Chester's Urine Odor Removal Tips

If you have ever had pets or have recently become a parent, then urine stains and urine odors are a new part of your life. Consider it one of the rights of passage to adulthood. These stains are going to happen, just make sure that you are well armed with knowledge to deal with them correctly! No matter how clean your home is, house guests will immediately smell pet urine odors! It is just one of those smells that cannot be ignored.

Removing Pet Urine Stains from Carpet

If Fido or Fluffy has an accident in the house, it is important to treat the stain as soon as possible.  You can remove pet urine stains from carpet by mixing one part of white vinegar with four parts clean water. Mix in a spray bottle and apply liberally to the stain. Cover the stain with dry paper towels or a folded towel and cover with a heavy object. Wait until it pulls all of the liquid out of the stain into the towels and repeat if the stain still exists. If the stain is still there, clean your carpet with our carpet cleaning tips! The pet stain is only part of the problem, removing the pet urine odor is going to be a whole different process. You will also need to treat the urine odor differently depending on if the perpetrator was a cat or a dog.

Dog Urine Odor Removal

Dog urine usually does not have too strong of an odor, if it does you dog is probably sick and should go see the vet. Needless to say dog urine doesn't smell nice so you will need to take some extra steps to remove the odor. The first thing you need to do is determine exactly where the stain is. A black light works great to find where the actual pet stain is located. Now that you know where the stain is, you need to treat the odor. For dog urine odor I like to use plain baking soda. After you have cleaned the stain using the above method and the area has dried you should sprinkle a generous amount of baking soda over the area and let it stand overnight. Vacuum the area thoroughly the next day. The baking soda should have removed all of the odor. If there is an odor left you can move on to the cat urine odor remover as it works on much smellier cat urine.

Cat Urine Odor Remover

Cat urine is one of the worst smells. Our cat has gotten ill several times where he could not control his bladder. Needless to say it took quite a bit of work to get that smell out of our carpets. We had a couch but decided to just get rid of it because we couldn't get the cat urine odor out of it.

So what makes cat urine smell so bad?  Several different types of substances are in cat urine.  The cat’s scent marker is made up of a unique chemical compound, called the spray, and uric acid.  This is what makes cat urine smell so bad.  Even after clean up the liquid and pigment portions of the urine, the crystals and salts from the uric acid remain, causing the odor.  The crystals are insoluble and will attach to anything they come into contact with.  Using most normal cleaners actually makes the smell worse because any type of liquid will reactivate them.  Even humidity in the air can bring out the smell.

To get rid of these crystals you need to use an enzyme cleaner.  Enzyme cleaners break down the crystals and bacteria left from the urine.  So unless you use and enzyme cleaner you are never going to be able to completely remove the cat urine odor.  Whatever you do never use ammonia on pet stains as it will react with the crystals and attract your pet to go there again.

To use an enzyme cleaner you will need to thoroughly soak the area with the cleaner and let it work it's magic.  It may take several days for the wetness to go away, but during that time the cleaner is breaking down the bacteria and crystals that are buried deep in your padding and carpet.  If the area still smells a second dosing has always gotten rid of the odors in our house.

Commercial Odor Removal Products

Enzyme cleaners take about three months to make on your own.  They sell several at you local pet store, but they can be pricey since they are relatively hard to make.  Enzyme cleaners are actually very environmentally friendly cleaners. Here are a few that we have tried:

• Zero Odor - is a non-toxic odor eliminator.  I have only seen it sold on-line and that is where we bought ours.  It is pretty pricey but does work.  It did not take us very long to use it up.  We have not bought any more because several of the other products are available locally.
• Urine Gone - This product was first pitched as a As Seen On TV product.  You can buy it at Target and Wal-Mart.  It works really well and comes with a battery powered black light which will help you find the stains, even the ones from last year.
• Nature's Miracle - We bought this at our local pet supply store.  The advantage to this cleaner is that you can buy it in bulk for a relatively cheap price.  If you have lots of old pet stains around the house, buy a gallon of this.  We use Nature's Miracle the most because it is readily available and priced well.  When buying it at the store check which enzyme formula you are buying.  They make several different formulas for specific jobs like blood stain removal or urine odor removal.
• Odoban - We used to use this a lot, but unfortunately they changed their formula by adding a scent to it that my wife and I really don't like.  It does work, and we would use this the most as it is by far the cheapest, but the new fragrance is not to our liking. You can buy it at most stores.  If you want to buy it in bulk they sell it at Sam's Club.

