Holy cow, sometimes having animals is a chore. Our dog Basil loves anything stinky. She takes delight in anything putrid, rotting, fermenting… it could be as simple as deer poo, or as exotic as rotting raccoon carcass. This morning alone she came up twice with cakes of goo all over her neck. My God. It’s disgusting. I guess to be more accurate, she enjoys things with strong smells. When the violets started blooming I found her rolling in the patch of fragrant purple flowers and as far as I could tell she was just enjoying the smell. Unfortunately, rolling in flowers is far more pleasant than what she is usually found rolling in.
This month I have taken it upon myself to try to keep our pets clean in a natural way. When the dogs get slimed, the apple cider vinegar comes out! The added bonus of ACV is that the residues it leaves on their hair keep pests away including mosquitos (who can transmit heart worm!) and even fleas! If the dogs are particularly stinky, I’ve started using baking soda paste just like I use in my own hair now.
In addition to the stinky dog issues, we live in an area with very resilient fleas. They laugh in the face of modern chemical flea medications, and they love our dogs. Cat fleas and common fleas. Gross.
Last summer we got into some serious trouble with fleas. They were everywhere! They had established themselves in our home, and you could see them on your socks as you walked through the room. *shudder* I had tried the topical remedies for the dogs, both conventional and all natural. I had tried spraying them with various concoctions, including apple cider vinegar. Nothing was working. I even resorted to buying an all natural carpet spray that, despite being all natural, had the potential to be very toxic and dangerous. Finally, I started researching flea bombs. Ick.
I had several nights of tears, trying to decide what to do. I’m so against setting anything off in the house that requires me to not only seal my cupboards but then re-wash every food-related item in the house despite it being in sealed cupboards. Yikes!
It was a small forum I found through a random Google search that led me to Borax. Apparently when you apply borax thickly to your flea infestation it causes them to become dehydrated. More importantly, it dehydrates their eggs as well, destroying the unborn fleas. When combined with salt, it works even better. The possible reactions to borax include GI upset and skin/eye/lung irritation but considering it wasn’t nearly as toxic as the flea bomb I decided to give it a try.
It worked! Now, I was pretty religious about this stuff for a while there and I think it was my diligent vacuuming that sealed the deal more than anything. I did five applications of the whole house – Borax EVERYWHERE – and the fleas were gone. We would occasionally see a dog scratching here or there, but I assume it was from bringing fleas in from outside or from friends’ houses.
Now I find that if I simply sprinkle a bit of borax about on the carpets while I vacuum, maybe once a month, it keeps the fleas down. Between borax (boric acid), vinegar (acetic acid) and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) I feel like my pets are staying clean and far safer than when I was using the things I was before.
My big discovery about cleaning this month has been the use of vodka as an air freshener spray. Basically if you mix two cups of water with 1/2 – 1 tsp of vodka in a spray bottle you have yourself an unscented air freshener! It works very well in the general direction of the dog beds (or in our case we use it on the two carpet squares that our dogs lie on in the mud room that get wet-dog smelly). I haven’t gone as far as to add essential oils yet, but everything I’ve read suggests 20-30 drops of essential oils makes for a very nice level of scent. I can’t wait to get some lavender oil and try it out!
Do you use any natural methods to clean your pets or your pet related messes?
Not Dabbling In Normal 
I worked in theater for years and we used the vodka trick all the time on costumes between washings. The added benefit of the vodka is that the alcohol also kills any bacteria.
great info!
I’ve used apple vinagger too and it works.
Also I feed my dogs with natural raw food and every 15 days I put one small piece or garlic on their food and it works from inside to outside of them.. fleas do not like garlic 🙂
Our dog loves anything stinky, too. Sometimes she rolls around in the most disgusting, putrid smelling stuff ever.
I am going to give some of your ideas a try, thanks for sharing them!
I am 100% in favor of solutions (haha) that involve liquor.
Brilliant! I didn’t know about the other solutions you tried, but Borax doesn’t surprise me. My dad used it around the perimeter of all of his rooms, and he was one of the few residents of Louisiana who was NOT infested with cockroaches! (“water-bugs?”)
I was going to suggest diatomaceous earth as well. (as sort of a natural “flea powder”) It has the same dehydrating effect, but since it is made up of diatoms, it also cuts pests up! I am using it as a mite deterrent in our chickens’ dust bath. Also (and forgive me if you already know this, I am new here!) we put a little apple cider vinegar and a clove of garlic in their water to ward off internal parasites.
Oops! I see other posts in which you have discussed DE. Of course you would!
Keep up the good work!
Thanks for all the great info!
Do you have any suggestions for getting rid of ants? I’m wondering if the Borax and salt would work? And kiddos on the vodka spray!
Diatomaceous earth is a very effective desiccant.
I love your posts about natural cleaning in all sorts of areas. I have almost converted our home to natural products =) I use vodka with lavender as a body spray and since it is my favorite scent I absolutly love it! Using it as a linen spray works and now I will try it as a room spray. Thanks for the suggestion.
Our dog is anti bad smelling things (thank goodness since she is also anti getting in any water ever). But for the bugs we use TripleSure (http://www.natural-wonder-pets.com/natural-flea-control.html) Flea and Tick spray. It works great this is the second year with it and she has only had 1 tick actually bite her and no fleas to date. ( I also like that you can spray your carpets with it, I’m a total baby when it comes to biting bugs) And since it is natural I use it on my skin too, and it work GREAT (even keeps off the mosquitoes which in MN are a NIGHTMARE) The only down side is that is not water proof so this year we have had to respray her if we go out in the rain.
Our dog is, thankfully, not too stinky … for a dog. She doesn’t enjoy rolling in stinky stuff – just a daily dunk in the (pretty clean) stream at the bottom of our garden.
We only have to bathe her in actually clean water once in a while – then, I use a ground oatmeal & bicarb scrub, rinsed off with some rosemary-scented water. She smells lovely when she’s done!