Skunk smell

[MaxHollyNoah]

Hi there,

Just one and a half hours ago, when I let the doggies to the yard before going to bed, Holly came right back and started acting like crazy, rubbing her face and paws against the floor! Then, dashed in Noah and did the same thing! I immediately smelled some kind of chemical/plastic smell and I panicked without knowing what it was in the world happening

I called my husband and our son and they went to look for the source of the smell while I rushed Holly and Noah to the shower! I didn't use any soap thinking it might cause a chemical reaction, because I was thinking it was some kind of chemical at that time. It was very scary.

They came back and told me they saw a skunk in our yard!! I can't believe why a skunk was here. We live in a suburban of Portland with population of 87000 or so!

Fortunately Daisy was safe. I guess Holly and Noah chased the skunk as soon as they saw it and got splashed right into their faces.

Holly got most of the smell off but Noah is still stinky. I will have to do the Hydroproxide recipe tomorrow. It is already 1am but I can not leave my doggies alone since they are very nervous and my husband didn't want them in our bedroom so I will be sleeping on the couch with them...

[kjd]

Poor Holly and Noah!

Dogs love smelly scents, but skunk is not one they like! Sounds as if a plain shower worked well for Holly. And I think that skunk perfume is more than a smell so that treating it like a chemical attack was probably excellent.

The wild animals have moved into urban areas more and more lately. We have deer, fox, wild turkey, opposum, racoon, coyote -- perhaps we, too, will have to watch out for skunk! You would think there are enough of them on Capitol Hill!

kjd

[crazycrayonmom]

I feel your pain MHN! If you found the on-line recipe for the peroxide skunk remover, double the dish soap amount and only use Ivory soap. That's what worked for us. You have to be very careful around the face area though. You can't get any of the solution in their eyes, ears or nose. It's too harsh. Don't forget to clean their collars too. When Koko was skunked the first time we actually gave up on her collar. We couldn't get the smell out at all. We left the collar outside and 6 months later it still stunk!

[mcridge]

Sounds like several posters know about the formula: 1 qt hydrogen peroxide plus 1/4 cup baking soda plus 1 teaspoon detergent. A similar formula was given me by a local vet when my dog tangled with a skunk.

Information about how this works and why can be found at:

Skunk Spray

The researcher explains the chemistry, why the peroxide and baking soda rinse works (it oxidizes the odorous chemicals), and gives links to other pages and websites in case you're interested.

A side note: My barber says that he would leave peroxide on human hair for 20+ minutes to bleach it. The above article says leave it on the dog for 5 minutes, perhaps that's why the dog doesn't get bleached much.

[crazycrayonmom]

Koko is a black dog and she definitely bleached lighter after only a few minutes of the skunk solution on. She's now black with light brown frosted tips. lol

[kjd]

Has she gotten any compliments from the males yet? Those frosted tips sound beautiful!

kjd

[cpfiber]

I can honestly vouch for the vet recipe.....peroxide, baking powder and dish soap water....the only thing we did alittle different was wet the dog first and scrub a small amt of baking powder down into the undercoat then proceeded as normal.....washed with the mixture. It was such a relief to everyone - that no one noticed any after smell at all.....its surprising what 2 yorkies can get into.