You dream of the perfect, pristine backyard space filled with homegrown food and flowers, a lush lawn, and comfy seating areas to relax with friends and family. But your furry family members have dreams of their own: running, digging, chewing, and living their best pet lives. You adore your pets, but you don’t love the destruction they wreak on your garden.
What’s a pet parent to do? And is it possible to create a beautiful, beneficial garden space with pets running rampant?
Relax. With a few easy-to-implement tips, along with patience and some training—for both pets and pet parents—you’ll soon be enjoying a lovely, safe garden space with your fur babies.
7 Tips to Create the Perfect Petscape
Let’s be real: creating a gorgeous garden with pets underfoot does pose challenges. Whether it’s your favorite canine companion digging for voles in the lawn, a feline friend using your vegetable beds as a litter box, or a fluffy domestic bunny snacking on your favorite perennials, pet parenthood can prove frustrating when trying to grow a great garden.
But with some practical deterrents, a little training, safe romping spaces, and pet-friendly plants, you’ll soon love spending time playing—and relaxing—in the garden with your furry friends.
Safety first! Check your garden space to ensure it’s safe for pets. Keep sharp tools stored in sheds. Repair broken fences so pets stay contained. Remove existing toxic plants and incorporate only pet-safe plants into the garden.
Check the ASPCA website for a list of plants considered toxic for pets.
1. Establish Boundaries
You’ve planted a beautiful bed filled with your favorite flowers, turned your back for a minute to take a sip of water—and in those few unsupervised seconds, there’s your pooch, digging to his heart’s delight.
It’s frustrating, both for the gardener and the pup, who doesn’t understand why Mom is mad. Instead, establish boundaries in the garden with both physical deterrents and training.
Construct fences or natural barriers like hedges, raised flower beds, or decorative rocks to delineate pet-friendly zones. These barriers help restrict pets’ access to areas of the garden where you plan to plant—or where you’d prefer they don’t potty. Short fences may not keep a Great Dane from stepping over them, but with consistent training and positive reinforcement, you can establish which areas are off-limits for your pets.
It’s easy to create a border or fence, or define an inviting pathway, with quick-install rope stakes and the rope of your choice. Just thread your rope through the holes, knot the end to hold it in place, and you’re done!
Likewise, a densely planted hedge helps protect beds from pets’ paws.
If you’re looking to establish a shrub border to discourage pets from off-roading into flower beds, select pet-safe shrubs, like Lichfield Angel® Rose. While rose flowers are non-toxic to pets, thorny stems can pose a hazard to curious pets’ eyes—and paws. Choose thornless varieties. like Lichfield Angel, to create borders. Pale, peachy pink buds gradually open to form neatly cupped, cream rosettes.
For another colorful, pet-safe hedge, you’ll love Vinho Verde™ weigela. This unique selection features lime green leaves with distinguished black margins. Dark reddish-pink flowers appear in late spring, but the variegation is the true star.
Or incorporate a border of pretty but practical blueberry bushes to define paths and beds in the garden. BerryBux® shrub looks like a boxwood but with a bonus of delicious fruit. Its compact habit makes it perfect for planting as a hedge in the garden. Not only do blueberry shrubs provide gorgeous interest throughout the year, with pretty blooms in spring that produce delicious berries in summer, the yellow and red autumn foliage also looks lovely as the weather turns chilly. Plus, blueberries make a healthy treat for both dogs and humans. Pick a handful to use as training treats in the garden to teach pets which areas to avoid.
A bonus to using low hedges as bed borders: the dense shrubs shield more delicate plants within the beds from getting flattened by curious canines. Establish the bed boundaries with shrubs, then add your favorite pet-safe perennials, annuals, herbs, and vegetables within the safe confines.
When creating boundaries, try to use consistent materials so pets learn that decorative rocks, for instance, indicate a flower bed that’s off-limits for digging.
Consistent training with rewards is key.
2. Choose Pet-Friendly Plants
One of the most important ways to keep your pet healthy and happy in the garden is to plant only non-toxic plants in areas your pet can access. Fortunately, there are many varieties perfect for a pet-friendly garden. Whether you want to grow flowers for homegrown bouquets, veggies for garden-to-table meals, or just a pretty landscape filled with annuals and perennials, you’ll find plenty of choices to plant in your pet-friendly garden.
A few options include:
Annuals
Marigolds
Marigold Mango Tango produces sizzling bi-color blooms of primrose yellow and deep red on a compact plant, blooming nonstop from summer to frost. AAS winner.
Sunflowers
Concert Bell Sunflower brings big drama to the garden with its unique, vertical display of bright golden blooms. This pollenless, branching variety produces multiple clusters of 10 to 12 flowers per stem, creating an impressive tower of color. AAS Winner.
Zinnias
Crestar Mix Zinnia combines the best of crested zinnias in one fantastic varietal mix. These distinctive semi-double blooms with a pronounced central disc provide a vibrant palette of colors—including pink, orange, red, white, peach, and yellow—in a single planting. AAS Winner.
Perennials
Coral Bells
With brilliant red foliage that deepens with dusky green undertones as the season progresses, Carnival™ ‘Cinnamon Stick’ Coral Bells adds interest to shady spots in the garden from spring to frost. Delicate bells of pinkish white flowers hover above the foliage on thin red stems in spring, inviting hummingbirds, butterflies, and bees. USDA Zones 4-9.
