Dog Kennel Project (plenty pictures) Part 1

Family had been without a dog for almost 10 years while we followed kids thru their highschool, travel, and college athletic careers. During that time the kennel I had built 25 years ago deterioated. The brick base suffered through 25 years of frost heave, root incursion, and since I had used already used building bricks rather than pavers, the bricks them selves were crumbling from freezing. The goat fence was rusting and the pressure treated posts were pretty much finished with their ground engagment.

Fast forward to an early and untimely retirement for me; but kids are out of school, living on their own, house payments are totally under control, and wife has good benefits. And, I decide it's time for another dog, a nice compact French Brittany. Close hunting, very companionable, great for an outdoorsman (or woman). Time to address the kennel.

I decided it was near do over time. So, I pulled the goat wire, then pulled the posts. Next lifted the bricks, found none really salvagable, and hauled them to a spot in the woods where they are stashed for some future project.
Next step, scrape the stone base I had originally installed, re-level the area. Though this is a lot of hand work, the JD x728 helped me with the stone and dirt grading.



Then I installed a better landscape and railroad tie perimeter for the new base, and moved some stones in for drainage. I rounded up some used paving bricks and some better (good corners and edges) construction bricks. Just raking the stone as level as I can before setting in some sand. (Paver stones were just some test colors for the patio I was also having built, not actually going to use them for this kennel).


I rolled the stone, and let it settle through a couple of spring rains before any paving. During this time I found a 10'x10'x6' kennel on CL that I picked up cheap. It had been sitting on a dirt base under a shade tree so there was some surface rust around the base. I wire brushed it, and sprayed it with rustoleum primer and again with rustoleum black paint. I staggered the height and side to side so that I was painting all four panels at the same time.


I had a couple ton of paving sand delivered for my patio, and used some of that here to make a nice level base for the kennel. For some reason I didn't capture any photos of laying the brick. I think I was afraid if I took a break, I'd not get back to it. I don't really like this kind of work. Anyway, bricks laid, and kennel fence assembled, I set it on top of the bricks this time. So, I can remove it for cleaning, and also to get it out of the way when I had to take that nice 100+ year old oak tree down after it died. I'm pretty sure this kennel is sold by TSC and probably other places. It is very sturdy, as tested by a bunch of 8 year old kids who used it for a jail during a picnic game of cowboys and indians. At one time an entire posse was climbing out when the sheriff was not watching.


Not terribly obvious, but I swept Polyermic Paving sand into all cracks between bricks and wetted it down. This sand forms a semi-rigid morter that resists seed germination, brick shifting, yet remains able to absorb some amount of shifting due to frost or roots.