Automatic feeder for Sphynx with sensitive stomach

A Sphynx with a sensitive stomach is a real challenge for automated feeding — you need a feeder that dispenses genuinely small, consistent portions multiple times a day, because irregular amounts or gaps that are too long will set off digestive upset fast. The most important features here are portion accuracy, ease of cleaning, and mechanical reliability. Cheap feeders jam, throw out inconsistent amounts, and have food trays that are almost impossible to clean thoroughly — all of which become hygiene nightmares, especially with a cat whose gut is already reactive. Can you tell me a bit more: how many meals a day is your vet recommending, roughly what portion size per meal, and are you feeding wet food, dry, or a mix?

Six meals of 30–35g each is very manageable for the right feeder. The key concern with a cat who vomits from overeating is that the portion mechanism has to be precise and consistent — not just 'roughly right.' Some feeders use a rotating drum that can dispense 10–15% over or under the target weight depending on kibble shape, which isn't good enough for Noodle. Is the kibble she's on a standard size and shape, or anything unusually small, large, or oddly shaped? That affects which feeding mechanisms work reliably at these small portion sizes.

Good — that's a well-sized kibble that works reliably with auger-style dispensers. For Noodle's situation, I'd go with the Cat Mate C500 Automatic Pet Feeder. It uses five individual sealed meal compartments rather than a hopper-and-motor system, which means there's no jamming, no over-dispensing, and no kibble sitting exposed in a reservoir all day losing freshness. You programme each compartment to open at a set time, and what's in the compartment is exactly what she gets — no mechanical variation. The trays are removable and dishwasher safe, which matters a lot for a cat with a sensitive stomach where you want to keep the feeding surface genuinely clean. It handles up to five scheduled meals automatically; for a sixth you'd set the first as an early morning manual feed before you leave. It's widely available on Amazon UK, well-reviewed for reliability, and the simplicity of the mechanism is actually its biggest strength for your use case — fewer moving parts means far less to go wrong.

Five automated slots is genuinely enough for your working day — you'd load the five compartments for the meals while you're out (say 9am, 11am, 1pm, 3pm, 5pm), then feed Noodle by hand for the first morning meal before you leave and the evening meal when you're home. That's actually ideal because the two meals you're present for are the ones where you can watch her pace and make sure she's okay. On portion accuracy: because each compartment holds exactly what you put in it, accuracy is entirely down to how carefully you weigh the food when loading — the feeder itself introduces zero measurement error. Weigh 30–35g into each tray when you prep it, and that's precisely what she gets. No auger drift, no dispensing variation.

No Wi-Fi, no app — it's entirely standalone, which for a lot of people is a feature rather than a limitation. You set the meal times directly on the unit using simple buttons, and once it's set it just runs. The trade-off is you can't adjust schedules remotely, but for a fixed six-meal routine you've already worked out with your vet, that's unlikely to be something you need. Runs on batteries, so no trailing cables near a feeding area, and it'll keep the schedule through a power cut. Straightforward to programme, reliable, and easy to keep clean — for Noodle's needs, it ticks every box that actually matters.