Urine Problems with Pets

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Urine & Odor Removal for pets

 

Homeowners who have household pets will sometimes have urine stains on their carpet. Pets will urinate on carpet as an act of territorialism, anxiety, or simply out of need.

 

The color of pet urine and its staining potential will often depend on dietary habits and the age of the pet. Foods high in protein tend to produce a darker, more pungent and acidic urine. Foods higher in carbohydrates such as corn or oats; produces more alkaline urine that is less likely to stain carpet and does not produce as potent an odor. Typically, because cat diets are richer in protein than dog diets, their urine will produce harsher odors and are more likely to cause stains. Unlike dogs, cats do not urinate for territorialism. This behavioral pattern in male cats is accomplished by spraying. This urine product also contains the male hormone testosterone which makes it even more pungent than urine. Although spraying is typically done on a vertical surface (such as a couch) it could also conceivably come in contact with a carpet.

 

Another consideration is the age of the pet. The older the pet the more renal function diminishes, thus producing urine that contains more plasma proteins. Because less uric acid is secreted in this urine it is less likely to stain a carpet; however, it will produce an even stronger odor. In almost all cases cat urine is the worst perpetrator for pet stains.

 

The amount of staining from pet urine on a carpet will depend in part on the fiber type and dye method of the carpet. Solution dyed fibers will be the most resistant to urine stains with olefin fibers providing the greatest stain resistance. In most cases, stains created by urine tend to leave either a red tinge (by adding to the existing color) or a yellow tinge (by reducing existing color). In either case the shift in color is almost always permanent in nature. Although there are some commercially available products designed to remove urine they are only effective on fresh spots. Neutralizers and deodorizers offer only minimal help in removing urine and urine odors once it has set into the carpet and pad. Even the sub floor can become contaminated.

 

Acids found in pet urine can also liberate calcium carbonate fillers used in carpet latex, causing it to lose its bonding strength. Therefore, it is not uncommon to experience delamination (a loss of tuft bind strength) in carpet exposed to pet urine. Urine stains can be identified in several ways, the most obvious means being smell. Because pet urine is so concentrated, it will initially emanate a strong ammonia odor, which after several days develops into a musty odor. Because of its mineral content pet urine will fluoresce wider a black light Using litmus indicator paper, pet urine (cat in particular) will display a red (slightly acid) color (pH 6-6 1_2). Extractions taken from stained fibers can be tested for the presence of uric acid. Staining of the carpets backing is also usually apparent.

 

Stains that have appeared within a couple of hours can often be cleaned with good success. This can be accomplished by using a 50/50 solution of white vinegar and water, followed by blotting with water only. After this, absorb the spot with clean colorfast towels until it is as dry as possible. Next, place a one-half inch thick weighted layer of colorfast towels over the spot and let it sit overnight. This final procedure must not be overlooked, since crystallized urine residues left in the carpet are capable of reproducing odors during the warmer more humid months. Older urine stains often require replacement of the carpet and pad in the affected areas and can also necessitate cleaning the sub floor with a disinfectant. A final concern for carpet stains from pets is vomit. Hydrochloric acids found in the stomach of pets will be present in any vomit’s material. The degree of acidity of these materials and their potential staining of carpet will be based on stomach content. Foods from the stomach tend to dilute the hydrochloric acid content, reducing the chance for staining. On the other hand, reflux of bile from the small intestine, which is more common with dogs, can be highly acidic. Typically, stomach acids are very acidic-A pH2, which explains why vomit is much more likely to stain carpet than food.

 

Like urine, the effectiveness of cleaning vomit is based on expediency. The first step is to scrape up as much of the matter as possible.

 Next, it is important to elevate the pH of the stained area. This should be accomplished by blotting using a solution of one part non-sudsing ammonia to five parts water, followed with blotting with a damp towel until the spot is as dry as possible. Again, it is also recommended that you place a weighted layer of white towels folded one-half inch thick over the spot and allow it to sit overnight to allow residual matter to wick up into the towel

