The trouble with having more than one cat is that sometimes one will decide that all the food belongs to it, and the other goes hungry. The Gatefeeder cat-feeding system addresses this situation via RFID tags, to ensure that only the cat wearing a tag can gain access to its food bowl.
Gatefeeder isn't a timed or programmable feeding dish. Originally designed for a cat that needed a special diet, it works a bit like an RFID doggie door. The cat comes up to the feeder and when its head touches the gate, the door unlocks. The cat then pushes the door open and it’s dinnertime. When it finishes, the door swings down shut and locks.
Getting into the feeder is a bit of a squeeze, but that’s deliberate. The idea is to make it so only one cat at a time can get its head and shoulders in. It comes with five programmable smart tags, though only one tag can be programmed at a time. The others are spares, in case the cat loses one.
The Gatefeeder is battery powered, can store enough food to last the average cat up to five days and has a stainless steel bowl. It also includes room for an ice pack to keep canned food cool for up to ten hours. On the enclosure lid there’s a window, so you can keep an eye on the cat while it feeds.
On the downside, the Gatefeeder isn’t cheap at US$249.
The video below explains how it works.
Source: Gatefeeder via Apartment Therapy
Remember the whole reason you do this is because you have MULTIPLE cats so you probably need more than one of these at feeding time. At $250 a pop uh yeah, no. RFID tags and the reader are not that expensive.
I do think the market would like a version that is smarter, i.e. does more tricks.