What was he doing in the garden?

Came home this evening after having dinner out to find dirt from the garden spread across the footpath and one of the centranthus (R's most hated plant) lying every which way. I got the straw broom and started sweeping up the mess, when I noticed other areas around had been well and truly disturbed. Looking further up the footpath I could see yet more soil scattered around. Then discovered the culprit was still at the scene of the crime. A large black dog standing in the garden with his lead wrapped around a small shrub.

I'm a bit wary of big dogs and I was quite relieved that R. readily came to the rescue, after donning an old jacket and heavy gardening gloves. The dog was actually quite friendly, wagging his tail whilst he was being released. He didn't have a contact number on his collar, so R. carefully tucked his lead into his collar and eventually he trotted off down the street.

I can't work out why on earth he was scratching in the garden in the first place. The two areas in which he had done the most scratching were about 30 metres apart so it seemed that he was looking for something. Most peculiar.

This particular garden runs the full width of the block right beside the footpath. Over the years we've had various instances of sheer stupidity like plants being pulled up, or stamped on, or the flowers chopped off and spread around. On one occasion a bicycle was ridden over many plants, but the worst damage was done by a car being driven down almost the full length of the garden, destroying conifers and many other plants. Fortunately, none of the plants were very expensive as they are mostly propagated at home, but any senseless vandalism is really annoying. On the other hand, many people stop and tell me how much they enjoy seeing the garden as they walk by; even teenagers and young children have often stopped for a chat about the garden. Sometimes, people will ask if I would mind if they had a small cutting of a particular plant. I'm always more than happy to give them whatever they want (and usually a lot more) as I like to encourage people to take an interest in gardening as much as possible.

We have new neighbours living in the house behind us. Sometimes their three small boys come and talk to me when I'm in the garden (they live on a battleaxe block - their driveway runs along one side of our yard). One of them enjoyed waving the hose around and giving the plants a bit of a drink the other morning, while the youngest asked very shyly if he could pick some flowers to give to his mother. That garden bed was established in a hurry a few years ago when I finally got so fed up with previous neighbours parking their cars all over that part of our yard. I came home one day to find three cars in the yard with deep wheel ruts in their wake.

Not a word was said about it but they certainly got the message.