Do It yourself Pest Control

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Do it Yourself Pest control
First to let you know how I got my information, I worked for a well known Pest Control Company for little over a year. I passed my certification course, which enabled me to apply pesticides here in the state of Florida. Why I no longer do this for a living, found out I am NOT a door to door sales man!
What I am going to share with you is what we did when treating a house or business for once a year Pest control. Using this info Will work, Buying the chemicals can last you the home owner for years if used proper and you will only have to retreat one chemical again in 6 months only to the exterior of the structure. Will you see a bug from time to time, sure but you can rest assure the treatment will get them. I will tell you this, once you apply these chemicals DO NOT use Raid or other smelly type sprays to get that bug, all your doing is causing the chemical I told you to use to be unefective.
PLEASE USE ALL PESTICIDES ACCORDING TO THE LABELS INSTRUCTIONS!
Ok heres the Info:
1. First thing we would do is knock all cob webs down from soffit and doors Etc. Then we would apply Termidor to the exterior of the house and interior of the garage. You start at the front door spraying around the door along the threshold around the exterior lites around windows around hose bibs along any cracks you may have, spray about 12″ up from the ground along the base of the house from one end to the other all sides, spray around all doors all windows lites all thresholds. Then spay the soffit area all around the house, if you can’t reach the soffit do the best you can, other applications we will talk about will take care of what you missed. After the exterior of the house is sprayed move to the interior garage and spray the base of the wall and any thresholds to doorways and last spray the garage door frame and along the cement where the door hints when the door is down.
2. With a hand held broadcast spreader, spread around the perimeter of the house about twentyfive feet out from the house with the granular insect bait.
3. On the interior we would use Phantom, we would use a spray bottle that was adjusted to the stream mode and spray a genorous amount to the tracks of the windows. This would run down the tracks and reach the bottom of the window. Do all windows this way. Also if you can get inside the cabinets and spray into any holes that may be visible, I am talking about under sinks not food areas. Remember to spray the tracks of any slider doors.
4. Switch plates and Plug plates, remove them and on the back of each plate you will apply a small BB size or drip size of roach gel bait this gel stays plyable for about a year, so you will reapply again next year. While the plates are off just under the bottom srew you will see on the plug or switch poke a small hole in the dry wall so you can squirt dust into it. This dust is called Delta Dust. You can use a phillips head screw driver to poke the hole. Make sure you do this so the plate will cover up the hole when reinstalled.
5. Ater putting all the switch and plug plate back on, you will start in the kitchen and apply the roach gel to all the cabinet drawer tracks, remember just a drop! Apply it to the cabinet shelves out of site in the upper corner where the guys like to hide. Apply under the upper cabinets and lower cabinets, under the sink on the hot and cold side pipes and on the P trap again just one drop, DO NOT SPREAD ALOT it won’t kill any better. If you have alot of roaches use alot of drops in different areas in all wet areas, Toilet shut offs under sinks, under counters in food closets on the shelve brackets keep the gell out of site, even put it on the hinges of doors in the food closets. Roaches hide in corners of the cabinets near hinges, cracks you name it. Don’t worry they will find that bait you applied.
Now using the delta dust, dust a little behind the stove under the refridge under the cabinets. Cabinets have false bottoms not all but some can be accessed by laying down on the floor and just a bove the kick plate you can get under the cabinet. If notdrill a hole in an area that is high and not visible when standing and dust real good. Just in case when I say dust, I am refering to applying the powder.
Now you might think this will take forever to do, your wrong. The average guy can get this done in two to three hours. Do you have to do everything I talked about? No! Just doing the exterior of the house will work, It all depends on each situation. This program was what we did to the customers house or business, the program works! You do have to reapply the exterior spray again every six months.
Now below I will help you find this product.
1. TERMIDOR- Any do it yourself pest control store, or googlr it like I did to find this link. http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/termidor-sc-p-184.html?gclid=COaX5_uW3asCFZBb7AodVQQYSA quart bottle odorless
2. Exterior insecticide for the broadcast spreader, use any granular insecticide bait you can buy this at any home improvement store like lowes, Home depot.
3. Phantom – again do it yourself pest control store. Google it too. http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=phantom+insecticide quart bottle odorless
4. Roach Gel – Get this at Home depot or lowes it come in a shringe type applicator, I use Hot shot name brand.
5. Delta dust- http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=delta+dust Quart bottle, buy the bulb duster if you can it will help you apply it correctly, using it just one or two puffs from the bulb duster is enough, any more is just wasting it.

Carpet Cleaning for Homeowners

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Everyone knows that the life of carpet can be greatly extended with proper care. Homeowners with carpet or professionals that clean carpet, must perform vacuuming, spot cleaning, and damage repair routinely.
Residential carpet should be professionally cleaned at least annually. carpet that is subjected to extreme soiling or heavy use, particularly high traffic areas. People that suffer with allergies or respiratory problems may require more cleanings.
Bottom line line homeowners do not wait until your carpet looks soiled before you call a professional to clean. Waiting greatly reduces the likelehood of restoring the original color appearance and texture of the carpet!

The Importance of Vacuuming

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The Importance of Vacuuming
As with any floor covering, if newly deposited soils are not removed with routine vacuuming, or if accumulated soils are not removed with regular cleaning, a significant reduction in the use-life of the carpet can occur. Further, health of the occupants may change.
It is important to remove particle soils before they sift downward into the carpet’s pile and become more difficult to remove. The primary responsibility for this effort lies with the carpet owner. If maximum carpet use-life and appearance is to be achieved, vacuuming must be accomplished.

