A few Moments From my Garden
The Plan
A few days ago, I showed you a picture of an area I have to clean up. Lots of branches to cut and to take care off.
A ditch is patiently waiting to be dug so I can harvest even more rainwater.
And I still haven't pruned all my fruit trees and I am running out of time!!
Today, I was planning on spending the morning on blogging and other work on the computer and then get a couple of hours of concentrated garden work in before I had to leave to open the gates and our Sustainability Center. Monday is garden day. Not too many people show up yet, but there is always work that needs to be done.
If you are one of the weekend freewriters, you will know what I mean by this next sentence.
The Interference
Here comes the interference: I hear cars honking in front of my house.
And that is not a good sign!!
Immediately, I get up and call my dog Boya. She is a Minpin and, true to her breed, is an escape artist.
Here, you see her digging to find something yummy to eat or at least to sniff. But she employs the same technique to the fences. Especially after a rain, when the soil is soft, she often can be quite successful.
Today she was. Her favorite thing to do is run out into the street.
And that she did - hence the honking.
By the time I had my shoes on and leash in hand to get her, my son was at the door with Boya in his arms.
Lucky for me, he had decided to come over and have some food with me and came upon the crime scene. (her crime) He was able to pick her up and bring her home.
You have to understand, I am not worried about her running away. She always comes back. But I am worried about her causing an accident since she has no respect for cars.
Instead of garden work, the rest of my time turned into "secure the property" work.
We found a loose fence board and replaced that. And we found a bunch of areas in the very back of the property where she had dug tunnels to the neighbor's yard.
That area seems to be the dog exchange area. His American bull dog leaps like a goat over any and all fence enhancements we placed there. and Boya tunnels under. We should just have a door there. But - they have lots of people visiting and not all are always closing the gate. And by now, you know what Boya does with an open gate. Yup. she runs through it fast as lightening!
We used a bunch of urbanite (broken concrete to those of you who don't speak Permaculture lingo) to build up a wall in front of the fence and used boards and hardware cloth stapled on the fence to plug up all the holes. At least we hope that we did that.
As we are walking along the fence line, I found a few nice surprises.
These bananas are the ice cream variety and are very delicious. I might cut them soon and cook some green and let the rest ripen in the house. Critters love bananas too!!
Next, I walked by this Negro Mulberry tree. Can't wait to get the first ones. They are so good!!
After I came back from the Bancroft Center for Sustainability, I harvested this beauty for my dinner.
Wish me luck that we actually found her escape route. Otherwise, I will be busy tomorrow - chasing her and finding the place(s) where she can escape.
Do you have a dog that forces you to have adventures?
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this is really nice pictures and wonderful banana tree . you are a good phothography.tnx for sharing with us.@mariannewest
Thank you so much!!
You sure do have your hands full with Boya. I was worried that you were going to say that she was hit by a car and I am so happy that I was wrong. At least you had some wonderful surprises after all of that commotion.
We had snow today. AARRGGHHHHHH!
Oh no!! Not snow! It is almost spring!
Tell me about it! Spring might be in 7 days but it feels like the dead of winter here. But I am enjoying your garden! : )
Toby is my dog, and it's not very adventurous (probably because he hates rain and we live in a humid climate), but he likes a lot to eat shoes and to scare us with epileptic attacks.
Oh no!! A shoe eater!! And epileptic attacks sound a bit scary!
Great photos. As for your escape artist, have you thought about an electronic fence? A neighbor of ours had very friendly, but enormous dog that was always charging the front door the moment is was opened. So, they put any electronic fence around their front yard (they dug into the driveway sectioning crack to lay it there too); they laid the buried line around the perimeter of their property. IDK how big your property is, but there’s was around a quarter of an acre. Part of the system was a collar that vibrated against the dog’s neck and emitted a signal only dogs can hear; I think the vibration and tone got stronger the closer the got to the fence-line. The dog couldn’t even be enticed to cross that line.
If you try this route, be cautious about the system you purchase. Some of those electronic fence use a shock collar – which is just outright cruel.
We have neighbors, on one side of our house, with two large digging dogs. They were digging under our fence, making us worry our little schnoodle would get through or they’d get through to him. My husband wedged a line of bricks under the fence line on that side of the yard. It seems to have stopped them digging.
Thank you for the tip. The electric fence might be too hard to do - we have 1/3 of an acre and the way it is set up, with a culvert going through and such, it would be hard.
We are working on the rock method. That what we worked on yesterday. 🤓
I hope that works for you, for the safety of your dog.
The bricks seem to have worked for us. When we bought our house a couple of years ago, there was a stack (maybe 1/4 of pallet) of bricks in our garage, which is why we used bricks. But, I would think any largish rocks would suffice. In fact, now you come to mention rocks, the yards in my former neighborhood in MO backed up to the neighborhood park/playground area; my immediate neighbors laid down a low dry rock wall along their back fence because their dog kept digging at the fence line, wanting to follow their children to the park.
In our yard here in NC, the level ground from the corner at the gate, back to the 2 elevated garden terraces at the rear of our yard, isn’t more than a couple dozen yards on that side. Fortunately, the neighbor’s yard doesn’t have the terraces, only a very steep slope which their dogs don’t seem to climb.
I hope so too. It is interesting what dog owners will have to build to keep them in 🐶
For the pups’ sakes, it’s worth it. 🙂
Feels good to read your post. I am glad your son to rescue Boya. Better be cautious around that dog. And that last photo is so refreshing. Which plant is that?
it is a lettuce! :)
I thought so too :)
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I have more of a cat that forces me on adventures. But she thinks she is a dog anyway, so that must count. Is a MinPin a miniature Doberman? Looks like it from the south end.
One thing you can do to alleviate the fence digging, is to attach a small-hole wire fence along the bottom, and then turn it to an L, which is buried about 3-6 inches underground. Does that make sense? I can make a diagram. But they dig, but can't get under. At least it works for Nutria and raccoons, etc...so why not for dogs? Though leaving the gate open, kind of negates your gained ground a bit ( :
Plus, she may be smart enough to keep digging BACK, until she hits below the horizontal wire. Probably much smarter than a buck-toothed Nutria.
What a cute escape artist!