How to Remove Pet Odors from Your Laundry & Machine

Having pets is one of the best things you can do as a person and can often be a hugely fulfilling experience. Pets are able companions, attentive confidants, and great for keeping the home full of energy and life.

Of course, what isn’t great is the odors that animals can create over time. While it’s obviously not their fault, the fact that any carpet, piece of clothing, or blanket can be ruined because of a missed bathroom break can be hugely inconvenient and something that can have a domino effect on the rest of your home.

Pet odors are also difficult to eradicate from cloth, and washing your items in the washing machine can negatively affect the device, transferring those unpleasant to your machine and making your next laundry load smell terrible as well!

Thankfully, there are ways to deal with this and avoid having your machine infected with the unpleasant germs and smells of your pet’s latest accident. In today’s blog, we’re going to explore the different ways that you can eliminate pet odors from your clothes and what to do if your machine has contracted these odors as well.

A Little Chemistry

Fundamentally, pet odors from urine can be best dealt with if you know how these odors occur and what makes up the cat and dog urine to create that smell.

Both cat and dog urine stains are protein-based compounds that are incredibly tough to remove from a surface once they’ve landed. This is for a good reason, as marking territory is part of most pets’ nature and crucial to survival in the wild, so it must be tough.

Attacking the area with a fast cold water spray as soon as you notice it is crucial; this eliminates most of the substance and begins breaking down those proteins. Then, hold under a running faucet and be sure to cover every spot.

Next, throw your item in the washing machine, by itself, and set your device to the highest setting, adding one cup of distilled vinegar as well. Vinegar helps to reduce the odor by breaking down the proteins even further.

Finally, soak your item in a 2:1 solution of water and vinegar overnight if your item has been affected by the urine for some time before initially noticing.

What About the Machine?

For some stains, adding them to your machine, even with vinegar, can mean exposing your washer to the odors as well and potentially infecting it with the same smell as well.

When this happens, it pays to make sure your machine is back to smelling pleasant again for future laundry loads. For this, use Wash Warrior Drum Cleaning Tablets to eliminate the foul odors entirely.

Place a Wash Warrior tablet in your drum and set your machine to its “Drum Clean” mode. If you don’t have a Drum Clean or similar mode, simply set your device to its highest temperature and spin cycle settings. Once done, simply let your machine complete its cycle, and you should have a perfectly clean and odor-free washer made safe using a non-toxic and family-safe cleaning solution.

That’s it for today’s blog, be sure to check out our other blogs from Wash Warrior on the latest tips and tricks for keeping your washing machine clean and operational. Also, if you have any questions about our products, then feel free to contact us!

Happy Washing!

The Wash Warrior Team