before the other so there's a risk that one cat will eat both servings of food 

2.  They are very light and Mosi used to push them all over the place.  He knocked the battery out on one occasion (so it didnt' open) which resulted in me sellotaping it in , but he still pushed the whole bowl all over the kitchen.

The ones I now have are much heavier and although he can move it, he tends not to move it all over the kitchen.  They don't have an ice pack, but I think you could probably improvise and get some ice beneath the food bowls if you wanted.  I just freeze the food before it goes in    or make sure it's very cold (I usually put it in the fridge overnight then into the freezer for a bit in the morning before putting into the feeders.  One time I put it into the freezer the night before by mistake so it was frozen solid when I put it into the feeders,.  It was all gone when I returned home so must have been ok).  You can even record your voice to play when they open 

[Gill (sneakiefeline)]

Oh dear Ruth, I get so worried it wont work , so will have to remember that.

[Tiggy's Mum]

I've got the Catmate 20 too, the only downside for me is that the dials are clockwork not digital so it's almost impossible to get both bowls to open up at exactly the same time - this could lead to Riley having 2 breakfasts and Lukey having none!

I've got a staywell pet pod aswell which has a digital timer, the only downside to this is that it doesn't have an ice pack so no good for the summer really.  The link below says optional ice pack but I can't see where it would go if there was one.

http://www.ukpetsupplies.com/Details.aspx?CatId=1049&ParentId=479&ProdId=1826

The Catmate one pops up silently as there's no motor, the pet pod one whirrs when it opens.  I thought Lu might be frightened of the pet pod one as he's a bit sensitive to strange noises but he's not in the slightest bit bothered by it.

[Team Svartalfheims]

Thank you both for your replies.

Hmmm Pinball is a big wuss and so may well be frightened of the lid popping up (I hadn't even thought about that tbh) although his tummy will prob get the better of him as he's a piglet with wet food (it's mainly him I'd be getting it for). Just googled the Catmate 20 and it seems Zooplus have got 20% off at the minute which brings it down to about £22.50 which seems a good price plus Purrs get commision   

Poor Lexy not eating for 24 hrs    I will def make sure to be careful with the button if I get one of these.

[Kittybabe (Ruth)]

So did he Gill, he was paranoid, but as he was putting it down his finger hit the little button.. he didn't realise it.

[Gill (sneakiefeline)]

I always check that the little wheel is going round underneath before I put food in 

It runs off one AA battery.

[Kittybabe (Ruth)]

I have the same ones as Gill, Catmate 20 I think. Double tray for 48 hours. Obviously I wouldn't leave wet food for 48 hours even with an ice pack as it does melt at a normal rate.

Perfect for dry food and one nights wet food.

I bought mine from PAH. I bought 2 one as a back up.

The only thing I would be wary of, is that you as human can inadvertently switch it off at the battery bit underneath without knowing.

There is a little button on the battery compartment that switches the timers on. My ex accidentally put one down for Lexy one night, and when he put it on the floor he was holding it and one of his fingers must have hit the little button by mistake as he was putting it down. It turned it off. Lexy didn't eat for 24 hours.

I haven't used it since though, but it is worth it.

Pav borrowed one of mine for Boy once, but Boy was afraid of the lid if I am not mistaken so it was a bit of a no go in her house. Forthe most part its well received.

[Gill (sneakiefeline)]

i have double catmate ones. the bowls inside remove and are sorta square and eack bowl has a lid of its own. they come with an ice pack that goes underneath if you want.

They time for about 2 days I think.........just going to look lol...yes 2 days and I think they are Catmate 90s 20 but it doesnt say.

I have three of them but really need another.

I did a search on the web for them and bought them from an onlibe store I think cos that was the cheapest place.

There are other catmate ones but dont think they look as good and are nor so big.

Here is a link to them

http://www.woofnwhiskers.co.uk/automatic-pet-feeder-twin-p-392.html

and this may be where I bought the last two from but cant remember but the price looks good.

[Team Svartalfheims]

We go away some weekends and so unless I can arrange someone to come in and look after the cats then they can't have any wet food whilst we're away (dry food and water just gets left out in big bowls) and so I am thinking of getting an automatic feeder to put wet food in for them. They'd be having 1 wet meal per day if that is relevent.

I've had a look online and there seem to be so many different types I don't know what to go for      I'd ideally like one that has got icepacks to keep it cool in the summer, holds decent amount of wet food and one that has a good size opening for the cat to get their head into.

They do definately run off batteries rather than mains power don't they? How do you clean them, are the bowls removable?

Any recommendations???