[EllieMom]

Ellie thought the pigs would like some perfume. So she sprayed their cage area with Febreeze air spray. I am beyond upset at her right now, but that's immaterial. Could this harm our pigs? What should I be looking for? What should I do? I already turned on the space heater and opened the window to air out the area.

[mooser]

I'd get them out of that area till it airs out more. They'll probably be fine..

[kleenmama]

It's not the best thing for them, but I think they'll be ok. Change the cage bedding in case any drifted onto it.
Look online for a number for Febreeze manufacturer. You could call them and ask. It might even be on the can or bottle.

[Rai]

I would probably want to bathe them, so they don't ingest any.

[EllieMom]

They're downstairs away from the area having some floor time. I've got the number off the bottle of Febreeze and I'll be calling them momentarily. I think they'll get a bath next and then while they're drying, I'll change the bedding and wipe down the cage. Arrrggghh! My poor girls.

[EllieMom]

They're back in their cage. Everyone and everything has been thoroughly cleaned. I swear you could perform surgery on their pigloo, it's so clean. The lady at the consumer hotline for Febreeze claims their product is nontoxic, but I didn't expect her to admit that their spray could kill small animals, so I took that with a grain of salt. The girls are all pissed at me, of course.

[Amy0204]

I saw you called the consumer hotline. Febreeze is made by P & G and as a former employee, I know they do pretty thorough safety testing. And they do take consumer issues very seriously. I'd demand to know if there's a way to get the Febreeze off the surfaces (just to confirm you cleaned with the best solution). Also, did you consider bathing the girls just in case that stuff got onto their skin?

[EllieMom]

The girls did get a nice bath, which they think they could have lived without, but I wanted them to have just in case. They've been running around in their hay since I put them back in the cage and smell like nice fresh hay instead of melons now. I'm going to call the hotline again re. what to wash surfaces with. It got on the wood floor and left a terrible sticky mess.

[aqh88]

Febreeze is nontoxic but I don't know if it's nontoxic no matter how much they ingest so cleaning the cage and pigs was probably a good idea. Your wood floor may be in trouble though. I know some similar products break down some of the polishes used on wood floors and they have to be recoated(waxed?, whatever it is).

[glade]

Of course it is not good to spray on them, but it may make you feel a little better that the ASPCA has given febreze their seal of approval to use around cats and dogs.

[shannen]

How old is your daughter?

[EllieMom]

I do feel much better knowing that Febreeze is okayed by the ASPCA. And I think it's off my floor now (vinegar and water seems to clean just about anything). But that stuff is nasty.

"How old is your daughter?" She's nine and she should have known better. That's one of the reasons I was so angry with her today. I don't know what possessed her to do something like that.

[whittibo]

Ah, a nine year old. Old enough to "know better", but still young enough to do things without thinking clearly. :)

My oldest who will be 13 on the 15th of this month, she is old enough to be responsible too, but failed to call me when testing was over last Tuesday. They were the last kids there, and the teacher had to wait 45 minutes for us to get there! And she's almost 13!!!

Kids make mistakes, I know it was chaos at the time, but now the piggies are all fine and everyone has calmed down, I hope you can have a nice quiet talk with her and explain that you weren't mad at HER per se, but you were worried about the pigs and that you want her to really think about things before she does them.

Now with that advice, I can tell you, I would still be pissed and yelling at my girls. ;)

Glad it all worked out. Sorry for the stress it caused, remember, she's just a kid.

[EllieMom]

"Old enough to "know better", but still young enough to do things without thinking clearly. :)"

You got that right! I can tell you're a mom, too. :) Luckily, everything and everybody is nice and calm now. Even me. But I know that Ellie will think twice before doing anything questionable to or around the pig princesses in the future. Thinking she might have hurt them was a much worse punishment than anything I could have said or done.

[twofinepigs]

But man, those pigs smell fresh!

[EllieMom]

Actually, she sprayed them with some melon-scented version. They smelled like little fluffy cantaloupes.

[whittibo]

That's how kids grow and learn, by making mistakes!

We live on a hill, our driveway is gravel, my girls would run down the driveway, I would have to yell at them all the time. Our pediatrician told me once, "don't yell, let them fall, they won't do it again". Guess what? Yep, he was right.

Unfortunately we have to make mistakes sometimes while we're learning. She didn't mean to do anything harmful, her heart was in the right place. That's what is so sad.

My middle daughter once put her hamster on my manual treadmill, she thought he would like to run on it. Well, he got in the flywheel and she tried to get him out, he braced himself, she thought he was stuck, she turned it and smashed him! He survived, but only on a prayer! He was never quite right after that, but wasn't in pain, he still did everything a hamster did, but it was a learning experience for me AND my daughter. I hadn't even considered she was too young for a small pet. So it was my fault just as much as it was hers. I will say, he did live to be 2+ years old, just wasn't as fast as he should have been.

I am glad everything worked out OK for you EllieMom. Trials and tribulations, that's what kids bring to our lives. :)

[JaneDoe]

"They smelled like little fluffy cantaloupes"

Funny! As opposed to fluffy little eggplants?

[TexCavy]

Cantaloupes... Makes me think of Bing, "Were sweet and round like cantloupes, We hop around like fatty little antelopes"

[ladyveg]

EllieMom, I totally know what you mean. Daniel never, never, never got into stuff when he was smaller. Jason can't take any kind of medication without leaving the cap off and the bottle sitting open, so that's been tested.

Last year, Daniel was telling me how he wanted to put peaches in the blender and make air freshener out of it. He thought he could use an empty air freshener bottle and fill it with the peaches. I said, "That's a good idea," meaning, sometime in the future when you are a famous scientist.

Ten minutes later, I hear Daniel screaming in the basement. He comes upstairs holding his head. I couldn't understand him except he has a sudden horrible headache. I freaked out and got him in the car, then smelled him and tried to get more information. He was trying to empty a bottle of CitreShine and decided to spray it all on his head. I ran in the house, grabbed the bottle, got him to Urgent Care. On the way, I asked him what possessed him to do that--he sobbed, "I thought it would make my head smell fresh!"

They got all the chemicals off of his scalp and he was fine. He had red skin on his head for a couple days. Anyway, that is so close to what Ellie did I had to tell you.