Removing Pet Urine Stains & Odor
How to Eliminate Dog & Cat Urine Smell from Washable Items
When your pet urinates inside your home, throwing soiled items in the wash is not enough. Make sure you know how to permanently eliminate these tenacious odors.
If your pet begins to urinate in the house, the odor must be eliminated and the behavior addressed before you can hope to return to a sweet-smelling home. When urine odor persists, it encourages your pet to continue using the same inappropriate areas for elimination. Here are some helpful tips to stop this housebreaking problem in its tracks.
Find All Pet Stained Items
It is much simpler to eliminate pet odors from items that you can throw in the washer than from soiled carpeting or other porous flooring. But whatever it is that your pet has soiled, the sooner you find the offensive spots the better. Fresh urine is much easier to remove than urine that has had a chance to dry and set. So, for starters, use you eyes, nose and touch to identify all soiled areas. If you have been finding feces in the house, it is a pretty safe bet that the pet is also urinating in that area as well.
Using Black Light to Find Urine Stains
To find older, dried soiled areas, a black-light can be invaluable. You will have pet odor problems and your pet will continue to soil these same pieces until you completely remove all of the stains. Anything that shows even a small amount of urine needs to be thoroughly cleaned.
Completely Remove Pet Urine
It is not enough to just run the soiled items through the washing machine. There are special measures that must be taken to remove all traces of urine odor from everything. If you follow these steps and successfully clean the soiled items, your pet will be much less likely to urinate on the same objects again.
Removing Pet Urine From Machine Washable Items
- Use an enzymatic cleaner (pet urine stain remover) to break down and neutralize the pet waste odors. First test a small area of the object to make sure the cleaner doesn’t alter its color. If it is color-safe, follow the manufacturer’s instructions carefully.
- After the enzymatic cleaner has worked it magic, machine wash, adding a box of baking soda to your regular detergent. It's best to air dry these items if possible. If the stains are not yet completely removed, the heat of the dryer could permanently set them. So avoid heat until you are sure the smell and the stain is gone.
- If you can still see the stain or smell the urine, repeat the first two steps until the stain and odor are completely gone.
Removing Pet urine from Large Items
If your pet has urinated on the sheets or blankets of a bed, it is easy to clean the sheets, but much trickier to clean the mattress. See instructions for removing pet stains from carpeting, and use a wet vac that has an upholstery attachment. The same instructions can be used for removing pet stains from upholstered furniture. After you’ve completely removed the stain and odor from the mattress or furniture, cover the area with a vinyl, flannel-backed tablecloth when you begin re-training your pet. It's machine washable, inexpensive, and unattractive to your pet.
Housebreaking Your Pet
Cleaning the soiled area is only part of the battle. You will also need to re-train your pet to use appropriate places for elimination. You may want to make smaller, recently cleaned objects unavailable until your pet is reliably doing his business outside. Make sure that you first understand your pet what might be causing this behavior. The lapse in your pets pottying skills may signal a medical problem. One you have ruled out this possibility, it's time to re-train.
Bring your pet outdoors frequently to increase the likelihood that he will eliminate outside. Every time your pet urinates or defecates outdoors pour on the praise! The re-training period may take a week or more. Remember, it took time to build the bad habit, and it will take time to replace that habit with a new, more acceptable behavior. Treat your pet with patience and give him lots of encouragement!
More Information on Pet Ownership
There are numerous resouces that can help you to better unerstand your pet, including: The Animal Behaviorist and the ASPCA Animal Behavior Center. If have your heart set on a canine companion, but haven't chosen one yet, the Suite101 articles Choosing a Dog and Adopting a Shelter Dog may help you on your journey towards pet ownership.
