Spring is coming. We’re moving the old septic system for the house to upgrade for an additional bathroom and as part of re-plumbing the whole house. That means the area just off my kitchen door will open up for use as a kitchen garden. That is, once we move the dog.
My Loveable Idiots
We have four dogs. Two live inside, two live outside. The two outside are nothing short of idiots. I love our dogs and all their quirky splendor, but they’re idiots. No denying it. Pure idiots with fur. We definitely don’t love them for their intellectual prowess. They have doghouses and such, but when the weather gets nasty? These two morons won’t go in them. They’ll sit outside, in the pouring rain, whining and wimpering to come inside. It’s pathetic. Really.
In order to have my kitchen garden, I have to move Ollie, our backyard outside dog. Unfortunately, there’s nowhere out back that offers him any kind of cover from the weather. So, we started working on kennel plans…something to give him an enclosed area to roam, with a covered end to keep him warm and dry. Naturally, if we’re going to find him a solution, we should do something for Stripe, the front yard outside dog.
Enter the idea of dog kennels with a shared wall, so we don’t spend quite so much on kennel construction.
The Problem with Standard Kennel Designs
There’s just one problem with standard chainlink and other kennel designs. My outside dogs don’t like each other. An open shared wall is probably not such a good idea, especially when my inside dog, Zeeva goes into heat and all the dogs act like idiots. There’s also another problem. Ollie barks at everything that moves. The loveable, cuddly, uber-friendly, dummy sits under his little lean-to and barks at the rain, for cryin’ out loud. The leaves on the tree next to his tie out fall, he barks at them.
The solution? Cordwood walls. I designed a shared wall double dog kennel with partial cordwood walls. Each kennel measures 5ft wide and 10 feet long. Not big kennels, but big enough for a medium sized dog that only spends 80% of his time in it. (We’re big suckers and routinely bring the outside dogs inside for however long we can tolerate their poor indoor behavior.)
The back wall is 10 ft long, with a middle wall (also 10 ft long) splitting it into two 5ft sections. Basically, two cordwood walls forming a “T.” Add two 4ft cordwood sections to either end of the back wall, and you have a fancy “T” that gives the dogs a completely walled-in area we can cover with tin roofing. Think horse stalls, but for a dog. Using cordwood means the dogs can’t see each other, or what’s going on back in the woods behind them. They can, however, see toward the house, via the gate and a long section of fencing on the side of each kennel.
Here’s a diagram of our proposed dog kennel project:
The heavy lines indicate where we’ll build cordwood walls. The dashed lines indicate fencing. The dotted lines show where we’ll fit in 4ft gate panels.
What Are Cordwood Walls?
If you’ve never heard of cordwood construction, you’re probably sitting there, scratching your head thinking “what the heck is a cordwood wall?” The easiest explaination is this: have you ever seen a stack of firewood? Of course you have. Now imagine that same stack of firewood made permanent with concrete poured in between the layers. That’s a cordwood wall.
Homesteaders have built barns, sheds, retaining walls, even entire homes from cordwood construction. Our little cordwood dog kennel actually serves two purposes. First, it gives our outside dogs a warm, dry place to call home…saving them from the rain and their own stupidity, and saving me from worry over if they’ll try to attack each other, or bark at leaves falling until 4am. Second, it gives us a chance to experiment with an inexpensive, sustainable building method.
Experimenting for Future Builds
If all goes well with the dog kennel, I plan to build a shed behind the house using cordwood construction. Granted, we have plans to build a large barn, but I want a shed closer to the house. Someplace to store my everyday household tools, lawnmowers, and that sort of thing. I’d also like to have some space for a workbench for when I’m working on house projects. The idea of dragging things all the way back and forth, to and from the barn just doesn’t sound like fun.
We’ll see how the project goes. I’ll update in the next few days with pictures and commentary on any design changes we have to make. Keep your fingers crossed! I just spent $130 at the hardware store on tin roofing and concrete supplies. I figure another $50-75 for the supplies to build the gates, and maybe more concrete…but what I bought is enough to get us started. I think $200 for two custom-built dog kennels ain’t such a bad price. 
(Plus it gives us a use for all these leftover pine logs and tree tops from clearing the land.)
