Cat urine and PDZ or Stall Dry

[Bean789]

I just purchased a house that has a garage to 'playroom' conversion and the previous owner kept her cats and dog in there. She was not the best at cleaning up after her pets. The room, no central AC to other parts of the house, reeks of cat urine. I mean reeks as in you can't be in there for more than a few minutes and breathe. She has removed the carpeting and pad and now it is up to me to somehow rid the concrete floor beneath of the cat urine odor. The urine has absorbed into the concrete. After reading all about etching the concrete with muratic acid, various urine removal products that seem to work half***, etc, I am still not sure how to approach the cleaning. I know not to use bleach or ammonia type cleaners. If I clean the affected spots with a baking soda/peroxide/lemon dish detergent mix and then generously apply PDZ or Stall Dry to each area, will the urine and odor be absorbed into the PDZ or SD so that it can be vacuumed up? Does PDZ or SD actually absorb the moisture as cat litter does? I have a very sensitive nose when it comes to cat urine. I clean our cats little box daily and super clean it weekly.

 

[iwiw60]

There is a product (the name escapes me, naturally!) that I've seen both on TV and at Home Depot that you use on concrete to remove cat odor. Once it's cleaned then it gets sealed with a secondary stuff...sorry I'm not much help but if you Google it I'm sure a ton of stuff will come up....best of luck!

 

[res]

http://urineoff.com/

^ This is the product that I have used for years with absolute success. It is generally only sold in vet clinics or grooming salons. I had a terracotta tiled sunroom in our house in OKC. It is where I kept foster dogs, puppies, cats, etc. It got soiled constantly, and any urine that soaked into the grout would stink like crazy - until I sprayed it with Urine Off, and let it dry. Gone!

 

[Chickerdoodle13]

I've used a combination of vinegar and baking soda to get rid of gross smells in the past. Another thing that works really well is charcoal, but without any lighter fluid or chemicals on it. That is one thing that is incredibly good at absorbing odors!

As for the baking soda, you can try sprinkling a bunch of that over the ground and let it sit for a few days. Vacuum that up and scrub the floor well with vinegar.

We had a problem with dead mice in one wall of our house the previous summer (they kept getting stuck behind this one pipe, never had a mouse problem before but that winter was particularly cold) and we hung a mesh bag of charcoal and it really helped take care of the smell until we were able to cut into the wall to fix the problem.

 

[Bean789]

Thank you for all of the suggestions for cleaning and removing the odor. The offensive odor is so strong in that room that your eyes will water and it will take your breath away. I am looking for how to draw the moisture along with the odor up and out of the concrete. I can't seal the floor until the urine has been completely eradicated. Otherwise, the sealer will only last a short while and then I will need to do it all again. I have already planned on gutting the sheet rock and replacing the walls.

 

[Peaches Lee]

You can also try Kennel Odor Eliminator (K.O.E.)--veterinary clinics use it (especially for smelly toms LOL!), and I have used it, works good.

 

[Bean789]

Update: We used baking soda with peroxide mixture over the entire playroom floor and let it dry. Took hard bristle brushes and loosened it (dried hard as paint almost) and then vacuumed it up. Then 2 scrubbings, walls and floors, with TSP cleaner, from HD. Then ordered "Global Bacterial Enzyme Odor Eliminator - Case Of Six" and voila' odor is gone and has not returned. It has now been 6 full weeks since the last spray down with the enzyme odor eliminator. We used less than 1 quart because it is very powerful stuff and the spray bottle that came with the case order sprays a very fine mist so it covers more easily. I do not know if the enzyme odor eliminator would do the trick on it's own or not. By the time I ordered it, the other cleaning methods had been completed and the cat urine odor was still lingering somewhat.

When I googled a remedy to my situation, I saw many posts in other forums that stated that cat urine odor was impossible to get rid of, sell the house, don't buy the house, etc, etc. Our home now has new carpeting in some rooms and after the 'play room' was cleaned, there is no more cat odor in our home. The play room still has not had the carpeting put down in there until I know for sure the odor is gone and will stay gone. I live in FL so our humidity and rain/moisture factor is heavy here. The play room will be the last room that will be worked on and it will be in at least 3 months from now before it's revision begins. I will keep my fingers crossed that the odor is gone forever. Next option for remedy is concrete etching of the floor and complete removal of all drywall including the ceiling.

As a side note, I bought a used chicken coop that was quite 'nasty' to say the least. I brought it home, sprayed it down with various cleaning agents, scrubbed, scrubbed, cleaned, scrubbed some more with bleach and let dry. Then I sprayed it down with the enzyme odor eliminator and no smells have lingered. I let it dry out for a day. Then I sprayed it with clean water several times the next day and let it dry and then introduced my pullets to their new home. I layer my coop floor with PDZ and pine shavings with a little DE mixed in. No bugs, no smell and chickens are happy with their larger coop.