[MyCodyBoy]

With one dog we had a great yard, but ever since we got our second dog the yard looks like crap! The grass is torn up and dieing, the dogs are chewing up and bush or tree they can get at no matter how often I tell them no.
Our ground is rathe ron the moist side which is why the grass gets ripped up so easy but with torn up grass it creats mud! rain+mud= a huge mess.
If we didn't have kids I would gravel the entire yard I think.

How does everyone deal with stuff like this? Do you just live with it or do you try and fix the yard every spring? I am hoping for a dry season enxt year, we had a very wet one this year which doesn't help the problem.

 

[LibertyME]

I ended up sectioning off the yard into two sections....separated by a gate...if the yard is dry....or the ground frozen I open the gate and they can tear around the whole space...if it is muddy or wet I can choose which section they are in - in the spring this gives the grass (not really grass....more like a combo of grass and tough, green weeds LOL) a 'chance' to establish. There are usually a couple of weeks in spring where they are walked exclusively....just to give the grass a chance...

I have just added some boardwalks in the most used raceways....raising the height of the feces around my gardens...and hope to get my raised beds finished...

 

[LifeOfRiley]

Your yard sounds a lot like ours. The only good thing is that, right now, it's buried under about six inches of leaves, so we can't see how bad it looks. lol. I need to get them raked up, but that means mud, and I really don't want to deal with that just yet.

I do try to fix it in the spring and it will look great for a while. Then it's right back to the grass dying off and just coming out, so I don't know why I bother.
I'm going to spend this winter doing some research and planning and see if I can't come up with a solution for next spring. Right now, my best solution seems to be astroturf. :

 

[Bender]

We have a dog run, off the mudroom, so most of the time the dogs are trashing that area and not the rest of the yard. I love it because there's less chance of the gate being open and one of them getting out, plus the rest of the yard is poop free and nothing gets chewed up. We also have an apple tree and the dogs will inhale the apples that fall and get the runs, so it's nice that they can't do that.

Right now it's dirt but should be getting a load of straw in there fairly soon, so they'll stay cleaner over the winter (gravel is not in the budget at the moment, but will be doing sidewalk blocks or cement on part and then shredded bark on the other part).

Lana

 

[fostermom]

Our backyard is all dirt, but that should change in the spring. We just had (another) 12 trees taken out and our next door neighbor had all of their trees taken out. So now the yard can get some sun. Once the neighbors, who are uphill from us, plant their grass and it starts to grow, then we will plant grass in our yard. If we try now, the first rain will wash the seed away.

 

[Sienna's Mom]

We've used chicken wire and quickie fence posts here to section off my gardening areas. But we only have the one dog- just dealing with crazy zoomies. She loves to help me weed and prune :uhoh:

I just wanted to say your siggie picture is ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE!!!!! :

 

[Augustus McCrae's Mom]

My yard looks like crap! And that's not just because there's dog crap back there:

 

[janine]

My backyard is looking worse by the day. The rain and dog zoomies are killing it....we will work hard in the spring to bring it back to life...so in the fall and winter the rain/snow and dogs can kill it again. But the frontyard looks ok!

 

[GoldenJoyx'stwo]

This is what part of my yard looked like a month or two ago. I hope the link works.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v2...09_0912024.flv

 

[MyCodyBoy]

the frustrating thing is that we spent $200 on new sod this summer.
We moved to a new house and there was so much flower garden area which means mud! so we dug it all out and put sod down. It looked good untill we got the second dog and Cody basicaly destroyed it all. Livy has a nice bounce to her run and not so much dig like Cody does.
For some odd reason when it is wet he comes in FULL of mud and Livy is as clean as a whistle, how is that possible?
We call him mud dog all the time. it is like it finds him or something.
I think I will have to chain them up on wet spring days and just use the daily walk as their exercise time.
I have also gotten smart and only send out one at a time for pee breaks. Cody doesn't get nearly as muddy on those days.
My DH is beyond frustred to say the least.
But it isn't forever(thats my thinking) and it is just grass it will grow back one day.

 

[MyCodyBoy]

We've used chicken wire and quickie fence posts here to section off my gardening areas. But we only have the one dog- just dealing with crazy zoomies. She loves to help me weed and prune :uhoh:

I just wanted to say your siggie picture is ABSOLUTELY ADORABLE!!!!! :

thank you! that is my daughter's favorite tv watching spot

 

[fostermom]

This is what part of my yard looked like a month or two ago. I hope the link works.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v2...09_0912024.flv

Wow! That's a NICE backyard. I would be embarrassed to show mine now. LOL

 

[asiacat]

our backyard is a mess too and we only let one dog out at a time...maddison loves to dig in the mud and we are in the process of filling in our 4 foot deep pond and sodding the grass where we had a pool set up for the summer there is also a track around where the pool was from the dogs running around it chasing each other....we put sod down and as soon as maddison got out there she dug up a piece....actually i try to walk them as much as possible and not let them in the back when it is rainy and muddy....i limit the backyard time since they r so destructive and they are only out there for maybe 10 minutes tops lol...

 

[Dreammom]

ummm let's see... watch out for land mines (we have been sick so no one is cleaning up the poop) three dogs poop a lot LOL, Hurley holes, some big enough to bury a body, mud baths (home made of course)... my yard will never make into any landscaping magazines that's for sure.

 

[AmberSunrise]

My yard isn't bad actually. My 3 goldens are kept in an outdoor yard (30 x 50) during the day - this has no grass LOL

My sisters dogs are kept inside and I do not know if it is a co-incidence or not, but her kibble fed dogs do kill the grass with their pee (my dogs are raw fed and I never had the problem before) but since they are walked several times a day it is not a major issue.

 

[BonnieM]

Right now, the yard is in good shape, but when Coby was young, it looked as you describe your yard. It drove me crazy. In the last couple of years, he's settled down, and we now have a real lawn, no pee spots, and no holes. However, the cycle will probably be starting all over again when the puppy gets here! Good luck in the spring with your yard!

 

[AquaClaraCanines]

Mine don't play in my yard- they play at the park or the beach, and they only go out to pee, so our yard isn't bad. Any crappiness about it is just because we don't garden out back, just mow. Lots of shade trees.

 

[Miss Happy]

Our yard is nice - DH loves yard work.

 

[MyCodyBoy]

that is what our back yard DID look like until we got dog #2.
Our front yard is nice and that is all people see so I can live with that. I am hoping once they both calm down a bit it will get better.

Our yard is nice - DH loves yard work.

 

[Evil Eagle]

Mine is getting better. I had a roommate with a pit bull thats urine burned the grass sooooo bad. She refused to give her a supplement to aid with it. One of the many reasons I had to eventually kick her out. Now its fall so it won't recover this year, but I expect it to look decent next year.