Looking at this article, there’s only millimolar concentration of ammonia in feline urine (mean 118mM, range 16.9-292 mM). I’d be very surprised if anyone was able to generate significant quantities of chloramine gas by mixing bleach with cat urine.
It actually makes sense; if cat urine contained ammonia the smell would be gone once you washed your cat’s impromptu litterbox, since ammonia is both volatile and highly soluble. And yet it keeps stinking - this hints that there’s something else there producing that ammonia by decomposition. (Probably proteins. Cats eat a lot more protein than we do.)
Note: chlorine gas is the one that leaks from an open bleach bottle, and gives it a distinctive smell. The ones created by reacting bleach with ammonia are chloramines, considerably more poisonous.
Isn’t chemistry all a matter of scale though? I admit it’s not my field
I mean, if the cat pees on the rug and you clean it up right away, that’s probably not a big deal. I imagine it’s a different story if you’re cleaning out a hoarder’s cat colony in a poorly ventilated area and don’t dilute the bleach because you wanted something stronger
Yes, from my personal experience. We mop up dog pee in the house all the time with hot water and a splash of bleach and it’s totally fine. It bubbles a little when you rinse the mop in the bucket and you can definitely smell the reaction occurring.
However, I also once cleaned the back patio of my old apartment of a summer’s worth of dog pee on concrete with about a gallon of straight bleach and had to wait for it to air out for about 20 minutes because it was a definite chemical hazard. As in, eyes burning, and difficult to breathe. I started pre-rinsing with the hose to dilute everything prior after that.
I have a dog that insists on marking inside the house in a few different places and no amount of training, deterrent sprays, or preventative potty breaks has been able to fix it. It wasn’t a problem until we had a housemate move in with a dog who peed inside the day they moved in and it’s been non stop ever since.
As for the concrete patio, I had a dog door that my only pup at the time could use to let herself out with. The entire space was concrete with a small strip of dirt that had some trees and stuff. I would be gone for work for most of the day so she’d let herself out to use the bathroom. I’d clean up the poop and stuff but the pee was kind of a pain to get up and off and I was really busy for a few months. She was getting walked or taken to the dog park nearly daily.
I assure you, both of my dogs are extremely well taken care of. I’ve spent hundreds of dollars and dozens of hours to try to alleviate the peeing inside problem at this point and pretty much everyone, trainers included, is at a loss for how to get him to stop. But thank you for your concern. I’m sure you would do better than me but I just can’t be as superior a being as you.
I don’t think there is enough ammonia in human urine to create chloramine, considering bleach is widely used for cleaning toilets and bathrooms. Let alone cat urine.
Friendly reminder that using bleach to clean cat pee can fucking kill you and your cat
I mean, I’d be kind of surprised if it did kill you, but ammonia and bleach mix to make an extremely toxic gas
Looking at this article, there’s only millimolar concentration of ammonia in feline urine (mean 118mM, range 16.9-292 mM). I’d be very surprised if anyone was able to generate significant quantities of chloramine gas by mixing bleach with cat urine.
Thanks for sharing this data - it’s great.
It actually makes sense; if cat urine contained ammonia the smell would be gone once you washed your cat’s impromptu litterbox, since ammonia is both volatile and highly soluble. And yet it keeps stinking - this hints that there’s something else there producing that ammonia by decomposition. (Probably proteins. Cats eat a lot more protein than we do.)
Note: chlorine gas is the one that leaks from an open bleach bottle, and gives it a distinctive smell. The ones created by reacting bleach with ammonia are chloramines, considerably more poisonous.
Damn autocorrect, I thought I had typed chloramime.
Isn’t chemistry all a matter of scale though? I admit it’s not my field
I mean, if the cat pees on the rug and you clean it up right away, that’s probably not a big deal. I imagine it’s a different story if you’re cleaning out a hoarder’s cat colony in a poorly ventilated area and don’t dilute the bleach because you wanted something stronger
Yes, from my personal experience. We mop up dog pee in the house all the time with hot water and a splash of bleach and it’s totally fine. It bubbles a little when you rinse the mop in the bucket and you can definitely smell the reaction occurring.
However, I also once cleaned the back patio of my old apartment of a summer’s worth of dog pee on concrete with about a gallon of straight bleach and had to wait for it to air out for about 20 minutes because it was a definite chemical hazard. As in, eyes burning, and difficult to breathe. I started pre-rinsing with the hose to dilute everything prior after that.
… Why are you constantly cleaning dog pee indoors?
Why was there so much dog pee on a concrete patio?
Neither of these things scream “good dog owner” to me.
I have a dog that insists on marking inside the house in a few different places and no amount of training, deterrent sprays, or preventative potty breaks has been able to fix it. It wasn’t a problem until we had a housemate move in with a dog who peed inside the day they moved in and it’s been non stop ever since.
As for the concrete patio, I had a dog door that my only pup at the time could use to let herself out with. The entire space was concrete with a small strip of dirt that had some trees and stuff. I would be gone for work for most of the day so she’d let herself out to use the bathroom. I’d clean up the poop and stuff but the pee was kind of a pain to get up and off and I was really busy for a few months. She was getting walked or taken to the dog park nearly daily.
I assure you, both of my dogs are extremely well taken care of. I’ve spent hundreds of dollars and dozens of hours to try to alleviate the peeing inside problem at this point and pretty much everyone, trainers included, is at a loss for how to get him to stop. But thank you for your concern. I’m sure you would do better than me but I just can’t be as superior a being as you.
So you’re saying there’s a chance.
I don’t think there is enough ammonia in human urine to create chloramine, considering bleach is widely used for cleaning toilets and bathrooms. Let alone cat urine.
Is it good on hotdogs and pretzels?
I hear that the hot new trend is subway surfing
The issue is not ammonia (at least not when it comes to urine) but rather urea, which also reacts with hypochlorite to create chloramines.