One of my dogs, Sally, is a Digger. (Note capital “D”. She is deadly serious.)
She’s a good-sized dog and can dig an enormous hole pretty quickly. Now my backyard looks somewhat like a nuclear test site, and I believe if she digs much further she will open a gateway to hell or at the very least cause some sort of serious seismic activity hereabouts.
To her credit, she’s after a mole, who has caused considerably less damage than Sally herself has. Further to her credit, she actually CAUGHT a mole last year, so her little digging-mammal brain reminds her that if she just digs fast enough, far enough, deep enough, she’ll be rewarded with yet another fuzzy wiggly chewtoy.
Rocks in the way? Dig 'em out! Tree roots? Chew right through them! Mud? Just eat it–you can always barf it up later, after all.
If I can gt her to stop, I can plant small trees in the existing holes and have a nice orchard.
Any suggestions?
Well, Tabasco sauce in any given hole will probably deter further digging there, though it may not deter holes in other places. She won’t like it, but you don’t want her to, right?
Does she get enough exercise? A few years ago someone here posted about their dog chewing up their house, I asked my aunt* about it and the first thing she mentioned was that when dogs start doing things like that it tends to be for lack of exercise and that just talking them out on a daily walk can curb that behavior. Now, I don’t know that this will translate to digging up the backyard, but I thought I’d put it out there.
*Her credentials being that she’s the president of Illinois Doberman Rescue, so it’s not just a random theory, she does actually know what she’s talking about.
She probably does need more exercise. She goes out a lot but generally on a long, long lead and cable. She could actually run around quite a bit if she wasn’t so obsessed with digging.
She’s a working dog mix, so I know she needs a job. Unfortunately, she has assigned herself the job of Chief Excavator. And she’s really purposeful–she definitely appears to be tracking something that only she can hear or sense as she’s digging. I’ve had random diggers before, who dig just for the fun of it, but she appears to be entirely focused on catching whatever dwells beneath.
Or she’s just craaaaaazy. I’m not positive.
You could just do what I’ve done - give up any notions of being yard-proud at all and just accept the new lunar landscape in your back yard 
I have a malamute, so that was pretty much my only choice
Put some of her own poop in the holes.
Won’t stop her from making new holes, though. But it kept my golden from digging to freedom as a pup.
She still digs as an old lady, to get cool, but I just let her do it because she is very hard to stop and I am easily amused. And don’t care about dirt in my house (anymore). And she’s not digging to freedom, just digging to cool dirt.
But try the poop, see if that does anything.
I used to have a St Bernard. AZ isn’t the best place for a snowdog, so she would dig a hole to get cool. I was amazed at her work, she could go into her hole and turn around to walk out. I used to carry her backfill away so she could complete her tunnel. I showed people her tunnel and they always admired it. Brandy was a very good dog and the only bad habit she had was digging her way to the neighbor’s BBQ.
She died of old age before she got there.
I still miss her.
Anyhow, I’d suggest that you use habanara juice. Dogs and cats run away when the smell it.
If Sally were just digging a nice cool place to lie down, I wouldn’t mind so much. In fact, the only reason I care at all is that it makes it difficult to mow the yard.
On the other hand, the holes she digs now are really BIG holes, which are easier to avoid than the old just-big-enough-to-break-an-ankle-in holes she used to dig.
Last year I had a kid who was into river systems as well, so I had a series of resevoirs and lakes in addition (and sometimes as a part of) Sally’s mole-catching landscaping work.
Sierra is right…if I want pretty, I go to the front yard. The back, so far, is the animal kingdom.
I’ll try the poop idea, maybe. I expect she’ll just move on to the next site on her list, but we’ll see. 
That what I did with my dogs. They still dig a hole from time to time, but they have pretty much stopped after a few months of the “poop treatment”.
It’s obvious. She’s trying to please you. Every time you come home and seem upset by the holes, your dog thinks “Damn, that’s the best hole ever, and she’s still not happy? I’ll have to try even harder tomorrow!”. The secret is to praise her and act thrilled with the latest hole so she can relax and quit digging.
I had a dog like that too. This is the only explanation I could come up with. He actually stopped digging when I quit snarling about it.
When she releases the Balrog let us know if it has wings or not.
But if you just leave her out there and let her choose her own exercise, she’s not going to choose to run laps while stuck on a lead*. If you don’t have the time for long walks, just make them more intensive. Ride a bike she has to jog to keep up or get one of those ball chuckers for hard core fetching.
*BTW, if she likes to chase animals, I hope you are using a harness instead of a collar. Otherwise she could break her neck.
In a book I read, it said never let the dog see you fill the hole. And put poo in, works really well. The other thing that worked was letting him choose one spot where he can dig to lay in the cool.
or you can do what we did, make a hang out for the pup. Dig a nice round hole about 2 feet deep, then make a top for it out of a couple sheets of plywood nailed together into an aframe and set it over the hole to create a shady patch. Our huskey added a couple inches of gravel a mouthful at a time:smack:
I’ve been told that the secret to wearing out an apparently tireless dog is not JUST exercise, but a combination of physical exercise and mental stimulation. People whose high-energy dogs run with them for miles a day have reported the dogs return from the workout still raring to go…but when it’s combined with 15 minutes of reward-based drill on specific behaviors (for example, the classic “sit-lie down-stay-come here!” routine) the dogs keel over and sleep like babies.
IMHO what makes it effective is the combination of physical and mental stimulation with the added element of having been rewarded by the pack structure for performing specific tasks. A dog with a secure sense of place in the pack and the confidence that comes with being rewarded for performance, will snooze in utter contentment.
When she breaks through to this side, I’ll be sure to send her back.
This. A dog isn’t going to get the proper exercise it needs on a long lead - period. Get a dog backpack, fill it with a few water bottles, and head off on a nice long walk. Every day. Maybe even twice a day. Your working dog needs (and by “needs” I mean “wants”) to work. If a few miles of walking isn’t enough, get some rollerblades or a bike, and go from there. At home, she needs mental stimulation. There are plenty of toys on the market that get a dog to really work for a treat. The traditional Kong ball is good, there are others that dispense an entire meal over the course of 15-20 minutes of working.
Watch out for balrogs.
You need to think outside the box. She’s really doing you a favor. Do you know how much it costs to have a hole excavated for an in-ground pool? That’s what will really make her happy. She’s probably hot and trying to send you a message. Give her a pool. Maybe throw in a built-in grill, so you grill some burgers while watching her play in the pool.
Heh, neither of my mals have ever dug holes.
The little brown part Australian cattle dog, though…she has her own hole in the far corner of the yard. Digs at it every time she goes out, then lies in it.