How to clean your carpet the healthy way for your dog!

Last week we shared information about how dangerous the toxic chemicals are that some professional carpet cleaning companies use and how they may affect your dog. If you haven't read that post yet, we highly recommend it!

Today we are going to discuss healthy ways you can clean your carpets to keep those nasty toxic chemicals out of your home and away from your dog so they can live a happier, healthier life and help the environment at the same time.

Dirty carpets are a staple at our house. We've got the mud from the yard around our cabin, and we also have the occasional hairball cough up from one of our senior kittie bros, and don't forget the spills, yep Mum spills stuff now and then.

So how do we recommend you keep your carpets cleaner and clean your carpet for the health of your dog? Here are our top ideas to keep your carpet clean, smelling fresh and free from bacteria.

1. Place doormats at the entrance (outside and inside) to your home and encourage the humans to wipe their feet. You can also purchase wonderful mats that help soak up the muck from dog's paws too or do what we do...place old cotton towels at the door for the dogs to stand on for a few extra seconds! This tactic can reduce the dirt and debris coming into your home by at least one-half!
2. Have your humans remove their shoes when they come inside. Mum never wears her shoes inside our cabin, she's more of a sock person. And that helps reduce lots of dirt and debris in our cabin.
3. Vacuum often, at least 2-3 times per week. Keeping up on the vacuuming helps reduce a lot of dirt. We like our Dyson, it sucks up superbly, and has a HEPA filter to reduce the dust coming back into the room.

4. Clean up spills and oopsies as quickly as posible to prevent staining. Start with just plain water on a white towel and dab, dab, dab. If plain water doesn't do the trick add a little white vinegar 1-3 solution (spot test first) and use that to dab. Never rub as it could damage the carpet fibers. For other stains like red, use club soda; for wax or gum use an ice cub to harden and then scrape off; and for greasy stains use baking soda and let sit overnight then proceed with the vinegar/water solution.
5. For overall cleaning of carpets you can utilize a steam cleaner (rented or purchased) but remember to only use plain water, never the chemical cleaners that sometime come with the machine. We like the new HAAN MultiforcePlus SS22A that was graciously provided to us free of charge for review from the great folks at HAAN, our newest Raise A Green Dog Partner! Just be sure to do this on a non-humid day when you can have the windows open and let the carpet dry more quickly and naturally, to prevent mold and mildew.
6. To keep carpets fresh smelling, you can sprinkle baking soda (keep pets in another room while you do this, so they don't breath it in) all over the carpet, leave for about 15 minutes and then vacuum.
7. Use a green, safe, healthy, eco-friendly carpet cleaning company. If time is an issue you can call on a green, eco-friendly, healthier carpet cleaning company. Just be sure that you know exactly what solutions they may be using on your carpet when evaluating the company. A good quality company will be completely forthright in sharing information about their solutions, and you can then look up each individual ingredient on EWG.org and insert the specific chemical into the search box to receive toxicity or non-toxicity information to that particular product.

Happy cleaning!!!

Images:
Christopher Woo
Sarah McKagen