How do YOU scoop the poop?

[Decemberwed]

We have a 5 yr old Golden Ret. and a fairly small, fenced yard. I have two small children who play back there. I HATE the fact that our yard smells like poop all the time. Regardless of whether or not we pick up the poop every day or every 3 days it is not an enjoyable place to be. It grosses me out thinking that my kids have to look out for poop when they play. And, when we do no one wants to stay out there because it has a residual smell. God knows you can get all the poop if it isn't "scoopable". DH and I have had the most arguements about how to handle it in a better way. I just don't know if there is an answer.

Any suggestions?

:confused:

[Hello Kitty]

Well, the poop isn't going to disappear on it's own :p Although you may want to check out what kind of food you feed your dog - a better quality food usually leads to less pickup.

I pick it up before DH mows the lawn, and I dispose of it in a homemade Doggie Dooley (http://www.doggiedooley.com/). We'll be having people over and while they're here, I imagine I'll pick it up every other day or so.

But I'd think that really picking up your lawn, and either it raining or you watering would help you to start fresh, and then you can just maintain from there.

[mkvh]

We are considering training the dogs to have "their place" to go as for some reason they have taken to going about 2 ft off the front walk :rolleyes:. We just try to scoop weekly before we mow, at minimum. If we can get them to go in one spot, that will make it easier to pick up AND keep the rest of the yard clean. Ah, one can dream.

I know what you mean about the smell, but it definitely differs with the food you feed them. They're MUCH stinkier on Iams than Nutro.

[Decemberwed]

I wish he would only go in one place. For that to happen it would have to be right off our patio and it would still stink. I say that it would have to be there because otherwise DH wouldn't help faciliatate that.
Interesting about Nutro. Max has always been on Iams. Maybe a try on nutro will help some.

As you can see - I don't take any responsibility for him. I am the one cleaning the litter box. We are a house divided. His dog, my cat.

[penybryn]

I scoop every day now that its summer and we have 2 dogs that I swear crap at least 3 times a day each. I just get 2 grocery store bags, put one over my hand to use as a picker upper and drop it into the other. Tie both up and throw them in the trash can (outside of course). We can't get a Doggie Doolie here because they don't work in cold weather and we have lots of that.

In winter, it only happens about once a week because we don't go out there very often. I try to fly out there to clean it up before it snows because if it does, I've lost the battle. The first spring thaw is the worst! Poop soup!

For those stools that aren't solid (and there are many), after a quick pick up, I spray the area good with the hose.

What else can you do?

[maggieb]

We walk our dog 2x a day and pick up the poop right after he poops. We live in the city and the thought of our dog pooping in our small backyard grosses me out, especially since it's the only outdoor space our kids have to play. Our dog isn't allowed to poop in our yard or anyone else's.

Is there a way you can walk your dog so he can poop then? Or is your dog an outside dog only?

[sublime311]

I just get 2 grocery store bags, put one over my hand to use as a picker upper and drop it into the other. Tie both up and throw them in the trash can (outside of course).
This is exactly what we do. We lucked out, though, our dogs poop in the same exact corner of the yard. The problem is that we have rocks there, so it's hard to pick up everything.

Every now and then we'll pour a whole gallon of vinegar over the area to help neutralize the smell.

[skyblu]

For the most part, Blue goes in his "place" (behind the shed), so I pick it up all at once on trash day and put the bag outside.

On occasion, especially if FH is letting him out and not paying attention, he'll sneak to the side yard and poop there. I have to be careful because I won't always know it's there!

I use a pooper scooper and a small trash can lined with a grocery bag. The trash can lives outside, of course. For the runnier stuff, I hose it down, but it still grosses me out.

They have services around here that will come and clean your yard completely for $40. I'm thinking about it, especially in the summer when we spend time outside.

[Katy]

When I lived with my roommate we used a pooper scooper service. We'd have them come once a month I think - but we never used the backyard EVER, so it was just the dogs. I thought dogs basically liked to go in only one or two spots? I know our guy is like that both here at home and at my FIL's house. Heck, even when we walk, he'll hold it to get to the place he WANTS to go. We can walk 3 miles and we know which patch of green he's going to go on and when. We use sandwich bags to pick up when we walk him, grocery sacks for the yard at home.

I also second the better food = better poop. The best part is it all stays firm and much easier to pick up.

[mkvh]

For those of you whose dogs poop in "their place", how did you train them? Thanks!

[skyblu]

mkvh, when we moved here we always took him out on a leash to his place. We'd say "place" in a command-voice, and praise him as he was peeing/pooping there. It took a while but he got it, although he sometimes still rebels and goes in the side yard. I think that only happens if his place is too full of poop :o , because our dog is quite prissy.

[jh124]

We have a tiny backyard. Maybe 15 x 20 at most. We have put up a mini-fence that people put around their flower beds (about 2' tall) and roped off half the yard. Our dogs respect it, I'm sure others wouldn't . But our dogs aren't out there for very long. About 15 minutes tops. We pooper scoop up after them.

We have a second story deck that we have really turned into our outdoor area for our son. I'm sure when he's older and can respect the mini-fence, we will let him play in the yard, but for now it's off limits. Also, that will give the yard a year or two to lose the poop remnants.:rolleyes:

[lady1297]

We trained our lab to go in one spot by putting her on lease and walkiing her to that spot and waiting until she pooped. It's wonderful. Unfortunatley, though, we did that 3 years ago, before we put a swing set right in that area...now we can't get her to go anywhere but 3 feet from the swings... sigh.

[mkvh]

THANK YOU for the advice. As I am tired of scooping, and my DD is not easily contained, I think we need to get ON this. Our older dog already will poop pretty much "on command", so I THINK the transition won't be too difficult. We're just spoiled by letting them out unattended to do their thing.