Dog Poop Is Not A Substitute For Fertilizer
Some dog owners don’t clean up dog poop because they believe that it’s a fertilizer. And if you think that too, that’s wrong.
As mentioned above, dog poop is a pollutant. Not picking it up and spreading it across your lawn is already dangerous. Also, it has high contents of nitrogen that, in no way, will be helpful for your soil.
It’s the exact opposite as it will make your soil highly contaminated and harmful bacteria will spread. In the long run, your backyard will be an unsafe place for your dogs and children. We don’t want that.
Also, high loads of nitrogen can lead to soil imbalance, which will decrease any nutrients found there. This will cause your grass to turn yellow, or worse; it can die.
How do lawn professionals (Professionally) handle dog poop on the lawn?
So, you have a client who has a dog/s that use the lawn as a liter box, how can you address the issue?
Look, there are basically 3 simple solutions:
Before I offer advice from my experience, check out what our poll of over 500 lawn care professionals told us about how they handle the issue.
Hands down, the most common answer we received by far was to simply cut the lawn and move on to the next one. 329 of the respondents said that they simply cut the grass with no extra charges.
Yet, a lot of lawn care professionals, 125, said that they charge more when they have to cut a lawn with dog poop.
This is crazy but a small segment of lawn care pros said they would simply cut the client. And a smaller segment still said that they would mow around it and tell the client that the waste must be removed.
However, a lot of lawn care professionals may be overlooking a good opportunity to make more money.
Let me break it down…
Should I charge more for pet waste removal?
Now there is a HUGE DIFFERENCE between charging more to cut a lawn that has pet waste, and actually removing the pet waste from the lawn.
This is crazy but, only 25 of over 500 respondents seemed to catch this business opportunity.
Here’s the deal, if you are already going to be cutting the lawn and getting dog poop on your mower. Why not offer pet waste removal services instead? After all removing dog poop from the lawn is a good yard clean-up tip.
You are already there, and it will only take a few minutes to pick it up and you can make an extra $10-$20 for each cut. And avoid getting it on your equipment. Best of all you can leave it in their trash can.
And selling this service isnt that difficult at all.
For example, you could easily sell them on the idea by showing them this article about the dangers of dog poop. No one wants fecal matter on their lawn when they really take the time to consider it.
If you pitch the add-on service and they say no thanks. And you are already one of the nearly 70% of lawn care professionals that would simply mow the lawn anyhow. There is no love lost between you and the client. Just sling that $h-t everywhere then.
What to do about dog poo when you are mowing a lawn?
It actually does the opposite of fertilizing your lawn, leaving your perfectly green grass with discoloring and even burns. … By leaving the dog’s waste in the backyard while you mow, you are then spreading what has been determined as “toxic” chemicals by the EPA and CDC all over your lawn.