I do not know enough about animals to understand why some dogs dig holes in the backyard. Yesterday I visited the house where I am evicting the tenants and noticed their dog has dug several holes in the backyard,...one hole (crater) was 4 feet wide and 2 feet deep! These holes will have to be filled in before I can get this house inspected and re-rented.

In the past, with smaller holes, I have bought bags of sand and used that to fill the holes with. Now, I need at least a 1/4 ton of sand. Maybe more.

Would you consider this a DIY project or would you hire a landscape company? How would you move 1/4 ton of sand inside a fenced in backyard? Somebody with a strong back is going to have to use a shovel here,...would that be you or someone else?

I will take photos of these holes and increase my pet fee but that is another post.

Perhaps the soon to be ex-tenants wanted to relocate their hidden bodies before a new tenant's dog dug them up.(g)

Couldn't you just put the same sand / dirt back in the hole? I can't imagine that it wouldn't be just spread around in the general vicinity of the hole.

For the amount of dirt I would just get a yard in my dump truck & have one of my guys use a wheel barrel to fill the hole. Then either throw some grass seed on it or if I was in a hurry cover it with a few pieces of sod. I would think that anyone with a pickup or small trailer could do this.

Steve,

These holes were not dug yesterday. Enough time has passed to where the excavated dirt is now part of the impacted surrounding soil. A roto-tiller (which I own) would be needed to bust up the impacted dirt (my roto-tiller is heavy and labor intensive to relocate to another place).

From a labor standpoint, it would be cheaper to buy a pick-up truck load of sand at a landscaping outlet and then shovel that into the holes. I may have to take down the chain-link fence to get a pickup truck into the backyard or use multiple wheel barrow trips.

I've had this happen a couple of times. Luckily the yards have been easy to access through double gates.

I can go down to a local landscaping place and buy a scoop of "fill dirt" for $20 or half a scoop of sand for as little as $8.50 (I do half a scoop as a full one is too heavy for my little pickup truck) and do the filling myself. If sand it might take two runs so I tend to focus on the fill dirt (it's also not as heavy as the sand).

Is the dirt not next to the hole? Or did the dog carry it off in buckets?

It's just Dirt.

Shovel,

Wheel Barrel,

Rent a Bobcat,

Group of Neighbor Kids. ( Boy Scout Project )

I'm Older than you and would have had it done, already.

Eat your Wheaties, Roy !

agree that it was the dogs afternoon napping spot.

Why not just rent the place to another tenant with a dog?

Personally I would tell them if they want their deposit back, they will have to fill the holes themselves, return the property to the state it was when they moved in and let them do it. Its their dog and their responsiblity to live up to. Its a completely reasonable request.

They won't do it right, but assumedly it will be less work afterwards. How poorly can a hole be filled with dirt?

jeffpas

Half of their $600.00 deposit was used to evict them. The other half,..well,. I will learn today when I go inside how the other half will be spent. This one of the few houses that still has carpet in it. I am praying the 4 year old carpet is not trashed.

These tenants were 'reasonably good' Class C tenants for 1.5 years. They had a total financial meltdown which resulted in them becoming deadbeats.

Richard - my houses have to be inspected by the city at turnover and the inspector would not pass this crater since it is located at the foot of the outside porch stairs.

>>>Is the dirt not next to the hole? Or did the dog carry it off in buckets?>>>

Having a dog who digs holes myself, I'm always amazed by this.

Where the heck does the dirt go?

There is practically never a pile siting next to it to scoop back in.

Instead the ground is rock hard and there's the gaping crater.

Got me lol.

Another reason for the 2-minute in home inspection. You go see what the yard looks like at their current home. Granted, if they get a new pet while in your unit you won't know, but at least in most cases you'll know what trick existing pets try.

Roy,

Has LTD been practicing in your yard?

I say rent a Bobcat and have a blast playing with it for an afternoon! Best $150 I ever spent!

Round here the mowing has stopped and the snowplowing has nto started. Should be easy to get one of those guys.

The question of whether to fill or to regrade really depends on the slope around the foundation. If you can add material without negatively affecting proper slope, that's easiest. Next to house, you might want top 6" of material to be clay, ( well, clay-ish,) sloping away from house. Sand will provide nice drainage for surface water to the foundation, so, I wouldn't put sand in hole within six feet of house. (Drainage below grade- good. At surface, you want to promote run-off away from foundation, hence a cap of six inches or so of clay. ) The blocks or rubble buried though would help deter future diggers.

If the slope needs correction, I bet you and a skid steer could make short, fun work of this. A long, straight two by four can help you figure the slope. I always forget the recommended drop, but Google knows.

Brad20K said, 'Has LTD been practicing in your yard?'

If she had, she would have been using hand grenades. There is more than one hole here and each one looks like a small bomb crater.

Goggle

Toro Dingo TX420 Walk-Behind Tractor

Our local rental place has these and will fit thru a lot of gates at 31" wide.

Roy,

And doggie urine will disintegrate the aluminum fins on that AC unit. Give it a good bath and maybe a fence.