View full sizeLet's not forget the sheer decorative quality of dogs in the garden -- as with basset hound Beamer and the planter that West Linn artist Ann Munson modeled after him. Think you have to choose between having a beautiful garden or an outdoor playground for your dog? Not so. Once you understand your dog's natural preferences, you can train it to be garden-friendly --and design your garden to be dog-friendly at the same time.
Designers Sarah Smith of
and Amy Whitworth of
along with the Eastside Study Group of the Association of Northwest Landscape Designers, offered these tips a few years back for dog-friendly gardening.
• Some dogs may never stop digging completely. In that case, consider training your dogs to dig only in specified areas: bury their favorite bone or toy there. Always redirect them to their assigned "digging spot" if they try to "help" you garden in other areas.
• Insert short, thick stakes in the ground, 6 inches apart, to keep dogs from trampling new plants or from digging in new mulch. (Make sure the stakes aren't sharp enough to injure the pet.) Installing hardware cloth or bird netting just under the soil or mulch also works.
• Does your dog like to patrol the perimeter, perch on a high spot to survey the area or nap under a shady shrub? Whenever possible, accommodate its natural tendencies -- by building circular paths, for example, or by strategically placing leafy shrubs in its nap zone.
• Large or extremely active dogs might need a dog run or agility/fitness area in addition to daily walks. A decorative fence can separate the special dog area without segmenting the garden too severely.
Sharing your turf
• You probably won't have a golf-course-quality lawn if you have a dog, but you can keep it presentable. Give your dog plenty of drinking water; it dilutes urine, which makes it less damaging to lawns. When possible, rinse fresh urine spots off your lawn promptly.
• Plant a low-growing orchard-grass mixture that includes wildflowers to help hide urine spots.
• Aerate your lawn every year to keep it from getting compacted by running dogs (and kids).
Take care with fertilizer
Organic fertilizers are supposed to be safe if animals accidentally ingest them. However, some pets -- probably drawn by the bone meal in the mix -- think the organic stuff is yummy. Keep pets out of your garden for several hours after spreading and watering in your fertilizer. Also, use the techniques already discussed to prevent digging. Don't leave rhododendron leaves (they're poisonous to dogs) or other debris on the ground with fertilizer sprinkled on it. Fido might nibble the leaves to get the fertilizer and could get sick.
-- Homes & Gardens staff
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