Dogs in Their Gardens

text and photographs by Page Dickey  

Harry N. Abrams, 96 pages, $16.96

Available on Amazon.com

Perhaps you're an avid gardener but you haven't got a dog because you fear he might dig up your daffodils or tear up your tulips? The 90 charming color photographs in this blooming beauty of a book spotlight brilliantly-behaved dogs in lushly-planted paradises, and beg the case that a garden is rootless without a sweet dog to sun himself in it.

The dogs featured range from purebreds to mutts; their gardens are tended by people like Dick Button, the former figure skating champ, and designer Bunny Williams. Many dogs ham it up, looking directly at Dickey's camera. But the sweetest shots are the candids of, say, a spaniel taking a sip from a birdbath, or various garden hounds watching quizzically as the tables turn and their humans doggedly dig in the earth!  

The photos are real draw here; the text merely describes the edenic gardens and their angelic dogs without telling how they got that way. Absolutely no practical service information is provided on what to plant and how, or how to train dogs not to demolish a gardener's hard work. For those pointers, you'll need to consult the excellent Dog Friendly Gardens, Garden Friendly Dogs. 

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