Removing Cat Urine From Carpet
One of the most challenging problems to have as a cat owner is to get cat urine out of the carpet. I will tell you right now that there is no easy home remedy to remove cat urine from the carpet despite what you might read so I recommend that you buy a professional cat urine cleaner and be done with it.
You see, a cat’s urine is made up of three components:
Urea – This is the sticky part of the urine.
Urochrome – This is what contains the pigments that give the urine its distinctive color.
Uric Acid – These are crystals that are extremely hard to remove and cause a terrible odor.
Many regular cleaning products may remove the stain and even the odor temporarily but what happens is the Uric Acid crystals dry out and bond tightly to the carpet fibers and as soon as it gets humid or the carpet gets wet the odor comes right back just as strong as ever.
Consider also that there is usually padding underneath the carpet and a wooden floor underneath that. Cat urine will seep through the carpet and padding to the floor so just surface cleaning the carpet is not enough.
To completely remove the cat urine from the carpet you need a product that has special enzymes that eat the Uric Acid crystals. You also need a black light to show you where the crystals are hiding and to let you know if you got them all otherwise you will continue to have that nasty cat pee smell.
The Internet is filled with countless posts about how to remove cat urine from the carpet and the consensus is any home remedy for cleaning cat urine doesn’t work or is only temporary.
Baking soda, carpet deodorizer, Fabreeze, or vinegar just masks the smell and it will come back as the Uric Acid crystals in cat pee are tightly bonded to your carpet, padding, and floor and cannot be washed away. Ammonia will just encourage the cat to pee on the carpet more because ammonia is a part of cat urine and your cat will smell the spot and continue to go there thinking it’s an “approved” spot.
If the urine is fresh try blotting the spot with a cloth or paper towel gently to minimize the affected area. Do not rub the spot or you will just drive the urine deeper into the carpet and make it worse. You can use some cool water and then keep blotting but this often tends to spread the crystals around further.
I would not use anything else on the stained area except for an enzyme-based urine cleaning product that has been proven to clean cat urine stains completely. Look for a product that includes a blacklight so you don’t miss any spots and be sure and follow the directions exactly as many people buy a urine remover, ignore the directions, and then complain that it didn’t work.