Dust Mites

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Dust mites can cause
allergic reactions　

 

If you only new what could be lurking in your carpet, you might be surprised at what you’d find. Out of sight and harmless to most of us, dust mites live deep in carpet fibers and may number in the millions.

Dust mites help contribute to dust allergies and have caused significant health problems. Humans are not allergic to mites but to the protein in their fecal pellets and the body parts of dead mites, which are small enough to become airborne. Approximately 75 percent of people who have house dust allergies are sensitive to “mite parts” in airborne dust.

Dust mites are less than 1/2 millimeter long (approximately 9 or 10 could fit on the period at the end of this sentence. Dust Mites belong to the same family as ticks and spiders. Hundreds of different species are found in nearly every habitat of animal and plant life.

House dust mites live in your bed mattresses, carpeting and soft or upholstered furniture. They seek these protected environments and are rarely found in other parts of a residence.

Dust mite population levels are normally determined by humidity in a building. Mites require moisture in their environment, and this is the most important factor in determining their survival and growth.

A humidity level of 65 to 75 percent and temperatures between 70 and 80 degrees Fahrenheit are the best conditions for dust mite survival. Mite population densities rise and fall with natural seasonal changes in relative humidity and temperature.

In buildings, where it never rains, dust mites are living in a veritable desert and are under a constant threat of dying of thirst. Because they cannot find liquid water in indoor environments, their food has to be moist enough to provide them with the minimum water required for survival.

Dust mites feed on microscopic fragments of human skin cells, and fungi and bacteria. Because each of us sheds approximately 40 to 50 million skin cells a day. This gives dust mites an abundant food supply.

Dust mites have a life span of 40 to 60 days, and in vacuum bags, which are stocked with ample dust mite food, they can breed for hundreds of generations. Unless you have high filtration (capable of filtering particles between 1 and 5 microns) on your vacuum bag, dust mites that are vacuumed up from carpets will be emitted back into the air and into your carpeting.

Many people are affected by dust mites, and everyone has some kind of reaction to dust. This is a significant concern to building occupants and should prompt you to develop a routine preventive maintenance program.

This will depend on the concentration of people in the facility and the use and condition of the building. Daily and weekly dusting, vacuuming and cleaning of upholstered furnishings or carpeted flooring, combined with periodic carpet pre-conditioning and extraction should be performed.

Applying a preventive maintenance program will help control household dust and mites that inhabit our homes, diminish indoor air quality and contribute to allergies.

Why Hire Carpet/Janitorial Contractors, Handyman, And Other Outsourced Facility Service Providers?

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Outsourcing your facility services means more than just finding quality janitorial contractors to clean your facilities. It’s a strategic business decision with many great benefits. And it all comes down to a single bottom-line: making your business better. Richard’s Carpet Cleaning services can give you a competitive advantage by providing the time you need to help you grow your business and outshine your competition.

Focus On Your Core Competency

Your business provides specialized products and/or services. Each business function that does not directly support, develop or improve your products/services – like facility services – can be outsourced. For example, outsourcing your business’s cleaning needs to janitorial contractors allows you and your team to concentrate on your core competencies and mission-critical objectives, not cleaning your facility.

Reduce Costs

Cost-savings alone can be a good enough reason for businesses to outsource tasks like cleaning to janitorial contractors. As you well know, retaining in-house employees is a very expensive endeavor, and in-house facility services personnel are no exception. What value do these employees add to your core business function? The answer is most likely little to none. But you still have to pay for those individuals’ payroll tax, salary and benefits package (insurance, 401(k), vacation and sick pay, etc.), not to mention numerous indirect costs like tools and equipment, management, and training.
Outsourcing your cleaning services to janitorial contractors and other similar services to a contracted facility services provider can help you control operating costs and establish a budget, freeing up capital that can be invested in your core business at a higher rate of return.

Richard’s Carpet Cleaning Offers Expertise

Just like your company has expertise in a particular field, Richard’s carpet Cleaning has specialized skills, whether were doing janitorial, carpet cleaning or Handyman maintenance. We have the experience and expertise to mantain your facility better than you do because it’s what we do. And we are always at the forefront of technological advancements in our industry, ensuring that clients are receiving the best efficiencies in facility operations.
An outsourced facility services provider, such as a janitorial contractor, affords you a higher level of service at a lower cost, bringing world-class capabilities to your facility not otherwise available from in-house resources.
 Outsourcing lets you easily adjust the level of staffing for facility operations on an as-needed basis, helping you control operating costs and easily adjust for changes in staffing and service requirements.