Owning a dog is extremely rewarding; the sheer joy and love your canine companion can bring to the house is like nothing else in the world. Unfortunately, however, there will be occasions when you wish your dog would just learn not to do certain things ? peeing on the carpet or floor is often one of them. Teaching your dog to do his dirty business in the yard - or wherever you want him to - is not that hard if you know what to do, but that?s a story for another time. If you have a dog, then you inevitably had to deal with some accidents on your carpet or floor. The smell of fresh urine may be pretty bad, but nothing compares to a few days of old pee stain. Learn how to effectively remove urine stains as soon as possible if you want to keep a decently fresh air inside your home.
Remove the stain as soon as possible
The first and most important thing you could do to prevent the unpleasant odor you know so well is to remove as much urine as possible while the stain is fresh. Take a few paper towels and place them on top of the stain, then put your foot on them and add as much pressure as possible. The towels will wick urine from the carpet within a few minutes.
Turn the towels upside down, add pressure again. Change the towels if necessary and repeat the process until the towels come up dry. Just make sure to leave them on that area, since you may not be able to tell where exactly the stain was.
After the area is just damp, mix a half and half solution of white vinegar and water. Apple cider may stain your carpet, so stick to white. Pour the solution on the stain, make sure to cover a larger area until you see the vinegar staying on the surface of the carpet next to the stain. Allow the vinegar to act for 5 or 10 minutes and then use the towel absorption method to get it off the carpet. Ventilate the area, and once the carpet is dry, you won?t sense any smell of urine or vinegar.
Here we?ll be discussing how to best clean the urine stains from your home and ? more importantly ? how to remove the odors as well. There are two main types of urine stains, depending on when you find them and clean them: the fresh ones, and the dried (or persistent) ones. We?ll be covering each type separately, providing a step-by-step removal process, as well as plenty of tips to help you out.
First up, the fresh stains:
1. You?re very first step should always be to soak up as much urine as possible with paper napkins or towels, until the area in question in only very slightly damp.
2. Next, lay a fresh set of paper towels on top of the soaked area (this is especially important for carpet stains). Cover the paper towels with a no longer needed newspaper, and then proceed to stomp on the newspaper for a few minutes in order to bring up and soak up as much of the moisture as possible.
3. Now comes the rinsing: For the next few days, rinse the area with clean water repeatedly, while remembering to always soak up all the (now dirty) water afterwards. Do this for as long as necessary until the stain is completely removed.
4. For the more pesky stains, using cleaning agents such as vinegar, baking soda, or even specialized pet stain remover solutions will help control and remove the odor. Rinse again with water afterwards, if necessary.
You may not have been home when the accident happened, so the stain is dry now. Bacteria breed in these wet areas since they have both the humidity and the nutrients, and it is these bacteria that cause the unpleasant odor.
Try to use the vinegar solution method and then absorb it with paper towels. If the stain is a few days old, you may need to use an enzymatic neutralizer as well, as the bacterial growth would have left many protein stains that won?t go with plain vinegar. You can purchase both enzymatic cleaners and black light lamps to detect the stains at most pet stores.
Now let?s see how you can deal with older stains that have already dried up:
1. If you know exactly where the stain(s) is (are), you can skip this step. If, however, you just feel the smell of urine in the room, but don?t know exactly where your dog peed, grab a black light and scan the carpet with it. Once you found the stains, outline them with chalk or string so you remember where they are once the lights are back on.
2. Hopefully, you will have a wet vacuum cleaner in your home. If not, rent or borrow one ? it will make things much easier. Once you have one, wet vac the stained area with lukewarm water. This is very important, as anything hotter than that will cause the urine proteins to fuse with your carpet and make the stain impossible to remove.
3. Now head to the kitchen and/or the local store and grab the following: baking soda (3 tablespoons), dish detergent (a few drops), and hydrogen peroxide (8 oz). Mix them together and put them in a spray bottle, then apply the solution to the stain.
4. Clean the area with the solution, shampoo the carpet using the wet vac again, and finally rinse it with clean water again.
The above steps should remove almost any urine stain and odor out there.
Train your dog to pee in the designated area
While you may want to remove the stain and get rid of the horrible smell, your dog may still urinate in that area if it still senses any odor. Besides thoroughly cleaning the area you should make sure to teach your dog through positive reinforcement techniques which area is designated for peeing and which isn?t. You can even take the towels used to absorb the urine and place them where your dog is supposed to relieve itself.
The best way to treat is to prevent, so while you may need to remove a few stains from the carpet, properly training your dog will prevent you from doing it a lot.