Removing Human Urine Stains from Bedding

It is going to happen if you have kids. It is just a fact of nature. You may find yourself getting mad, but instead just get informed on how to clean it up right! Hydrogen Peroxide mixed with a little water in a spray bottle is your first line of defense. Once you have lightly sprayed the area, let it dry and clean with a mixture of one part white vinegar, one part baking soda, and four parts water. Scrub the area with the mixture and allow to dry completely. You can speed up the entire process by placing clean paper towels on top of the stain after each treatment and weight down with a heavy object. This will help extract the liquids from the urine stain. Check out our other great clean tips for Hydrogen Peroxide!

Removing Human Urine Stains from Clothing

If you are using cloth diapers or just simply have an infant, you know that you are going to have to deal with urine stains at some point. Pre-treat the stain with a mixture of one part baking soda and three parts clean water. Work the mixture into the entire stained area. Next, soak the item for at least twenty minutes in a basin filled with water and a cup of vinegar. Once you have soaked the stain, wash the item as normal. Your urine stain and smell will be a thing of the past!  Be sure to read our laundry stain removal guide for solutions to all of your laundering needs.

Room Training for Large Breed Dogs

Large breed dogs are very susceptible to getting hip dysplasia, a degenerative condition of their hip joints. Keeping them in a confined space can accelerate this condition. Instead of crate training, try room training. Kitchens usually work best especially if they have a tile or laminate floor and can be sectioned off from the rest of the house with child gates or similar barricades.

Avoid the Mess with a Bell!

My wife trained her St. Bernard to notify her whenever she needed to go outside. She tied a bell on a ribbon to the handle of the inside of her door. Every time that she took the dog outside, she rang the bell. She also began to help her dog ring the bell each time they went out. After a few weeks, the dog was ringing the bell every time she had to go out. Sometimes preventing the accident is better!

How to Rid Yourself of Raccoons

I have previously mentioned how my wife and I live in an old farm house. We love it. We love the seclusion that the small woods behind the house provides us. We love seeing the deer and wildlife that abounds around it. We even thought that the raccoons were cute...at first. Raccoons and possum are excellent scavengers. Once they know that food or shelter is available, they will stop at nothing to get it. (I have a humorous story about a possum, a mudroom, and me, but I'll save that one for later time!) Once they removed the screens that kept them from my chimney, it was time to do something about them. The easiest way of getting rid of these creatures is to let their natural instinct work for you. Sprinkle Shake-Away large animal in all of the areas that you want them to leave. Shake-Away is available in most nurseries and home care stores. Repeat every few days. Shake-Away's main active ingredient is urine scents for larger predators. That's right you are marking your territory! The raccoons and possum will think that their natural enemy has moved in on their territory and drank a lot of coffee. You may still see raccoons and possum on occasion, but after a few treatments, they will make their home somewhere else.

Homemade odor remover

Mix 1 cup hydrogen peroxide, 1/4 teaspoon of dish soap, and 1 tablespoon of baking soda in your favorite spray bottle. Spray the solution onto the area of the odor and let dry. Vacuum up the leftover baking soda. This works great on pet urine and vomit. The hydrogen peroxide kills any odor causing bacteria and the baking soda soaks up any other odors like the ammonia smell left from urine. Hydrogen peroxide can fad some fabrics so test first.

Commercial Cleaner for Pet Accidents

As a follow up to yesterday's post, Don't let pet accidents ruin your day, sometimes you need a quicker method to clean up the accident. OdoBan is a great commercial product for lots of smelly messes. From the product website:

"OdoBan, Odor Eliminator, cleans, disinfects, sanitizes, and deodorizes all precleaned hard, nonporous household surfaces. OdoBan eliminates unpleasant odors on washable surfaces such as upholstery, carpets, bedding, showers, walls and floors while leaving a fresh scent. This industrial liquid odor eliminator leaves no residue and has a variety of uses."

OdoBan works by using enzymes that eat organic material. Just spray on a liberal amount of OdoBan and let it sit for a while. The enzymes will eat up the odors, then just blot up the excess
liquid and your carpet will be fresh and clean.

What are your favorite uses for OdoBan?

Don't let pet accidents ruin your day

Everyone has been there, you come home and your pet has left a present for you. The import thing with treating pet urine on carpet is to get all of it out of the carpet and the padding. You can use a black light to find the entire area of the stain. Use a mixture of club soda and warm water (about half and half) to pour over the area, using lots of paper towels to blot the area well, until it is dry to the touch. Then sprinkle on a liberal amount of baking soda and let that stand for at least a day. Vacuum up the baking soda. Be sure to clean the filter on your vacuum afterward as the baking soda tends to lessin the suction power of most vacuums.