Kennels are almost DONE!

[Black Gold]

Have a 20' X 40' shed on my land where we are fixin to build our house.  My parents built it about 20 years ago with hopes of making it a camp house but never completed it.  It turned into a storage shed for my dad's extra steel from his welding shop along with other odds and ends.  It has a tin roof and a tin wall on the north side.  I bought the land from my parents and with it came the shed.  After cleaning out all the junk (well, most of it) I decided to begin a set of dog kennels.  Went with 2 pens, each 10' wide by 20' long.  Took in the 20' X 20' west end.  Used 20' X 5' panels with the 4" squares and 3' wide gates.  Built the pen portion on Saturday and this morning had 7 yards of concrete delivered.  Poured both kennels full of concrete and had enough left over for a big porch area that I will rig up to clean hogs on.  Currently working on the other side of the shed for storing my trailer and for a freezer to hold my chicken/dog food.  Concrete should be dry enough to move the dogs in by Thursday or Friday.  Have the room for a couple more 10' X 20' kennels if needed in the future.
Will post pics in the morning.

[Black Gold]

[Black Gold]

We leveled the concrete with a board and then smoothe it out with a trowel.....Left it pretty rough.....Do you think this rough finish will help condition the dog's feet and make them tougher?

[bob]

nice job cody , dont know the answer about the dogs feet & the concrete , mine are on concrete - dirt & one keeps tearing off her pads on every hunt , cant wait for the titian to come out buy the way, thank you

[Mike]

Looks good Cody!

I see more dogs coming in the future.

[matt_aggie04]

They look good Cody, the rougher finish will definitely benefit the dogs feet but it makes it a lot harder to get the waste out.  The areas that you can see holding water will always be there and make it a little harder to keep the kennels clean and sanitary but that is just part of and nearly impossible to eliminate unless you can work it with a large screed or bull float.  Overall I think you will be very happy with never having to deal with digging and also for me it eliminated a huge dust issue behind my house that happened every afternoon when I fed. 
Matt

[Black Gold]

Matt,

I thought about that.....Building these kennels inside a pre-existing building and then pouring around/thru panels limited my ability to get really smooth with the concrete......The good part is with feeding RAW I have very little waste and it is dry and chalky so basically a broom and handled dust pan are my clean-up tools (other than waterhoze for urine) because I dont have to deal with wet messy poo's......That combined with a high pressure waterhose should keep them pretty clean (I hope)......

What do ya'll use to clean your concrete kennel floors with?  and how often?  Clorox...Iodine...?

[matt_aggie04]

I use a 50/50 bleach water mix in a pump sprayer, let soak and then hose off.  Now that I have went back to Sportsmix my dogs have less waste and is hard and easy to clean up the urine and the one turd that gets stepped on and mashed into the concrete are usually where I have an issue.  I try to pressure my kennels with dirt/concrete once every 6 months just to keep the a little cleaner but they still track dirt on the concrete.
Matt

[uglydog]

I have never heard of cleaning poop with Iodine, but I do use bleach every now and then. Mostly when we have pups to keep down on infectious/contagious stuff such as coccidiaosis/parvo. However I don't believe in over doing anything, dogs need to build resistance to germs and bacterias, too many chemicals/bleach will burn their nostrils and olfactory and brain cells, I think of the old commercial this is your brain and this is your brain on drugs, with the egg in the frying pan.

Mostly Water and Elbow Grease involved in cleaning. You may get you a big push Squeegee for pushing water off after washing, a stiff  push broom for those stubborn "dirty" areas

[aladatrot]

Simple Green makes a house siding cleaner for a pressure washer. It comes in a gallon jug. A very tiny pour from the bottle - like 1/3 cup - makes plenty of suds that are pushed all over the concrete by the pressure nozzle on the hose or the pressure washer (whichever we are using that day). This stuff is safe for the dogs, doesn't mess up your clothes or burn your eyes, cleans the concrete beautifully, and eliminates odor. The kennel doesn't need to dry after application.

Hey, we made a modification to our concrete kennel last night. Our outdoor concrete kennel is a behlan with a sloped metal roof. Even though there is a roof, we still provide a dogloo dog house. The dogloo is big and cumbersome, takes up a lot of floor space, and is a pain to clean around. Last night we made a platform approximately 6 feet long by 4 feet wide. It's a metal frame on 24" legs with plywood on top. This platform now has the dogloo on top of it and still has plenty of "porch room" so that the dog can lounge on the elevated platform in or out of the dogloo. This simple modification has freed up a lot of floor space for the dog to move around on. As well, it has made the cleaning process MUCH easier because we now don't have to bother moving the dogloo.

Cheers
M

[uglydog]

Cody, also make sure like Mandi mentione make sure you dogs have something to get off the concrete, to get some stress relief for their joints, your very large dogs will especialy need it.

[jhy]

They look like they will have plenty of room for sure!  I dont know this for sure, but some AB breeders I know swear that the dogs will get sick and die from chewing on treated wood.  My buddy built his very similar to yours and the dogs have chewed the heck out of the wood, and he has had some unexplained deaths and the vet said that the dogs were poisoned and it just dawned on me that they maybe the case. 

Joey

[Circle C]

Joey,

    Might have been due to the arsenic used to be in treated wood.

Arsenic is a notoriously deadly poison, but for twenty years it was the most common preservative applied to wood used to build playgrounds and outdoor decks in neighborhoods across the United States. As a result, these structures, where children and families play and eat, are the largest source of arsenic exposure for an overwhelming majority of Americans.

http://www.healthybuilding.net/arsenic/index.html

[Black Gold]

Every piece of treated wood is to the outside of the pens except that big center post, but it has been in the ground for over 20 years.....figured it is pretty well drained by now......I know a lot of folks with trated wood in their kennels.....never heard of death.....I'll make sure my dogs have something to chew more appealing than the wood......I'll keep a big bone ready for them.

The stopped using arsenic a few years back.....why the wood is now called "treated" instead of "wolmenized".....

[uglydog]

Cody I would still take some hardware cloth and cover that center post, those pups are still likely to chew and treated or not, the splinters will cause impaction and that will be a slow miserable death.

I lost a real good 2 year old AB bitch a few years back to chewing on an old shoe that the sole cause impacted and lead to her intestine dying and had to be put down, No reason to risk it with such young pups.

[Black Gold]

I would still take some hardware cloth and cover that center post

Good idea....Think I'll do that.....no use to take a risk

[aladatrot]

We have rubber mats in some places on that concrete kennel. They pretty much have to use the concrete, but they can get off of it to lie down if they want. In the winter time I put carpet squares inside the dogloo. I know, I spoil them rotten as much as I can.

Cheers
M

[Black Gold]

Is one of the 3/4" thick rubber mats you can get at TSC (just laid on the ground) sufficient enough to give the dogs the rest they need from the concrete?

[uglydog]

Yes it would be, but rather than risk them pups chewing on that either, come see me I got some large pet carriers that you can have, you can put a half in each kennel for each pup

[Black Gold]

I got Iglagloo XL dog houses....that should work too