Curling up on the couch with your pet, watching a movie or reading a book is the best way to spend an evening . . . but what about all of that hair and fur they leave behind?
We know our pets shed, and we are forever trying to find creative ways to clean it up and keep it out of our house. Our furniture, though, is usually made of a kind of fabric so it’s super easy for the hair and fur of your pet to get trapped in it.
Since we use our furniture every day, it makes sense you want to find a way to keep them as hair free as possible.
The Quick Answer
One of the quickest and easiest solution to prevent a bunch of pet hair from getting onto your furniture is to make sure you keep your pets off of the furniture.
With dogs, this can be achieved with training them to stay off of certain pieces of furniture. Unfortunately, cats will climb on furniture as they want to so it’s much harder to keep them off of the furniture.
This solution, even though it might seem simple, doesn’t mean you won’t have any pet hair on your furniture but you will likely have less to deal with. This option can also help reduce some of the pet smell and dander transferred from your pets to fabric furniture.
Rubber Gloves
You probably have a pair of rubber gloves laying around the house, like those used for washing dishes. You can dampen the gloves and run them along the couch, or other furniture, and the texture plus damp of the gloves will pick up all the hair.
If you don’t have a pair of rubber gloves on hand, you can use a damp sponge in place of them and it will work very similarly. As an alternative, if you are in a rush you can use dry gloves to quick up small bits of dog hair in between bigger cleanings.
This option is also much more environmentally friendly as it doesn’t require you to use endless amounts of tape to pick up dog hair.
Do you have wooden furniture?
If part, or all, of your furniture made of wood? To remove pet hair from this furniture and prevent it from settling on it, use furniture polish or an anti-static dust spray with a soft dusting cloth and wipe it over the furniture. The spray will remove the electric charge of the hair, so it doesn’t stick and can be removed. Further, this spray will prevent hair from sticking again.
Regular Vacuuming
When you vacuum your home, do you only vacuum the floors? When it comes to fabric couches you can also vacuum them to remove the dog hair from the fabric and crevices of your couches.
Most vacuums have attachments for the hose that can get into the narrower parts of the couch and between the cushions.
As a bonus, when you vacuum your couches and other upholstered furniture you can help remove some of the smell and pet dander that your beloved four-legged family members leave behind.
If you want to, before you vacuum you can sprinkle a little baking soda on the couch about 10 minutes before you vacuum.
Baking soda can help absorb the odours in the couch, if there are any, so as you vacuum you will pick up the hair in addition to freshening up your couch.
Professional Cleaning
Every so often, having your couches professionally cleaned can go a long way to removing the pet hair that seems to never be gone. You can have a company come in and do it for you, or you can get your own steam cleaner and solution to do it yourself.
The professional cleaning will help preserve the look of your furniture and keep it smelling fresh.
You might also like to read about: Best Shark Vacuum for Pet Hair and Hardwood Floors
Lint Rollers
Some might think that lint rollers are meant for clothing only, but why not use them on your couch? If you have to clean up quickly, or just need to pick up a few stray hairs, lint rollers are perfect to keep around the house for removing pet hair from your couch and other furniture.
A lint roller will remove hair without damaging the fibers of your couch. The sticky on the lint roller isn’t dangerous to the couch so it won’t damage the fabric or wear it down by removing the pet hair.
Tape
If you have duct tape or masking tape hanging around in one of the drawers of your house they can both come in useful when it comes to removing pet hair.
Take a piece of tape and place it sticky side out around your hand, forming a circle. Then, take the tape and move it in sections over the couch where you notice the dog hair. This method is very effective for you removing pet hair, lint and other little pieces of debris that might be hanging out in your couch.
While this method is very effective, it’s not the fastest or most efficient. Depending on how much pet hair has built up in the fabrics of your couch, you might find yourself replacing the tape very frequently. You will likely go through a lot of tape with this method, so it might be slightly wasteful. If you have only a small section you want to remove pet hair from then this method might be an easy and quick fix for you.
Damp Washcloth
Have you ever had to clean up a spill on a carpet, and as you wipe it up you notice all the pet hair gathers on the cloth you’re using? Use this to your advantage when it comes to removing pet hair from your furniture.
Take a damp washcloth and rub it against your couch. This will cause the hair to clump up and it will stick to the washcloth, and that way you can easily pull the clumps off and get rid of them.
This method will leave your couch a little damp – which makes sense – so you’ll want to make sure you have time to let the couch air dry after rubbing the damp cloth over it.
An Old Toothbrush
If you have a few stray hairs that seem to just be stuck and won’t come out with other methods, you can try using a toothbrush. The bristles in a toothbrush are fine and really close together so they will usually pick up any stray hairs left behind.
It’s important to make sure the toothbrush is clean and doesn’t have any toothpaste residue on it, and that you won’t be using the toothbrush for anything else afterwards.
If you don’t want to use a toothbrush, many pet stores will sell a fur remover brush – which is actually a bigger version of using a toothbrush.
Keep it Humid
When the air in your home is too dry, the static electricity in the air can make pet hair that much more annoying.
If you can, making sure there is adequate humidity in your home. That will make pet hair less likely to stick to furniture and therefore easier to vacuum off when you need to.
And keeping your house humid does not mean buying a humidifier. You can also use some innovative DIY solutions to humidify your house.
Wash Cushion Covers
Not all couches have removable cushions, but if yours does then you might have a step up for removing pet hair from your couch.
Take a vacuum to your couch first to remove all the hair you can so it doesn’t clog up your washing machine. Then remove the cushion covers and wash them as per the directions on the tag.
Alternatively, if you have a couch where the cushions are removable but the covers aren’t you can purchase covers to put over the cushions so that you can wash them. There are also couch covers you can put over the entire couch that are completely removable and washable.
Minimize the Shedding
This might seem like an odd option for removing hair from a couch, but it’s more about prevention so the hair doesn’t get stuck in the fibers of your furniture.
Depending on what kind of pet you have, you might experience more shedding. You can help with that by regular brushing and grooming of your dog. There are special brushes you can purchase from your local pet store that help with shedding, before your dog hops up on the couch.
Regular cleaning and prevention is going to keep your couches looking their best, and these tips only take a few minutes to do each week. Take a little bit of time to save your couch, so you don’t have to kick your dog out of his favourite spot!
As much as we love our pets, their shedding is sometimes difficult to stay on top of. Their hair can find its way into the crevices of your furniture, making it difficult to get completely clean. With a few of these tips and a different approach to removing the hair, you can keep your couches and furniture looking absolutely brand new – no matter how many naps your best friend is taking on them!
