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How to maintain a nice yard, despite your dog's best attempt to destroy it.

I have had up to four at time dogs at a time and almost an acre of backyard. My wife and I like a nice yard, but not necessarily a manicured lawn. The biggest plus of a nice thick lush lawn is a lot less mud and dirt comes in on the 16 paws. Our dogs have open access to the yard through a dog door all year around. People stop over and are amazed that the backyard is a thick lush green carpet of grass. No dirt spots from the dogs digging and there are no discernible paths in the yard from 16 doggie paws walking their daily routes. Know thy dog Dogs are territorial by nature and creatures of habit. Each and everyday my four dogs walk the exact same route around the yard, stopping to pee on everything from a fence post to an old basketball . If an animal has gone through the yard during the night before, the dogs feel the need track the varmints steps through the yard, often several times. Combine this with the occasional st...

Puppy and Small Dog Crate Training Set up

Puppy and Small Dog Crate Training Set up Small dogs and puppies can be difficult to housetrain, especially when many of us work all day. In some instances tea-cup dogs may never be able to go more than 6-8 hours without needing a potty break. This set up allows you to teach your puppy or small breed to go on grass and enable you to go to work or be away for more than 8 hours is necessary. Fig 1 Fig 1 shows the set up, a crate, exercise pen (Foster and Smith) and a doggie litter box with a piece of sod in it. The set up should be initially set up where the puppies will spend most of their time with humans. Over the next 6 weeks this set up will be moved into the laundry room and the litter box will be treated much like a cat litter box. In this example it’s being used for 2 tea-cup Pomeranians. At 12 weeks of age one of the Poms was already using the litter box consistently enough to be left out several hours if needed. The puppies were also taught to go outside and since ...

Shelter Dog Playgroups - More than just pla

Shelter Dog Playgroups - More than just play Updated 1/2020 Wow, 20 years doing playgroups at shelters. When I started it was unheard of to put shelter dogs in play groups. There was too great of a chance for disease, fights or the mental barrier related to how can you put strange dogs together. Now we have great organizations like Dog Playing For Life and shelter playgroups are slowly becoming the norm. Even with that, people fear the fight when introducing dogs to each other. I originally wrote this article in 2013, updated again 2018 and now in 2020! If you were to watch me put together playgroups nowadays it may still look like I am choosing random dogs and hoping they get along. It couldn't be further from the truth. Shelter dogs need dog to dog interaction, but they need the right interactions to grow and acclimate into a home. It serves many purposes, from exercise, maintaining social skills and decreasing stress - IF DONE RIGHT....

The KC Dog Guy

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