As the warmer summer weather winds down in Calgary, it’s time to think about how to prepare your lawn for healthy growth next year. Your fall cleanup procedure will focus mainly on developing healthy roots and build a nutritious soil environment, but you also need to dedicate some time and effort to taking care of your pet waste before the snow buries it for a few months.
The Dangers of Pet Waste
There’s a whole variety of reasons why you need to stay on top of your dog’s toilet habits in your yard. From an aesthetic point of view, it just looks gross to have piles of poop around your lawn, and from an environmental standpoint, dog waste left out is like an open invitation to all your neighbourhood critters and rodent. However, the biggest threat of not taking care of your pet waste problem is to your lawn for these reasons:
- Nitrogen burn – if you let your dog go pee or poop out on the same area of lawn every day, you’ll quickly begin to see the effects of too much nitrogen. The grass will bleach quickly, making your grass look patchy, and it will not grow as well as the areas around it which can cause problems for you as you take care of the end of season mowing.
- Harmful bacteria – another issue when you leave pet waste out on your lawn for too long is that it starts to decompose quickly, leaching harmful bacteria into your soil. Unlike the waste products from herbivores which can be used for fertilizing and mulching, carnivore poop is full of bacteria that will kill of the roots of your grass plants.
- Clogged soil – finally, your overall goal in the fall is to open up your soil to allow as much snow melt to seep in and to encourage airflow and pollinators to circulate when spring comes round. Leaving your dog waste up starts to clog up the soil and create an unhelpful layer that water has to get through before it gets to the roots.
Do It Yourself Cleanup Tips
The easiest way to avoid any of these issues for your lawn is to take care of the dog waste yourself in a timely fashion. You might find that you’re able to get out and pick up your pet waste in real time, or you might have to work out how to operate on a regular schedule to keep things clean.
Real Time Cleanup
By far and away the most efficient way to stay on top of your pet waste problem is to go outside with your dog and watch them while they go to the bathroom. You can then easily step in with either a compostable dog poop bag or your favorite pooper scooper to take care of the waste wherever it happens. If you have multiple dogs, you’ll either need to take them outside separately, or bring another family member out with you to watch the other dog.
Working On A Schedule
If your dog is at home during the day with the freedom of the yard, or you prefer to just let them out to go do their business by themselves, then you’ll want to create a specific schedule for taking care of your dog’s waste on a daily or every other day basis. To help you with this, you can either assign it as a chore to a family member, or build a routine where you go do it straight after set times, such as a meal or coming home from work. You’ll want to make note of where your dog likes to go (they tend to be creatures of habit and will go back to where they’ve gone before) and invest in either a flashlight or a UV light to help you spot the poop as the days get shorter.
Taking Care of Waste
A final option is to set up a specific area of the yard where your dog goes to do their business, and ring it off with either a metal or a plastic fence to keep the critters out. This will keep all the pet waste in one location in your yard making it quick and easy to pick up. No matter what strategy you have for collecting the dog poop from your yard, you’ll need to make sure that you store it somewhere secure (preferably with a lid!) so that you don’t make your yard smell and you avoid unwanted rodents coming to make a bigger mess than what you started with.
Get Professional Help
Taking care of your pet waste is a full time job, and one that is easy to lose control of if you don’t take care of it for a few days. No matter whether your yard is full of dog poop or you just need someone to take over the job for you, Scoop Cut N Shovel has you covered. When you sign up for one of our subscription packages, you’ll get access to our team of pet waste experts who will work with you to set up a convenient schedule. We’ll bag all the poop up and talk with you about the best way to dispose of it, and our prices are based on the frequency of the pick up and how many dogs you.
Bundle To Save
Once you’ve got the idea that having professional help can put your mind at ease, it’s time to explore the different property maintenance subscription packages that Scoop Cut N Shovel have available. We can help out with the wider aspects of lawn care to help you have the most lush, vibrant lawn on the block, do a fall clean up and even take care of your snow and ice removal when winter rolls back around. You can pick and choose from a variety of subscriptions, or save even more with our year round property maintenance package, so call today to start saving time and money this fall.