Can I have a dog friendly garden ?

How to create a dog-friendly garden

It is possible to protect your garden and keep it in order while having dogs at the same time? Gardens can be very enjoyable and stimulating places for dogs. But on the flip side, if not managed properly it could contain several hazards, and if your plants or herb gardens aren’t sufficiently protected, you may find that they could get dug up, or peed on, oh dear. But fear not! As we will give some top tips on how to create a dog-friendly garden so you can keep furbabies happy and all live in harmony together.

Create dog-friendly sections

You can encourage your dog to stay away from certain areas of the garden by creating more dog-friendly parts, creating different routes around the garden in the form of clearly defined paths or providing designated areas using sand or bark for playing and digging will help keep your dog entertained. Make equipment for the to climb hide and weave through this also helps to stimulate their brain.

Putting plants such as Salix and ornamental grasses that sway in the wind can be stimulating for them. If you have a water feature in your garden, make sure it is robust and there are no parts of it that could fall and injure your dog, as it may be hard to keep them away from this, you need to make it as safe as possible, and has no plastic chew parts.

Plant dog-friendly plants 

Some plants can be toxic to dogs so it is important to avoid planting any that could be harmful. You will also want to keep them away from slugs and snails which could also make them ill if ingested. Planting more robust plants and shrubs such as viburnum, lavender, geranium or roses are a good idea, particularly if your dog is on the more boisterous side. Check out this list from the SPCA of some of New Zealand’s poisonous plants here including Karaka berries.

Protect your plants and lawn

Training your dog not to wee on the lawn is a good start but a big challenge. Have them toilet in the same spot can help you keep most of the lawn looking good. Picking up after the poo is important and using a form of dog composting system to remove the poo and have it decompose helps keeps things neat and tidy along with being sustainable, just remember to use the composed poo only on ornamental plants or trees due to the cross-contamination of bacteria. Urine can dry out the lawn or leave yellow patches. If your dog does a wee on the lawn at any point, you’ll want to hose down the area afterwards. You can also try adding apple cider vinegar to his water bowl start with 1 drop and steadily increase to a teaspoon over time, so they will get use to the taste.

To help prevent your smaller furbaby or less mobile ones from trampling over your borders you could create raised beds which will also help your plants grow and thrive, or you could put a low-growing box hedge around them, anything which will mark out a clearly defined boundary around them. However, our giant guys just use them as a raised bed and dig holes given the chance and they have pushed through the box hedges.

If you are growing any herbs or vegetables, then you could use strong wire garden netting to keep them protected, not only from your dog but from a range of common garden pests, including the birds who love strawberries.

Secure any hazards

Make sure your garden is secure by putting fences that are at least 2 meters high around the parameters, and check out this fencing that could help with keeping your cats at home as our four-legged friends can jump surprisingly high! You should also make sure that any gates to and from the garden are secure at all times.

If you have a garden shed containing any sharp tools or harmful chemicals this will need to be kept secure and closed at all times for both pets and children to be safe.

You should definitely avoid using any potentially harmful chemicals such as slug pellets or adding additives to water features or ponds in case your dog tries to swim in them or drink from them. You can use eco-friendly organic products like crushed shells to help you deal with garden pests while keeping Fido safe at the same time.

Happy furbaby-friendly gardening!