Laundry detergent for pet laundry

For those seeking advice on caring for incontinent pets and animals with kidney-related problems.
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CarolC
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Laundry detergent for pet laundry

Post by CarolC »

:bounce:
I shared this with a couple of people but want to post it here. I do more pet laundry than "people laundry", maybe 6-7 full size pet loads a week, so we use a lot of detergent. I like free-and-clear but brand name detergent is expensive when you go through bottles like we do. The only "dollar store" free-and-clear I have found is Sun Free and Clear at Big Lots, 50 loads for $2.75, but they stopped carrying the bottles and I can't handle the huge jugs.

I just discovered LA's Totally Awesome Laundry Detergent With Oxygen, the navy blue bottle. It is not "free and clear", there is a faint fragrance, but not bad. I tried it, and of course everyone has their own sense of smell, but as far as I can tell, you smell it in the washer, but by the time it comes out of the dryer the fragrance I can't really smell it.
detergent.jpg
They sell bottles that do 32 loads for $1 at Dollar Tree or 99¢ Only. Also at 99¢ Only they have the same stuff in a big bottle that does 150 loads for $3.99. It is bigger than I want to deal with, but not as big as those huge jugs of Sun. Their load estimate is based on a medium load so I use more because I'm doing large loads. One $3.99 bottle would last us maybe 5 months, that's cheap! The Sun Free and Clear I've used for the past 10 years was about 5 cents a load and the Awesome stuff is about 3 cents.

The laundry is white cotton towels, white cotton and polyester quilted pads, white fleece underpads, and light colored polyester fiberfill quilts. It includes a lot of urine, some slight fecal stains, and traces of greasy ointment, but no major ground in dirt. I have not had any doggy disaster laundry recently, but if I get some I will post how the Awesome detergent does on that.

Hope this may help someone with an incontinent pet who thinks, "The washer never stops at our house!" :)

Monday
:wash: :laundry:
Tuesday
:wash: :laundry:
Wednesday
:wash: :laundry:
Thursday
:wash: :laundry:
Friday
:wash: :laundry:
Saturday
:wash: :laundry:
Sunday...
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CarolC
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Re: Laundry detergent for pet laundry

Post by CarolC »

CarolC wrote:I have not had any doggy disaster laundry recently, but if I get some I will try to post back how the Awesome detergent does on that.
OK, had a stain on a quilted bottom sheet that was maybe a 4 or 5 on a scale of 1 to 10. Poured a full cap of Awesome With Oxygen on it and let it sit several minutes before putting it in the washer. Did not come out as clean as I'd like, you could still see it. I was thinking that since this is formulated "With Oxygen", that meant it would work kind of like Oxy-Clean, but it worked more like normal detergent. With Sun Free and Clear, when I have a ground in stain like that, I pour hydrogen peroxide on it, let it fizz, then wash as usual. Will have to do that with Awesome With Oxygen, too. To be fair, they do not advertise it as a spot remover, and I did not try rubbing it after I poured the capful on the stain.

If you're wondering why not just add bleach to the wash, I'd love to but the waterproof fleece underpads immediately get holes in them and start to leak. It must eat whatever plastic is sandwiched in the middle of the fleece.

And if you're wondering what's the big deal if you can still see where a stain was after you wash it, the dog won't care, there is a reason beyond just pride. This particular dog has an open v*lva as a result of her paralysis, and the urinary tract is inside the v*lva, and when I put her into bed at night without her diaper, I want to her be on really clean sheets. They may not be hospital clean, but at least "good and clean". I realize any dust on her feet or tail, etc, will soon also be on the sheets, but she can start with clean bedding.

It does no good to find a bargain detergent if your dog gets a urinary infection from contacting unclean bedding. You could buy a lot of expensive detergent for the cost of a vet exam and antibiotics, not to mention the guilt you would feel over letting it happen because you were being cheap. This seems to be working.
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critters
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Re: Laundry detergent for pet laundry

Post by critters »

Hmm. Interesting! Bleach has always been my friend, but, yeah, it can make fabric thin (and easy to hole) too. Plastic or vinyl sheeting can be SO fragile. If your formulation works, go for it!
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