Hollyhocks
Berry Cheesecake Hollyhock blooms with a blend of maroon, clear white, and soft creamy-yellow double flowers. It flowers from early to midsummer, reaching a height of 6 feet, making a lovely addition to bouquets. USDA Zone 3 to 9.
Coreopsis
NOVA® Sunstone Coreopsis glows like a garden sunset, with coral-pink flowers that bloom from spring all the way to fall. This compact, mounded perennial makes a big impression—especially with pollinators, who flock to its floriferous, nectar-rich blooms. USDA Zone 5 to 10.
Vegetables & Fruits
If you love homegrown food, why not add pet-safe varieties to share with your fur babies? A few veggies to consider include:
Carrots
Narvik carrot produces deliciously sweet roots with a perfect carrot crunch. Dogs can eat them raw, which also helps clean their teeth, or cooked, but be careful with puppies, or cut carrots into small pieces. Pet rabbits, obviously, will be fans.
Green Beans
A stringless variety, Park’s Whopper Bush Bean is easy to pick. The plant sets pea-shaped buds that blossom into small, perfect flowers, followed by straight, smooth, medium-green pods. You and your pets will love these garden-to-table (or pet bowl) treats.
Strawberries
What’s better than the sweet taste of summer strawberries? How about picking them from a drop-dead gorgeous plant? Summer Breeze Cherry Blossom is a beautiful, productive plant with glossy-green foliage, big, bright, semi-double flowers, and oodles of sumptuous berries. Your dogs and bunnies will love sharing these treats with you.
If feline friends roam the garden, avoid planting lilies, as they’re highly toxic to cats
3. Incorporate Raised Beds
One of the easiest ways to protect plants from curious pets is to add raised beds to the garden space. Whether you’re growing veggies, herbs, or flowers, the beds help protect your plants from digging, trampling, and snacking by your fur-babies.
With Gurney’s Raised Garden Bed Corners, you can easily build raised garden beds for growing vegetables, flowers, herbs, and more. Designed to form perfect right angles, these durable corners eliminate the stress of measuring and cutting, allowing you to quickly assemble your garden beds with ease.
4. Use Durable Hardscaping for Paths
Help your pets understand where they should—and shouldn’t—wander in the garden. Incorporating pathways throughout the space gives your pet plenty of room to roam without destroying your garden beds. Take a look to see where your pet likes to roam. What path does it take to sniff and entertain its brain? Once you observe your pets’ favorite routes, consider creating permanent paths with hardscape materials.
Use paw-friendly bricks or flagstones to build paths. Avoid any sharp rocks. And while smooth gravel and mulch are both easy on paws, these materials don’t deter digging—and they’re messy to clean up.
5. Leave Space to Play
While everyone loves a beautiful garden, don’t sacrifice fun for perfection. Pets need room to run and play, and you’ll love tossing balls and rolling on the lawn with your fur babies.
Instead of a pristine, perfect lawn, consider incorporating a hardier seed mix that withstands traffic. Pet Paradise Lawn Seed Mix is a resilient, pet-safe alternative lawn blend designed for play, comfort, and low-maintenance beauty. It includes Perennial Ryegrass, Creeping Red Fescue, Chewings Fescue, Sheep Fescue, and White Clover—each chosen for durability, softness, and eco-friendly performance. The mix offers quick germination, excellent wear resistance, and natural self-repair for high-traffic areas, making it ideal for paws-on use. With drought tolerance, reduced fertilizer needs, and a soft, lush feel, it’s the perfect lawn for pets and people alike.
And, if possible, encourage pets to use a specific space for potty time. If that’s not possible, clean up messes quickly to avoid lawn damage and icky shoes.
6. Protect Pets from Hazards and Heat
Safety in the garden is key. Along with storing tools in the shed and selecting non-toxic plants, make sure to use only organic fertilizers labeled safe for pets. Protect pets from chemicals—choose organic pest controls, like grubGONE! with Bacillus Thuringiensis, which only targets intended pests—not beneficial insects. If non-organic chemicals need to be used, keep your pets inside and away from the treated area for the time allocated on the pesticide or herbicide.
Also, keep an eye on pets near water features, like ponds and pools, to ensure their safety. But also make sure to provide a hydration station in your garden, in case they’re outside during hot summer days.
And give your pets a place to escape heat and storms. A shady pergola, access to a covered porch, or a doghouse shaded by a tree gives your pet a chance to escape inclement weather.
7. Create a Petscape Built for Fun
Peek-through fences for dogs. A catio for feline friends that keeps both cats and wild birds safe. Sand pits for digging. Elevated areas where dogs can survey their surroundings.
With a little imagination and effort, you can create the perfect fun, fabulous garden space to share with your furry family members.
Do you know that National Garden Bureau members include the most innovative breeders and distributors of plants perfect for a pet-safe garden?
If you want to create a pretty, practical space for your pampered pets, check out the plants and products available from National Garden Bureau members.
About National Garden Bureau
Founded more than 100 years ago, the National Garden Bureau educates, inspires, and motivates people to grow home gardens. National Garden Bureau members are horticultural experts, and the information shared with you comes directly from these experts to ensure your gardening success.
“This post is provided as an educational/inspirational service of the National Garden Bureau and our members. Please credit and link to National Garden Bureau when using all or parts of this article.”
