While your dog is still trying to perfect its potty training, you can expect more than a few accidents in your home. It can be stressful to always have to mop and re-mop the floor on several occasions during this time. While mopping the floor is not a big deal, cleaning up the greasy stains on your floor after such accidents can be exasperating.
Dog urine can have numerous unwanted effects on your floor, especially if it is a hardwood floor. Regardless of the type of floor, pet urine is one of the most destructive types of fluid that can get onto your floor, especially when allowed to remain for a while. After mopping your floor, you might discover that there’s still a greasy layer that you have to clean up, and it can be really messy sometimes.
On some occasions, this greasy stain can be pronounced and cause discoloration over the area of the floor that is covered. This discoloration can be a disheartening sight to behold. We are going to examine the possible ways to deal with a greasy floor caused by dog urine. Let’s get into it!
Why Are My Floors Greasy from My Dog’s Urine?
Your floors are greasy from your dog’s urine because of the ammonia present in his urine. Dog urine contains waste products of metabolism, especially nitrogenous wastes. In the case of dogs, their urine largely contains ammonia, and this compound can act on your floor to make it greasy.
Ammonia from your dog’s urine can bleach your floor and make the surface feel greasy. This fact should give you more insight into the kind of harm that dog urine can do to your floor, particularly hardwood floors. The urine can penetrate deeper layers of the floor and continue to dissolve them, and the longer the urine stays, the more time it has to dissolve the floor.
You can make things worse by attempting to clean up the urine with an ammonia-based product. The ammonia-based product will only augment the dissolving power of the dog’s urine and make the floor more slippery. You should avoid using such products to clean up your floor when your dog urinates over it. Soap-only products combined with enzymatic cleaners are effective for getting the job done.
Is It Normal for A Dog’s Urine to Make Floors Greasy?
It is normal for a dog’s urine to make the floor greasy because of its ability to react with the floor and dissolve it. However, on some other occasions, the greasiness can be because the dog’s urine itself is greasy, and this should be considered a deviation from the normal. Your dog’s urine should not be greasy under normal circumstances, and when it happens so, it could be an indication that something is wrong.
The first reason your dog’s urine is greasy could be because of dehydration. If your dog is starved of water for a period, its urine could pick up an oily consistency. This can be corrected by increasing your dog’s water intake. In male dogs, the urine may be contaminated with mucus from penile discharge. This mucus can also indicate an issue with the prostate gland or urethra.
Another important reason your dog’s urine can be greasy is an increased rate of fat metabolism. When the rate of fat metabolism increases, the level of ketones produced in the body will increase. This can be because of the protein-rich diet of dogs, an inability of the dog to use carbohydrates for energy production, or prolonged starvation. The increased presence of ketone in their urine will increase the oiliness in their urine.
How Do I Make My Floors Not Greasy After My Dog Pees on Them?
The best thing to do if you want to prevent your floor from becoming greasy after your dog has urinated is to ensure the urine does not dry up. Allowing the floor to soak up the urine will not only cause greasiness but can also have other harsh consequences, such as staining the floor, discoloration, odors, and other damages depending on the type of floor. This might be quite difficult to do as you really cannot always know when your dog has just urinated somewhere.
Detecting the urine early will help avoid the necessity of using harsh chemicals that can cause more damage to your floor. Whether the urine has dried up or not, the first thing to do as soon as you detect the urine area is to wipe with a damp cloth and then dry it up with a dry towel. You can also try using a little quantity of mineral spirit to clean up stains created by small pee spots.
If the pee spot is not exposed to sunlight, it will be preferable to use citrus oil-based cleaners. Hydrogen peroxide and baking soda are a good combination for removing stains and odors due to dog urine from the floor. However, you might need to carry out sanding and refinishing after applying the combination to prevent discoloration.
Conclusion
Dogs urinate either as a natural requirement for removing waste products of metabolism or as a behavioral expression of marking a space for themselves. However, their innocence does not reduce the consequences that their urine can have on the surfaces on which they spill. We hope that you found the information shared in this helpful!
