Auto feeder for Shih Tzu with dental issues

An 8-year-old Shih Tzu with dental issues is actually a really specific challenge for automatic feeders — small kibble pieces are notorious for jamming cheap rotating-disc mechanisms or dispensing unevenly, and then you've got a hungry dog and a mess. The most important things in any feeder are portion accuracy, ease of cleaning, and mechanical reliability, but for a dog on small-piece kibble those three things matter even more than usual. Before I point you in the right direction: is this mainly for when you're at work, travelling, or more about keeping her portions consistent throughout the day? And is she the only pet in the house?

That makes sense — hand-feeding even with the best intentions tends to drift, and a strict schedule is genuinely easier to stick to with a feeder doing the work. A couple of quick things so I can be precise: what size kibble is she on, roughly — do you know the diameter in millimetres, or is it just described as 'small breed' on the bag? And is the cat ever likely to get into her feeder, or are they fed in completely separate rooms?

Perfect — at 5mm you're in safe territory for a well-engineered feeder, but it rules out anything with a large auger or wide drum that's designed for medium-breed kibble. Given Bella's age, her dental needs, the strict portion requirement, and the fact that reliability matters more than fancy features here, I'd go with the PETLIBRO Granary Automatic Pet Feeder (the single-pet version, available on Amazon UK). It uses a slow-turn auger mechanism that handles small kibble without crushing or jamming, portions are accurate down to around 5ml increments which is what you need for a small dog on a controlled diet, and the food hopper seals well to keep kibble fresh. The inside is smooth and straightforward to wash — no awkward crevices where old food sits and goes stale, which matters for hygiene and honestly matters even more when a dog's immune system is a bit older. You can set up to 15 meals a day with portion sizes down to about 5g, so her vet's schedule is easy to replicate exactly. It's not the cheapest on the market, but it's the kind of feeder that actually does what it says without breaking down after three months.

Yes, genuinely — it has a small LCD screen on the unit itself and you set meals, times, and portions directly on the feeder with a few buttons. No app required, no wifi setup, no account to create. A lot of people actually prefer that because there's nothing that can lose connection or stop working if your phone updates. You just work through a simple menu, set the time, then set each meal slot. Most people are up and running in about ten minutes. There's also a manual feed button on top so if Bella looks at you with those eyes mid-afternoon you can dispense an extra small portion without changing the whole schedule — though obviously go easy on that given the vet's instructions.

Fair question, and worth testing before you rely on it fully. When you first set it up, dispense a few portions manually and weigh them on a kitchen scale — do this three or four times and you'll quickly see whether there's any variance. With the PETLIBRO and a 5mm kibble the dispensed amount is usually within a gram or two of what you set, which is accurate enough for a small dog. If you're hitting wider variation than that, it typically means the hopper isn't seated correctly. Once you've confirmed it's dispensing consistently, you can match the gram weight to whatever the vet has prescribed and you're set. It takes about five minutes to verify and then you can trust it completely.