Dreaming of grass

Before I got Stella, I had big plans for the backyard. There has always been too much shade in the back from the neighbours' huge overhanging trees and that put restrictions on the type of vegetation which would grow but still, there was a beautiful, young Japanese maple back there, a couple of nice rose bushes, some variegated shrubbery, a wonderfully scented mock orange tree and a healthy, fully blossoming lilac bush. In addition, I wanted to establish a garden with different types of grasses and blossoms and moss covered stones. The remaining space, ideally, would be covered with soft lawn grown from seed.

I began to realize that I'd need to rethink my plans when one day, probably a month after I brought Stella home, she came up to the back patio door and proudly walked into the house with a big stick in her mouth. That big stick was the the Japanese maple. She had pulled it out of the snow covered ground, ripped off all the branches and was going to finish off the job of stick chewing inside the house on her comfortable bed.

If Stella were a toaster, I would've traded her in for a different model right then and there.

The next three years saw various attempts at trying to establish some semblance of green life in the backyard but the lawn became a failure all three years in a row. I tried seed. I tried sod. I tried seed and sod. I'd fence off the newly grassed area and once I thought everything had taken root or turned nicely green, I'd let Stella in and for the first few days all was well. Inevitably, though, big round patches of brown would appear and pretty soon the green was polka dotted with those flattened, dead areas. It was like I had my own fleet of dwarf UFOs creating not so impressive crop circles.

Within a couple of months, the brown overtook the green and all hope was lost. Between the neighbours' overshadowing trees and Stella's buckets of pee, not a blade of grass survived and eventually everything turned to mush and then back to primordial backyard mud.

Over the years, several of the bushes died long pathetic deaths and those were probably caused by a combination of too much or too little pruning, not enough water and, again, too much pee - especially after Barclay showed up on the scene.

Much of the original ground level, blossoming flora in the back also suffered trampling, tearing, knocking over and, of course, too much pee and not much of it pulled through either. The stuff that did survive back there has made it through such a harsh environment that it could probably take over the planet if left unchecked. I don't know what any of that stuff is called but most of it has sharp stingers and will eat small animals.

Eventually what I ended up doing was fencing off a few slivers of the backyard where it got at least a few hours of sun every day and relegated any gardens to those areas. The rest of the yard was covered in either flag stone or wood chips. The cedar chips covering the mud was the only workable solution I could come up with to still allow the dogs access to the backyard without them tracking in big paws worth of mud every time they journeyed outside and back.

Unfortunately, all this meant that there was no grass left.

When Rocky joined the family a few years later, the backyard was pretty much in the same state it's in now. There was no soft place for the dogs to lie down on that wasn't either dirt or wood chips. Stella would just take over our one reclining lawn chair but Rocky preferred dirt and if dirt wasn't available, he'd make it available by digging through the chips to get to it. He just loved to curl up in a freshly dug, nicely damp dirt patch and that meant a really grimy, earthy smelling dog.

This year, dreaming the impossible dream of cleanliness with two big dogs, I decided to try putting down some fake grass on what used to be Rocky's favorite dirt patch. This fake stuff is supposed to be pretty similar to the real stuff. The artificial blades are cut to about 3 - 4 cm, it allows for good drainage, it feels somewhat similar to real grass - though I think it's a bit "crispier" - but best of all, it won't die under a deluge of piss or a lack of sunlight.

The real test, of course, was whether or not the dogs would take to it. I was a little worried because it smells quite different from real sod but there was no need for concern. The dogs took to it fine.

Stella: Grass is mine.

As soon as I laid down the piece of fake grass, Stella came over and decided it was hers and stretched out on it. I had to keep shoving her off several times as I was cutting and placing it.

Rocky: Mmm, comfy. Now rub my feet.

Rocky, at least, had the manners to wait until I was done and then he came over and moshed into Stella and gave the new ground a good sniff. I guess it smelled artificial enough that he decided not to anoint it and then he too collapsed onto it.

They've been luvin it ever since.

Stella: "You know, this fake grass isn't too bad ...

... except for that stinky pile of furbag over there.

I'll just stay over here while you clean that up."