For the last few weeks I’ve been walking to the gym and I go past a house with four dogs. They are about the size of German Shepherds, but they look like mixed mutts.
Anyway about three weeks ago I noticed they started digging a hole. Everytime I go past the house, at least one of them is in there digging.
So far the hole is getting not only bigger around but deeper. It’s spring in Chicago so the earth is pretty soft.
My question is, assuming the owner doesn’t intervene, will the dogs keep digging forever. Or will they say “OK this hole is pretty deep so enough of this?”
Something like … if you consider A to be the angle of the sides of the hole, and side c the hypotenuse leading from the deepest part in the center of the hole to the edge, then if A cannot exceed 40 degrees before the dog (D) falls over, and if c = length of dog (70 centimeters), then the maximum depth of hole H given dog D would be 44.99 centimeters. A perfectly circular such hole would, at a minimum, be 107.24 centimeters across.
But sadly, the mathematical field of dog-based excavation is not much taught in university courses these days.
I’ve seen dogs dig a hole to about 3’ x 5’ by 3’ deep. Often these massive holes get dug by a hot dog that digs out a few inches of dirt to lie on cool ground.
If you want to stop dogs from digging, fill in the offending hole, and cover it with a pile of dog squeeze. They’ll lose interest in that spot immediately
I might be overreacting here, but I think this is some kind of prank. Clearly three of the dogs are trying to pull something on the other dog. They’ll take turns digging, making the hole wider and deeper, until they get to the point that the next dog to go in ends up digging so deep he/she can’t get out. And that dog will of course be the fourth dog, the dog who is the object of the prank. Dogs are well known for this.