Glen & Kris Denning → Home Improvement → Retaining Wall < Previous Next >
When our house was built, the back door opened onto a 3' x 5' porch. We enclosed a 16' x 24' area around the porch with a cedar fence, then put a dog house in this yard for our two german shepherds. The grade in this yard generally falls towards the house - not the best for drainage. The result was a damp area that the dogs quickly turned into mud. We tried hay and then gravel for ground cover, but these eventually failed and left the dogs pretty dirty in the rainy season.
For our enjoyment and to keep the dogs a little cleaner, we've decided to build a 10' deck the width of our house. Beyond the deck we'll build a dog kennel cut into the hillside. The whole area will be enclosed by a new fence matching the sliding gate we built near the front of the house.
The pictures in this series start with the excavation to make way for our deck and a dog kennel.