Help! My house smells of Tom cat pee.

[D0oinMeCleanin]

We don't have a cat.

I have 2 dogs. One of them has an occasional accident (usually about once a week). If this is through the day I wet vax it immediately with an enzyme based pet stain cleaner and then spray white vinegar on it. If it's on an evening and thus too late to switch on the noisy vax I soak as much of the patch up with paper towels as I can. Soak it with the enzyme cleaner and draw a chalk line round it so I can Vax it the next day. This has always worked.

About once every 2 weeks I move all the furniture and vax every room the dogs are allowed in just to keep the stale dog smell at bay. Again this has always worked. The house normally smells of pet stain cleaner, which I spray liberally around the house daily because I like the smell of it.

One day I came downstairs and there was a really over powering smell of ammonia. It didn't come on gradually, so I don't think it's the dogs. It happened over night.

I do leave windows open so I suppose a tom cat could have broken in and peed, but the terrier would have caused chaos so I'm not even sure that happened.

I've owned tom cats before. Anyone who has owned tom cats would know the stench is unmistakable.

I cannot for life of me find the source of this smell. It happened 3 days ago. Since then I've moved all the furniture and vaxed the entire floor with enzyme cleaner daily. I've washed all the skirting boards with disinfectant. I've washed the dogs beds. I've waited until the carpet is dry and the used neutrodol carpet powder, left it down for an hour before hoovering it up. Ive done this daily for the last three days. The smell is still there.

It is taking over my life. I need it gone before I totally lose my sanity.

On the plus side all of this moving furniture and dragging around heavy carpet cleaners is having a positive effect on my waistline (could also be because the smell is very off putting when you're trying to eat) otoh my jeans keep falling down and I've spent all of my money on various pet cleaners, deodoriser and disinfectants so can't buy new jeans.

I am about 24 hours away from burning the house to the ground to kill the smell

Can you get an ultraviolet light to show up any urine stains?

I've already ordered one but surely by Vaxing the entire floor I will have already cleaned the area?

If it is a tom cat they spray standing so it might not be on carpet like if they were squatting but on a vertical surface, wall? Curtains?

It's hard locating a smell, you might need to go out and come in again with a fresh nose.

If its a male cat it wont be a puddle of pee on the carpet it will sprayed up the wall or furniture

My mum is coming round to help in a while.

It's driving me round the bend. I am seriously considering moving and forgoing my deposit.

So I need to clean walls too? I've cleaned the skirting boards would it go higher than that?

Yes the spay can get everywhere. I would sugar soap the walls and wash any curtains too.

Spray*

I don't have curtains. I have vertical blinds. I will sugar soap them.

I have leather sofas. What's the strongest cleaner you can use on leather? I normally use a weak bleach solution but if it's pee that will make worse, I think.

If I find this bastard cat it won't need to worry itself about my terrier

It can go quite high

see here

Hopefully you can locate the smell and get rid of it.

Biological washing powder breaks down whatever is in cats wee and neutralizes the smell, that should be ok on leather I would think.

Btw when your ultra violet light comes and you think your house is actually quite clean it's really not, I got one this week and I am

Could it be on a front or back door? The cat may not have actually got in.

I haven't washed doors. I will add doors to my list, however the smell is strongest in the dining room (which is the window I usually leave open) and it's an internal room. I will wash the window also.

are you sure its cat pee?

The reason I ask is that I thought the cat had peed in my sons room. Turned out it was his trainers, that he wears without socks. DIsgusting stench was permeating the whole upstairs.

Threw the shoes outside, opened the windows - problem solved.

doh! that wasnt supposed to strike out. Are you sure its cats pee....

No I'm sure it's cat pee but by moving the furniture daily and Vaxing I would have found any offending item. The downstairs of my house is spotless from all this cleaning and it's not often I can say that

Do any of your neighbours have a friendly neutered cat? If you bring that in the room and just quietly observe it it will find and concentrate on the wee

Biological washing powder is definitely the way forward. Wash everything in that room that a cat could have got to. Then go out for a while and see if you can still smell it. The smell could be stuck up your nose.

when I see the stray to spraying in the gardenit's around knee hight for ghe main bit but the fine 'mist' goes higher/lower than that.

hope you find it. it's thus smell.

can you get fly mesh so you can leave to window open without a cat coming in?

My mum has been. She can't pin point the exact source but thinks it's strongest around the tumble dryer, which is under the open window.

We've been to the retail park and stocked up on sugar soap, more enzyme based pet cleaner and I finally had an excuse to buy the mumsnet steam cleaner. I will kill this smell today.

I used bio washing liquid in the wet vax but the enzyme cleaner is based on the same principle.

She says I am imagining the smell in the rest of the house. It's only in the back room.

When a stray tomcat went and peed in our house I was going mad trying to locate the smell. I got next doors dog to come round and she correctly found all the 3 places the cat had sprayed. I followed her round and put a postit note everywhere she really spent a long time sniffing. I concentrated on those areas.

You don't leave your dryer door open do you? My cat pooped in mine gag

It's fading. It's not gone yet but it's not as pungent.

I vaxed, steamed, sugar soaped and enzyme cleaned anything and everything around the dryer. When I came home from work the smell wasn't as strong. I'm going over it all again today.

The smell is gone!!!

Now there is another smell that had been masked by the tom cat pee

The children could smell it. They thought it was their rats. After I explained it could not possibly be their rats dd2 asked "What would happen if you spilt milk on the sofa bed and didn't tell anyone?"

I'm spending today cleaning the sofa bed. I still haven't found the tom cat in question.