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June 24, 2004
Going to the dogs
Can your adorable pooch and a well manicured lawn co-exist, and that too happily? Durdana Soomro reports
My children are constantly at me to get a dog. So far I have been resisting it, my excuse being that dogs and gardens don’t go together. But is this just an excuse (that’s what the kids think) or is this true?
The problems people have with dogs are: They destroy plants especially anything that’s been newly planted, or particularly precious. They dig up holes in the garden searching for last month’s juicy bone or just to have a cool rest. They soil the lawn so that any casual stroll outside becomes a zigzagging, tiptoeing nightmare.
So how do people manage to keep dogs and have a beautiful garden at the same time? Is it possible to train Bonzo to go only in a certain area like a dog lavatory? Can you really prevent him from chewing up your favourite plant and trampling over the petunias? Or will your garden go to the dogs the moment that adorable puppy bounces into your life? To find the answers to all these questions I turned to three of my friends — Tahira, Saba and Carolina and their dogs Mishka, Zico and Bea.
Mishka is a miniature poodle, a prizewinner no less at one of the Kennel Club dog shows. She is obviously used to star billing and sits perfectly still while I click away with the camera. At the age of seven, she is already middle-aged and perhaps that is why she is so serene. But according to Tahira she was never destructive, not even when she was younger. I wonder if it is to do with the fact that she is female.
Dr Isma Gheewala, Karachi’s popular vet, disagrees. She tells me that males and females are equally destructive; it is just that females are more obedient.
Mishka is so tiny that soiling the lawn is not a problem. As Tahira puts it: “How much can she do?” Whatever she leaves on the grass is whisked away by the gardener or Tahira herself with a spade.
Carolina also cleans up after her dog Bea. “If I had a compost heap I would throw it there,” says Carolina. “But you have to put lime on it to kill the smell.” She could also have buried it somewhere in the garden but she feels that would attract cats to do their business in the same spot too.
There is also another delicate matter: wherever the dog pees, the grass turns yellow. Apparently the best way to stop this from happening is to put water on it immediately. But it is not easy to run around after your dog with a lota. Although I do have a friend who used to follow her dog with a roll of toilet paper. Even if you don’t go that far, a quick wipe of the paws is not a bad idea whenever the dog comes in from the garden.
Saba’s dog, Zico, is a one-and a-half-year old rambunctious golden Labrador. He is not allowed into the drawing room and is so well trained that he will lie down outside the door with his nose barely touching the threshold while you sit and have a cup of tea. But the garden is his domain; he is not going to take any orders here. So if there is any plant Saba wants to save she has to make sure it is well protected.
Zico has a penchant for climbers; every now and then one of them will start to wilt because he has chewed through the stems. To protect the climbers Saba has enclosed them in rolls of wire netting. A small patch has been cordoned off for zinnias but now he is after the ferns in the pot. However, you can’t be angry with him for too long. He has learnt this very cute trick of holding up his paw as if to shake your hand and according to Saba it’s his way of saying: “I am sorry, I won’t do it again.”
Carolina also has cordoned off a small area for special plants. So far it is working. But she isn’t happy about it. She feels very strongly that to have no-go areas takes away Bea’s liberty. The dog loves the garden. The moment you let her out she comes running towards the walls and the plants, standing up on the bougainvillea as if she is going to climb it. She runs round and round in frenzied circles, sniffing the ground and barking furiously. Apparently, she is chasing the birds that come in the morning to eat the insects in the grass. They’ve all flown away but she can still smell them and they are driving her crazy. This photo shoot is driving me crazy too. I think my pictures will just show a ball of hurtling fuzz.
All this friskiness and energy is because Bea is still very young and it is common to other hunting species too, like Labradors. Carolina thinks that maybe she will settle down by the time she is five. In the meantime they treat her like a baby, keeping her amused with toys; she has a tub full of rubber and toweling animals, some with squeaks. Carolina’s husband Jurgen is training Bea to pick up her toys and put them away after she has finished playing but so far the only one who is trained, it seems, is Jurgen!
When we go inside, Bea sits on her own cushion, on which Carolina’s mother-in-law has painted her name and all you can hear is a soft “choon-choon” as she plays with her toy. The toys are meant to distract her and absorb some of her energy so she will be less destructive both inside and outside the house.
This is apparently the right tactic. Dr Isma believes that dogs are destructive because of boredom and the remedy for this is supervised play. “Puppies are like children,” she says. “They have lots of energy. If you give them plenty of exercise outdoors they get rid of their surplus energy and won’t destroy the plants. But their play must be supervised. If you just let them loose in the garden they develop bad habits like digging holes. For them it is just a game.”
Carolina feels it is basically a question of choice. “I have to choose between the plants and the kind of garden I would like and the dog,” she says and she has chosen the dog. “The garden is really for her use.” She doesn’t use manure any more, only urea and artificial fertilizers as manure encourages ticks. She would like to grow parsley and herbs, but it is impossible as Bea doesn’t care what she is stepping on. She has grown herbs in pots but in the main she has to content herself with shrubs — ixoras, hibiscus, pisonia, banana, bougainvillea. “I would need a garden double the size of this one. To have gardens and dogs you have to have huge gardens.”
It is clear that getting a dog is a big decision and you have to accept one thing: compromises will be necessary. It’s like having a baby — it changes your whole life. You have to provide an environment in which the child can grow and play and be happy. It’s the same with a dog. You can’t be shouting at it all the time or scolding it, or worse keeping it tied up. You have to spend time playing with it and training it.
At the same time you will have to make changes to accommodate its needs and that will certainly include changes in the garden. After all dogs love gardens just as much as humans do; only for different reasons.
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