How to Protect Wood Floors from Dog Urine: Tips and Tricks to Keep Your Home Clean and Fresh!

Pets are usually a source of amusement, except for when they start peeing on your hardwood floors. Pet owners are typically quite familiar with incidents where their pets have urinated on the flooring.

Dogs and cats urinate over floors and carpets because they might be in heat or not trained yet.

But these accidents are not just tedious to clean up, they are also detrimental to your flooring, especially if you have a hardwood floor installed.

So if you’re wondering how to solve this problem now, we’ve got your back. Here’s how to protect wood floors from dog urine.

Can Dog Urine Ruin Hardwood Floors?

Before we tell you how to protect wood floors from dog urine, here’s something you need to know.

Wood floors are, well, made of wood, and, therefore, not moisture resistant. Wood flooring can get damaged if it gets soaked in your pet’s urine. The wooden edges can soften over time leaving an untrimmed look.

Even more, the slightly acidic pH of the urine can stain your hardwood floor. Pet urine stains are a problem because hardwood flooring is not the easiest to clean as well.

You can always use pet-friendly flooring materials to cover your home, but if you already have hardwood installed here’s how you can protect it from dog and cat urine.

5 Tips On How To Protect Wood Floors From Dog Urine

Accidents are accidents and there’s nothing you can do about it. But here are five things you CAN do to protect your wood flooring from urine damage.

1) Apply Hardwood Floor Sealants

The problem with pet urine on the floor is that wooden floors soak up moisture.

The solution: Prevent your hardwood floors from soaking up moisture. This can be done by applying a hardwood floor sealant, a polyurethane sealant for example.

The sealant makes the floor moisture-resistant so none of it ever seeps into the wood. A barrier over the surface also means that any stubborn stains can simply be wiped off.

However, applying only one layer will not help much. Several layers of the sealant need to be applied for proper protection. You would also need to sand each layer before moving on to have a smooth result.

2) Consider Applying Penetrating Oil

Penetrating oil is an amazing alternative for those who don’t like the plastic-like finish that comes with floor sealants.

Penetrating oils seep into the wood and protect against dampness from within. Moreover, the oils only need to be applied to the area where the “urin-cident” happened.

The result is strong pet-friendly flooring with a natural finish.

3) Lay Down Area Rugs

What’s better than dog pee on hardwood floors? Dog urine on a designated part of the floor that is covered with area rugs.

Area rugs are just rugs that soak up the mess whenever your pet decides to just go for it. Having a rug cover your wood floors protects the delicate wood underneath.

Placing a rug on the floor will also protect it from other liquids and not just urine.

Wood floors, however, also need protection against scratches. An area rug will have that covered. Placing a rug over your pet’s favorite place to sleep on the floor essentially makes it scratch-proof.

4) Keep Your Pet Groomed

Cats and dogs love to scratch on stuff, including furniture, bed sheets, and wooden flooring.

If your dog has long nails the chances of random dog scratches appearing on your wooden flooring increase tremendously. Moreover, pet nails can be even more detrimental to damp floors.

As a pet owner who is trying to protect their flooring from any kind of damage, it is advisable that you invest some time in grooming your dog or other pets that you might have.

Keeping your dog’s nails clipped will prevent both accidental and intentional scratches on your floors.

You can use nail caps to prevent scratches on the floor as well.

Dogs and cats should also be given regular haircuts because too much body fur will soak up liquid from everywhere and dampen your floors when your pet decides to lay on them.

5) Prevent Pet Urine Incidents

If you frequently worry about your floor finish, and you want to get to the root of the problem, consider training your dog to prevent urine-on-floor situations.

After all, preventive measures are better than trying to fix a hardwood floor.

Potty train your dog to use the litter whenever it needs to. Keep the litter box in the bathroom and not on a wooden floor to prevent spillover damage.

Give your pet frequent potty breaks at designated times so it knows better than to just randomly piss wherever it wants.

If dog-pee-on-wood-floor is still a regular occurrence in your house, consider hiring a professional trainer.

Can I use hydrogen peroxide to clean hardwood flooring?

Dog urine on hardwood floors is a problem, but it can also be fixed with some quick thinking. The first rule is to clean the mess as quickly as possible to avoid any long-term damage and staining.

And if you are wondering, yes, you can use hydrogen peroxide on wooden floors to clean up your pet’s mess. Mix hydrogen peroxide with water and use a mop to clean up the mess.

However, be sure to wring out as much water as possible from the mop beforehand because water can damage hardwood floors more than the accident itself.

You can also use baking soda to clean a small mess. Simply sprinkle baking soda over the stained area and clean up with paper towels after 15 minutes.

Baking soda not only cleans but also prevents urine from staining your wooden flooring.

Other cleaners like soap-based solutions and vinegar solutions can also be used to protect wood floors.

How to get dog urine smell out of wood?

More than the mess itself, the aftermath of a pet urine accident is tedious to manage. The nasty odor arising from the accident site can be difficult to live with.

So if you are wondering how to get urine smell out of hardwood floors, here’s what you can do.

Use baking soda to remove the odor from the affected area as described above. You can also use a vinegar-based solution to get rid of the urine smell from your hardwood floor.

Keeping an air freshener close can also come in handy if you want to get rid of the bad odor quickly.

Conclusion

Pets can have all sorts of accidents in the house, including smelly ones as well. However, with a few simple steps protecting hardwood floors becomes a piece of cake.

First, clean up your pet’s mess as quickly as possible. You can apply floor sealants to protect wood floors from any lasting damage.

You can also achieve the same results with penetrating wood oils. Laying down area rugs provides extra protection against any sort of accidents in the future.

Keeping your pet groomed is also a good idea to prevent urine damage to hardwood floors. Moreover, you can use aromatics and other household items like baking soda to get rid of the odor from the crime scene as well.

FAQs:

Does dog piss damage hardwood floors?

Yes, dog urine has a lot of moisture that any wooden floor can absorb. This moisture can cause fraying of the edges and cause the wood itself to swell. The acidic pH of your pet’s piss can also cause staining.

How do you dog-proof hardwood floors?

Applying wood sealants and using area rugs to cover your wood floor are great ways to dog-proof floors.

Does dog piss go through polyurethane?

Dog urine does not go through polyurethane, which is why it is used in so many floor sealants.

How do I make my hardwood floors not smell like dog piss?

Sprinkle baking soda over the affected area or use a vinegar solution to cancel out the odor. You can also use an air freshener to keep things fresh.