How Do You Get Cat Pee Out Of A Teddy Bear?
If you have a teddy bear and your cat keeps peeing on it, you may be wondering why this keeps happening and what you can do about it…
How do you get cat pee out of a teddy bear?
The easiest way to go about this will require some baking soda, a spray bottle, and a bottle of white vinegar. Start by mixing one cup of white vinegar with one cup of water and pour enough of this in to fill your spray bottle.
Spray the stuffed animal on and around the area where it is stained and let this stay on the stuffed animal for 10 to 15 minutes before giving it a rinse.
After rinsing, sprinkle it with some baking soda and let it sit for another few minutes before washing it with the ‘cold’ setting selected on your washing machine. Allow it to air dry and repeat the process as needed. Unfortunately, cat urine can be difficult to clean, so you may need to do this 2 or 3 times.
Why do cats pee on teddy bears?
A brown teddy bear.
When cats pee on things, it’s generally a way of marking these items with their scent, so while it’s gross it means that your cat likes the teddy bear enough to… well, to claim it.
Unfortunately, this is not a very pleasant way for them to express this from a human’s point of view, and so a thorough cleaning with water and vinegar or even some commercial enzymatic cleaner is going to be the best course of action for now.
How can you prevent your cat from peeing on teddy bears?
Once a cat pees on something, there’s a small danger that they’ll want to do it again, especially if you haven’t been able to remove all of their scents from it with your current cleaning attempts yet. Below you will find a few strategies to help keep your cat from repeating their unfortunate teddy-bear marking behavior.
Hiding the Teddy away in a drawer is a quick fix and can certainly keep your kitty away. After all, if they can’t get to it in the first place, then arguably Teddy is not 100% safe!
With a convenient drawer, you can take it out to let your kitty play with it if they would like and in this way, such play may be carefully supervised.
Lock the room door the teddy is in
You can also simply keep the Teddy in a room that you normally lock, such as a working area, study, or exercise room. Keep in mind, however, that cats are naturally curious and this is only a temporary solution – we can just about guarantee that they’ll get in there eventually.
Cover the teddy bear in plastic
A plastic bag or even a little saran wrap can cover up the Teddy so that even if your cat tries to mark it, the bear will still be safe under a protective plastic barrier.
Just be careful, however… some plastics seem to annoy cats with their scent, so get a few kinds to try to make sure that you don’t accidentally inspire MORE spraying.
Why does my stuffed animal smell?
If your stuffed animal smells, it could be because it’s soiled, for example, with cat pee, or just old and dirty. If it’s cat pee, and the vinegar is not helping, a commercial enzymatic cleaner may well be your best bet for getting rid of any unpleasant scents which your cat has marked the stuffed animal with.
Cat urine can be very difficult to clean at times, so enzymatic cleaner along with a heavy powdering of baking soda might be your best approach. Air drying is also recommended, as after the wash it’s possible for the cat’s urine scent to transfer into your dryer and you don’t want that ending up on your clothes.
Finally, citrus scents smell good to us, but cats seem to dislike them. A natural 100% citrus oil spray can help to ensure that your stuffed animal smells good again after a few cleanings and as a bonus, the citrus scent should keep your cat from repeating this behavior.
How do you get the smell out of a teddy bear?
A spray bottle, hand gloves, and a plant in a vase on a wooden shelf.
If the vinegar and the enzymatic cleaner aren’t quite getting everything, then a much heavier attack with the baking soda might be just what the doctor ordered. Get a new package of baking soda and an old pillowcase handy, and sprinkle the baking soda liberally over the stuffed animal before putting it in the pillowcase.
Let this sit for about 10 minutes before sprinkling the contents of half of your baking soda box into the pillowcase. Now, holding the top of the pillowcase closed, give it a good shake so that the teddy bear gets fully saturated with the stuff.
Let it sit this way for about half an hour and then give it a thorough rinse and let it air dry. You might have to repeat this with the rest of the box but in most cases, this will remove quite a lot of that unpleasant scent.
Can cat pee be washed out?
Yes, it can be washed out, but the biggest problem is the uric acid content in the cat’s urine. Due to this, simply cleaning it with detergent is not always going to be enough.
The trick to it is going to be treating the area you are trying to clean with enzymatic cleaner first so that the uric acid gets broken down enough for cleaning to be effective. Unfortunately, this can take a few attempts before you get any good results.
Sadly, cat urine is pretty tough stuff, as it’s designed to mark a cat’s territory in the wild. Just keep in mind that you CAN clean it out, it’s just going to take a lot of patience and even more ‘elbow grease’ on your part!
How do you wash stuffed animals that can not be washed?
If you need to wash a stuffed animal that’s not supposed to be placed in a washing machine, then there are two main ways to go about this. The first will be spot cleaning the stuffed animal with enzymatic cleaners or with color-safe oxygen bleach such as OxiClean. Clean the affected areas, let them dry, and repeat as needed.
The second method will require a vacuum with an upholstery brush head, as well as a box of baking soda, and a big, plastic bag. Place the stuffed animal in the bag, give it a good shake to cover up the stuffed animal completely, and let it sit for 30 minutes to an hour.
After that, vacuum it carefully with the upholstery brush and give it a whiff to see if this has removed the odors. As with the enzymatic or oxygen bleach cleaning methods, you may need to repeat the process to get that stubborn kitty urine scent out for good!
Can I use Febreze on stuffed animals?
Yes. You can certainly use products such as Febreze One to freshen up the scent of your stuffed animals, although citrus oil sprays are usually a better option if there is a curious house cat in the equation.
While most cats won’t like the smell of Febreze, they dislike citrus scents and these are more likely to keep your kitty from spraying your stuffed animals.
