When your second cat cracks the puzzle feeder too

So the puzzle feeder worked brilliantly — until cat number two figured it out and the whole system collapsed. That's a really common story, and honestly it's a sign you need a solution that doesn't rely on one cat being smarter than the other, but on them being physically different from each other. Microchip feeders are one of the most genuinely useful innovations for multi-cat households — they read each cat's unique microchip and only open for that specific animal, full stop. Before I point you in the right direction: how many cats do you have, are they all microchipped, and what's the core problem you're trying to solve — is one on a prescription diet, or is one just eating everything in sight?

Three days — she sounds formidably clever. But yes, any mechanical solution is going to fail eventually with a determined cat. A renal diet is exactly the situation where you absolutely cannot afford errors — the wrong food over time genuinely damages kidneys further, so this isn't just about fairness, it's medical. Can I ask: is your renal cat eating wet food, dry, or both? That matters because it affects which feeder design works best for you.

Perfect — that makes the recommendation straightforward. I'd go with the SureFlap SureFeed Microchip Pet Feeder. It has a lid that slides shut the moment any cat approaches whose chip isn't registered to that bowl. Your renal cat gets registered to hers; your food thief simply cannot open it — there's no puzzle to solve, no lever to paw at, no workaround. It works with a standard bowl shape so wet food sits fine, and the lid closure is quick enough that even a fast, opportunistic cat can't sneak a bite as the other walks away. It runs on AA batteries and the battery life is genuinely good — months, not weeks. One feeder for the renal cat is usually enough; you don't necessarily need to restrict your other cat's bowl since she's allowed to eat her own food freely.

It's genuinely simple — you press the button on the unit, let your renal cat approach, and it reads and stores her chip automatically. The whole process takes about thirty seconds. You can register up to thirty-two chips to a single feeder if you ever needed to, though in your case you're just registering one. The app connectivity is optional and through the SureFlap Hub if you want feeding data, but you don't need any of that for basic operation — it works perfectly straight out of the box. The only thing to bear in mind is that some cats are initially startled by the lid movement, so leaving it open for a day or two while she gets used to it before activating it is worth doing.

Yes — the bowl and the mat underneath both lift out and are dishwasher safe. The lid mechanism itself just needs a quick wipe; it doesn't come into direct contact with the food. For wet food I'd say a daily rinse of the bowl is all you need, same as any cat dish. It's one of the better-designed feeders in that respect — nothing fiddly to disassemble.