How Dogs Garden

Digging is not the only thing dogs do in the garden, of course. It just happens to be the first one most people think of when you mention the subject. We have had puppies who love to do pruning, pull down washing for mulching, getting rid of garden pests.

Recently we had a garden pest, a kitten. I had to step in and do the work on getting rid of that one. Fortunately, the kitten and the dogs were on opposite sides of a fence, so there was no nasty blood.

I'm not a cat person, but it was a cute kitten, so I strolled up the street and found the little cuties' home. I warned to kitten's owner that it might mot work out so well the next time his kitten tried to get in our backyard. I'm glad to say I haven't seen the kitten since.

Our dogs also help with the birds. They yell (bark) at them to scare them off, and sometimes they get rid of the slow ones by catching and eating them. We have also had pest reptiles killed by the dogs. The brown snake bitten in half caused me some stress, but it worked out just fine.

I threw out the snake bits, and the dogs lived to woof another day.

We get a particular type of very large moth come out after a heavy rain following a dry period, and it is hilarious to see baby puppies try to dispose of these pests. The moths are almost bigger than the pups.

Hanging baskets

My husband and I are dog breeders, and every year or so we have a new litter of puppies. The puppies stay inside the house for their first four weeks, then, depending on the weather, they get to go outside to explore.

I love watching the puppies as they discover brand new things, bravely venturing out, or sticking close to me for safety, depending on their character. One thing that always delights the little babes is the bits of plants dangling from the hanging plants on our veranda.

One plant in particular dangles nearly down to the ground when we don't have any puppies, and when we do have puppies it dangles just out of puppies' reach (they prune it). When I water the hanging pots the pups are fascinated by the drips and drops landing on the concrete, or their heads, or each others' heads.

One of the main roles of baby puppies is to amuse sometimes sour and cynical people. The puppies at our kennel fulfill this role beautifully.