My dog has short nails so them being long aren't the issue but we have a very large tree in our backyard and have exposed roots in most of the yard that she keeps breaking her back paw nails on from running over them. 

I've been reading and it says that shaving them can kill the tree but it also says not to cover them in dirt so the only thing to do is just leave them and keep dealing with broken nails? 

My backyard is the only place she can run freely so it's not as simple as just taking her somewhere else. Trying to find some solution because my husband is set on just filing them down.

 [![Exposed tree roots][1]][1]


  [1]: https://i.sstatic.net/ROMZl.jpg