Garden smells of dog urine due to no drainage [closed]

Question

I have 2 dogs, who routinely use the bathroom in my front garden. One of my dogs pees in the same place about 90% of the time he goes out. Due to a lack of drainage, and what I imagine is 100% saturation of the soil beneath, the pee will pool on the surface and stay there, some times for days at a time (and even when it's gone/evaporated, the remnants of what's left still emits a strong odour). This results in a really nasty smell that can be smelled from the inside of the house, and if my dog happens to walk through that general area, his paws absolutely stink.

How can I improve or resolve this situation? The soil bedding the grass is quite clay-like, so I suspect this is contributing to, if not causing, the problem, but I've no idea what I can put down to either eliminate the smell or resolve the drainage issue without digging drainage holes all over the garden (or both).

Answer 1

One of my dogs (female) loves to pee on mulch. My other dog (male) loves to pee on objects (not surfaces). If she were peeing where I didn't want her to and I wished her to pee somewhere else I would make the other spot more attractive by adding mulch. If I wanted to be sure that the new pee spot did not smell like pee I would use aromatic mulch such as cedar bark. If I wanted him to pee somewhere else I'd position an object he liked to pee on in the target zone. Of course coupling the target zone hits with rewards in the usual dog training manner (off topic here).

Is there a something in particular that your dog loves to pee on? Maybe use some of that in your target zone. And during the transition period consider adding a small fence around the no-go zone. (Based on the photo in your profile it would not need to be a very big fence would it?)

Failing that... agree that the local problem is drainage. Assuming 1) that you want to keep grass in the current pee zone and 2) you can't train the dogs away from there... you can look into improving drainage in the area.

If you just have a small zone to aerate you can use a simple turf aerator like this one:

If you need to do more... there are many answers on this site already on how lawn drainage can be improved. Example: How can I improve drainage in a rainy area lawn with little manual labour?

Answer 2

The drainage is the problem. Until the soil dries out the smell will likely continue. However there might be at least a temporary solution - how about if you build a couple of raised sand boxes? If the box is fairly deep then no matter how much rain the sand will drain really fast and the dogs will probably prefer the sand because it is drier than the surrounding soil. I know nothing of dogs so dimensions of the box would be for someone more knowledgeable.

Answer 3

If it pools on the surface, as opposed to immediately absorbing into the soil, the soil doesn't have enough drainage. As you said, the soil is clay-like. You need to improve soil drainage and aeration by mixing organic material (decomposed mulch or garden soil, compost, etc) into your existing soil. You may have to remove a lot of the crappy clay in order to get the right ratio. Once that's done, top everything with a couple inches of mulch. Over time, the mulch will break down into the soil underneath and help drainage even more. Add more mulch every year. It's not an easy solution, but relatively cost effective.