Cleaning tips from a microbiologist

[Yellow Turtle]

Chlorine as a gas is dangerous to both environment and all the living. Bleach is formed from chlorine gas and caustic soda by some process usually sold as 12% sodium hypo content in the solution. When sold to household as bleach, it is usually around 5% content.

Water treatment and swimming pool usage is controlled usage of sodium hypo to keep a range of usually 0.1 - 0.5 ppm residual free chlorine inside the water to kill the germs in water. It is not for selective killing thus very effective for both application. The residual free chlorine inside irritates your skin and makes your eyes reddish if you not using goggles, so does that stop you from swimming and drinking from the tap water? Of course in not controlled use, the more ppm than that then the volatile chlorine becomes corrosive to environment and above 1 ppm, it is also more irritant to your skin and soft tissue like eyes. That's why it is a controlled usage.

I talk with microbiologist before and I will keep using ammonia as spray, again under consideration of simplicity, effectiveness and controlled, but I don't have much experience using ammonia as disinfectant compares to bleach and alcohol, as I don't like the odor a lot. I can't stand vinegar odor, and ammonia is worse to me.

So between alcohol and bleach? I personally will use bleach wisely as I know the knowledge and it is much cheaper than others.

 

[kathyth]

Thank you very much for this info!
Who knew?

 

[greyshirt]

Chlorine as a gas is dangerous to both environment and all the living. Bleach is formed from chlorine gas and caustic soda by some process usually sold as 12% sodium hypo content in the solution. When sold to household as bleach, it is usually around 5% content.

Water treatment and swimming pool usage is controlled usage of sodium hypo to keep a range of usually 0.1 - 0.5 ppm residual free chlorine inside the water to kill the germs in water. It is not for selective killing thus very effective for both application. The residual free chlorine inside irritates your skin and makes your eyes reddish if you not using goggles, so does that stop you from swimming and drinking from the tap water? Of course in not controlled use, the more ppm than that then the volatile chlorine becomes corrosive to environment and above 1 ppm, it is also more irritant to your skin and soft tissue like eyes. That's why it is a controlled usage.


I talk with microbiologist before and I will keep using ammonia as spray, again under consideration of simplicity, effectiveness and controlled, but I don't have much experience using ammonia as disinfectant compares to bleach and alcohol, as I don't like the odor a lot. I can't stand vinegar odor, and ammonia is worse to me.

So between alcohol and bleach? I personally will use bleach wisely as I know the knowledge and it is much cheaper than others.

Yellow Turtle I am not saying that it is wrong to use ammonia or bleach as a disinfectant, and I certainly don't want to argue. I'm just trying to inform. If someone wants to kill germs and be ecologically sound, then the water, alcohol, and vinegar are what they should use. By the way I don't drink tap water, I brush my teeth with baking soda because I don't want any fluoride. I'm extreme in some of my beliefs(I'm an old hippie). I'm not saying you or anyone else has to change the way you do things, because I never want to try to force my beliefs on any one. I just wanted people to know that this has no adverse effects on the environment and that's the difference. That being said if I could only get bleach I would use it, because it would be better than letting my tort get sick. (I use bleach in my laundry). I hope I haven't offended you and if I did I'm very sorry. I guess writing doesn't convey feelings very well, and I know sometimes my words can seem harsh, please believe me that is not my intent.

 

[Yellow Turtle]

Bill, please not to feel offended by my words. I would like to state my opinion because it is still in my field of work for now. That's why I don't direct quote your statement, although in some parts it looks conflicting to your way. For me, it's just as simple as giving others idea or option to do thing in more simpler way. As for me, being an Indonesian, I'm no good in expressing my words in the most convenient ways and I'm just familiar with the technical statement.

Last thing, not even the slightest harsh word at all in your statement, so please cheer up and have a pleasant sleep

 

[lynnedit]

I also find that giving the dish a good scrub with soap and hot water and allowing it to bake dry in the sun (or in winter, under the basking light or near a heat vent) seems to work well.
But the alcohol/vinegar or alcohol suggestion would work too.

Interestingly, rubbing alcohol and acetic acid are the components in one prescription, Vosol, for outer ear infections. So there you are.

 

[greyshirt]

I also find that giving the dish a good scrub with soap and hot water and allowing it to bake dry in the sun (or in winter, under the basking light or near a heat vent) seems to work well.
But the alcohol/vinegar or alcohol suggestion would work too.

Interestingly, rubbing alcohol and acetic acid are the components in one prescription, Vosol, for outer ear infections. So there you are.

I have done that many times as well. The sun not only kills a lot of germs but also bleaches the dish so it looks clean.
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Yellow turtle I really appreciate your reply. Looks like we are both trying to do the same thing. Don't worry, Texican (the way people who grew up ing the rural Texas speak)as I like to say, is my only language and I have an unbelievable hard time making my point understood, even face to face. My wife is from upstate New York and after 35 years of marriage sometimes she still doesn't understand what I am saying. So no problems here.

 

[RosieRedfoot]

My virology professor said her disinfectant of choice was bleach followed by air drying. I personally loathe the smell of vinegar so I use dilute bleach in my kitchen, bathroom, and critter cages (followed by a rinsing).

 

[Dr. Chompy]

Thanks for posting, I was just thinking of cleaning Dr Chompy's habitat today.. he's getting bigger and its really starting to smell like a banyard out there, which is unfortunate, since its my front porch...I usually just use water pressure to clean but I will try this on the whole porch area..

 

[Mich]

Nolvasan is great! I was using a bleach/water mix and it would eat away at my spray bottles. I first started using Nolvasan for my iguana, its safe enough that I could spray his enclosure down with it and not have to wait until it dried before he went back in, it doesn't have the harsh terrible smell or that horrible toxic downfalls like bleach. But it is expensive and hard to get where I am (Ontario, Canada). The water/vinger/alcohol solution is MUCH cheaper (and easy on the spray bottles hehe). Here Nolvasan is actually sold as "Chlorhexidine". I called every vet I cound find a # for to ask if they carried Nolvasan and not a single one knew what I was talking about .. then my main vet looked up the active ingredient and immediatly knew what I meant when Chlorhexidine popped up

 

[MasterOogway]

We always used Nolvasan in the Vet. clinic too. Thanks for bringing this old post up.

 

[Eloise's mommy]

Since I purchase a water conditioner to keep Chlorine out of my Little Eloise's water dish I am very Grateful for this 1:1:1 Vinegar:Water:Alcohol solution....the conditoner is expensive and if I'm cleaning with bleach anyways what would be the point!! Thanks so much very helpful.

 

[biochemnerd808]

My inner nerd rejoices that I'm not the only one on here that likes to know *WHY* and *HOW* these work.

In the vinegar, what matters is that it's acetic acid (which all vinegar contains), so plain cheap vinegar works. What you're looking for is to lower the pH to kill bacteria. Bleach works in the opposite way, to kill bacteria with high pH.
The alcohol helps penetrate tougher cell walls and denature the proteins inside, basically killing bacteria from the inside out.

Higher temperatures aid alcohol in penetrating cells more quickly, but with a 15 minute soaking the temp isn't critical. If you're doing a quicker cleaning, higher temperature would be advantageous.

Bleach is fine to clean with, it's just more damaging to the environment when you dump it, it's harsher on the skin, and it's not good to breathe in.

 

[sibi]

This is great for our tort's dishes, but it's also good to know how to sanitized anything if we should ever find ourselves in a survival situation (I always think the thoughts no one thinks of)