Hi,
Can any one help me with a problem that I am having at my aunts home. My aunt had many, many cats before she passed away and it took over 3 months to find new homes for them. The question that I have involves cat urine odor in the house. The house requires a lot of work but I cant seem to get any one to work in there because of the odor. Does anyone know of any solutions to remove the urine odor. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks so much, daveJ
Hi Dave,
Were un-neutered tomcats involved? They're the worst...
Here are some ideas - not particularly well tested...
If you can isolate specific spots where the cat(s) have been widdling, try vinegar - it's the classic thing to try. It may help, it may not - but you've nothing to lose. I tried this on a spot were a cat nipped in and widdled in my bathroom. Limited success but it did help.
Give the house a good airing - windows open on warm days, get rid of as many furnishings and carpets as possible - even if they aren't damaged they'll be picking up the odour themselves.
Next thing that *might* work is sodium bicarbonate - get loads in powder form, mix into a paste with water and daub on to the worst spots, leave to dry (couple of days if possible) then hoover up dry.
The last trick works really well on fridge interiors - not tested with cat urine, but might be worth trying?... Bicarb is really good at sucking up odours.
Failing all of that, perhaps some scent (perfume, joss sticks, air-freshener) might make it more bearable for the workmen?
HTH
Tim (in the UK)
Have you tried spraying the whole place with Fabreeze? Available at supermarkets and Walmart, etc.
Ozone generator. Not a piddly-ass model, a BIG one. It should put out 900ug per minute.
You can buy one on Ebay (significant bucks), then re-sell it when done.
These are used to freshen sites where dead horses have languished for many months or meeting rooms where the opposition political party has gathered.
I had a cat that was 'stressed' and wouldn't go to her pan. Well after some research, I had to take steps to clean it up.
Now we only had a few small spots, but it did take time. The areas's weren't physically damaged, so there was no reason to remove effecte material. What I'm saying, what worked for us doesn't mean it will work for all situations. You might have to replace items, or hire a real cleaning service.
good luck,
tom @
Open up house (all windows..), pull up and discard all carpet and strips, etc. You may need to pull up other flooring, too. Possibly even some wallboards/sheetrock if you see water-discoloration marks.
Anything you may need to discard due to cat odor is repairs you'd need to do anyway. So you might as well start by getting that stuff out.
Banty
There is a product an Enzime base deoderiser it might be Natures Miracle or something similar, call pet stores or look online. Ive heard it works, that the enzime digests the odor bacteria-molicule or something like that, it does more than cover it up, it gets rid of the smell.
This is the best advice, based upon experience. Once you do all of that, then use some type of enzyme based cleaner. Then use a sealer like kills, bin shellac or even polyurathane on the exposed portions of the structure then have your workers re-sheetrock, re-floor, etc.
For a one spot small mess the other suggestions are fine.
I even heard of one severe case where the house was donated to the local fire company for practice - They burned the house down.
If the neighborhood can support a new house it may even be worthwhile re-building for a better ROI.
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We used this product on a corner of the dining room where I discovered that our cat had taken to urinating on the carpet. It takes some time for the product to work (sometimes weeks) as it has to "digest" the urine residue. My mother repossesed an old mom and pop store building where the tenant had allowed a tomcat free roam of the empty store area. He had sprayed all over the place and the odor was horrific. I gave her some of this stuff and she sprayed everywhere she could smell the cat and within a few weeks the odor was gone. Like I said, you have to be patient and may even have to apply more than once if it's really bad.
Tom G.
Should have started with a 12-gauge for the cats...
Yep. I have cats, had one that became incontinent (put her outdoors and cared for her best I can), and, after multiple liberal applications of "Natures's Miracle", finally took an xacto knife to the carpet in question.
A conversation with a ServPro manager later confirmed that experience - the enzyme stuff needs very liberal application, takes a long time, and works only yea far - someone inured to the cat odor (read, the cat owner) may get it where they think it 'works' (and this IMO is where all the positive testimonials come from), but my neighbors' kids were telling me otherwise.
In the case of the original poster, he has a much bigger problem than spot-cleaning would solve, and has no attachment to the current interior furbishments. So, really, all that stuff should just go out.
I think it would have to be a really extreme case to do more than possibly re-wall in places.
Banty
Sometimes the floor and subfloor must go, I saw it happen in one room a dog lived in.
You should really choose your aunts more carefully.
I tried Nature's Miracle, and made an invisible cat mess, into a very visiable yellow/brown stain. I waited, and waited, but didn't seem to get rid of the smell, and stain bothered me. The stain did come out with a simple steam cleaning, but smell was still there. I went to "Simple Solution" and I noticed results almost overnight. The smell declined over serveral days.
I recommend, you use aluminium foil layed over the spot to keep it moist. Plus cats seem to hate the feeling of foil under their feet, they left it very much alone.
This worked for me, results may vary.
later,
tom @
Dave:
If there is any carpet you will probably need to pull it up remove the padding and seal the floor with Kilz or some other product.
here is the bad part. Go to a party supply place and pick up a black light fluorescent or flood and go over to the house when it is dark and turn on the blacklight. The urine stains will glow white. I had a dog with a "problem" and have NOT found any product from natures miracle to urine gone and about 6 other products that will actually remove the stain so it will not show up under blacklight
Check the walls urine on walls will come off with a regular cleaner
Wayne
davej wrote:
"davej" wrote in news:9u%9g.17$ snipped-for-privacy@fe11.lga:
I HAD THAT TROUBLE! With 2 incontenient people mom stepdad and 3 ill dogs.
You CANT wash it off or neutralize the odor....
No how no way!
You just do what fire restoration companies do...
Discard all cloth smelly stuff. carpet pad furniture etc.
Empty area completely and scrub down with your favorite spic and span, mr clean etc. Wash EVERYTHING AND RINSE TWICE, change water often!
Paint all walls etc with BIN or KILZ. sand floor lightly and coat with OUTDOOR polyruethane! Use the outdoor smelly kind so the odor doesnt reoccur every time you have wet weather.
this is the ONLY way but it works 100% and you will never know you had a problem!
Basically you seal the odor into the surfaces
A guy >I tried Nature's Miracle, and Febreze, and neither appeared to work-
Yeah, sorta.
The enzyme products you see in most stores--mainstream stuff--is pretty poor stuff. Weak. Better than, say, Febreeze, but not something to deal with a serious issue.
Head to your Vet, a veternary supply place or, better, a medical supply place and get a real industrial strength enzyme--the stuff they use to clean up in nursing homes and the like. I've found Urine Off to work well, but it is pretty expensive.
-Tim
Yup. When we moved into our place two rooms were in bad shape from (mostly) cats but also a dog. One room was bad, the other, especially the closet, was horrendous.
Not knowing how big a problem it could be, we tried simple sprays and a carpet cleaner.
Nope.
So, out all of the carpet came. And the tackboards. And the floor moulding. Down to bare slab. We painted the walls, using Killz primer (real oil-based stuff) as a base coat, then washed the floors, etched with Muriatic acid, and used the Killz as a seal on the floor (saving money there instead of getting something specific.) No issues years later. No smells at all, even in damp periods--and we've got two cats who might just decide that if an area smells, it's the place to go.
Lots of work, but you need to make sure you get more than just the surface layer or the smell will work its way back from the subfloor and the like.
-Tim
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