So, you have a dog. Do you also have a garden?

[ChickensGoMeh]

Because my lawn looks like someone has held a 3 day festival on it. There are some patches of grass, but for the most part it's swamp land. Now, some of this churning is down to me dealing with the chickens, but a hell of a lot of it is down to an excitable puppy running laps around the coop/trampoline/greenhouse. So how do you all cope with the winter months, the mud, the notion that you'd quite like a garden, and the grumbling from the other half? All and any solutions welcome.

wait till spring, all that churning up will have done it the world of good. mine is a swamp buyt tbh I think that is more down to the chooks than the dogs, the dogs just help by bringing it all into the house.

Thing is, we're moving next month in to a new build. So I'll have an inch of top soil covering all the rubble, and new turf. If you had a blank canvas to work with, how would you arrange your garden to minimise swamp-ability and still have it look reasonably nice come next winter? I have pekins, so they don't like mud. In fact, they've taken to muttering from the edge of the run and flying to the patio to avoid it all. My patio is awash with chicken crap

I section it off in the winter with a no go area for the dog about half way down.

I always thought you couldnt have chooks in new builds. I fancy some pekins, but havent really got room for another run :( I have no idea about the mud but maybe I should stop being so grumpy with the chooks because I have always blamed them and not the dogs.

Ahhhh, see, I wish I'd thought of that. I'm considering some sort of fence system in the new garden, so that I can restrict the hound to hard paving during the winter. But I don't know if he'd hate that. He likes to toilet on grass and I have visions of him jumping the fence

Well, I'm in a new build now and have 8 pekins and 2 serama in a decent coop/run arrangement. No clause in my deeds, and I checked witht he neighbours before acquiring said pekins. The new house is a bit more of a grey area. There is no livestock clause in the deeds, but the wording is something like 'common domestic pets only'. Our solicitor is trying to get it clarified. Local council do not give a flying one, so we're just dealing with the builder's clause really.

Hmmm, replace turf with astroturf? :o

I don't have a garden at all. We just walk an awful lot.

#1 priority for the house hunt that will commence later this summer is a garden which I can completely concrete/pave/patio, is surrounded by a minimum 6ft fence and at least some of which can be turned over to a kennel and run system of lovely grey weldmesh. Grass, soil and plants have no place with huskies.

Gawd. I like gardening. I like growing things. I need greenery

Our garden is very muddy. We have plans to build a dog run that will be paved on the bottom, so that we have somewhere human-and-dog-proof to leave the dogs outside, as our garden isn't very secure. Hopefully that will save the lawn too. I have to have green space and wouldn't like to pave it all. Trouble is the dogs prefer to run about on grass...

The house we bought earlier this year has astroturf. Not a big fan previously, it is working very very well for three little kids and the puppy who are always going outside together to play. Unlike our previous garden, they are not then coming back in and trampling mud all over the kitchen. Hoorah for that. (ps in the Summer, IMO grass is still nicer).

I too have a muddy bog for a garden.... dog only goes out there for wee's and does not spend longer than a minute or two so no idea how he gets it like that!!

I have an end terraced house with a side garden and front garden so plan is for next year to pave the back garden which is quite small, leaving a border round the outside for bushes.

But that was the plan for when dog was a pup.... he is 8 now.

Chickens are fenced off in their mud bog in the bottom of the garden. We put wood chippings down every now and then when they look in danger of sinking.

Dog is banned from running laps of the garden as dh goes berserk. She tries it every now and then but is only allowed out under supervision and is soon shouted at if she tries it. She gets a run off the lead for over an hour walk every day.

We live in a 5 year old new build with the standard sized garden (that is to say, far too small! ). We did a variety of landscaping so we have built areas with flagstones and built in LED spotlights, various raised beds, a big pond, a gravelled area (this is popular for pooing and is easy to clean even in the winter), plus we have some areas with side beds and other planted areas - these have a mulched surface and we've gone for big shrubs and perennials. We have herbs and delicate stuff in the raised bed, lots of climbers, and have learned by bitter experience (weeps gently as she clutches her rare plant catalogue) that putting in anything small, delicate, fragile or dainty is Doomed. We have lots of things in pots - these do well and we use them for adding seasonal colour so at the moment they'd have winter pansies and ivy but would be summer annuals like geraniums after Easter. Also have large pots for things like Canary palms etc.

We use the flagged area for getting around, and eating in the garden (large table and two benches), and this gives good access to the various other areas. We invested in some largish trees (multi stemmed silver birch Jacquemontii and a rowan etc) to give height and structure when we started. Now that the climbers and other shrubs have matured it is fab. The dogs like it since there is a gravelled area for convenient pooing and weeing and they love disappearing into the undergrowth of the bamboo and digging holes in the mulch. Because most of the shrubs etc are large/tough there isn't very much harm they can do. Garden is also fab for wildlife -

Yes, and I'm just waiting for spring

And shrugging my shoulders a lot

I had a lovely garden. My husband lovingly dug it all over and re-turfed it last year. It looked great and was perfect for the children to play in.

Then I got the dog The garden is now full of bald patches, and the dog and cream sofas are constantly covered in mud

My husband is not impressed