Meet Finley, our sweet, stinky, skunky dog. I had always heard of people's dogs being sprayed by a skunk, but somehow I thought I would never have to face it. I was wrong. Last week we were all having fun outside, when all of a sudden we smelled an intense skunk scent. Where was Finley? She was out in the field playing in the same direction that the skunk smell was coming from. We rushed her inside to the shower and I immediately threw a can of tomato sauce on her hair. (This was her second shower of the week I might add. There were even more later the next week...)
I was knee deep in a tomato blood bath with her when I hollered to ask Dusty to look up how long I should leave the tomato sauce on her to get rid of the smell. He did a quick search and discovered that tomato sauce doesn't actually get rid of the smell it just blocks you from smelling the skunk scent while it is on her hair. Since we weren't going to let her prance around the house and sleep in our bed covered in tomato sauce, he kept searching. He then discovered a "skunk soap" as we call it, that promised to neutralize the skunk smell. He found it at humanesociety.org, so we figured it was safe. Quickly he went to the kitchen to whip up a batch.
That stuff works! Everywhere I used it on her, the smell was completely gone! You can't get it in the dog's eyes due to the hydrogen peroxide ingredient, so I didn't use it on her face (that part of her still smelled a little for a few days), but there was marked improvement.
Here is the recipe:
1 quart of 3% hydrogen peroxide
1/4 cup baking soda
1 teaspoon liquid dishwashing soap
Visit https://www.humanesociety.org/resources/de-skunking-your-dog or click the link above for all the details.
There are a few things to note:
1) Don't get it in the dog's eyes.
2) Don't leave it on the hair too long because the hydrogen peroxide can bleach the hair.
3) DO NOT try to bottle this stuff for next time. We did this without realizing and the bottle definitely exploded just like the humane society said it could. (We missed that bit of information when we were scrambling to get it on her.)
We hope this information helps you out. I can't believe I had never heard of it before! I'm all for folklore and old wisdom, but the tomato juice myth has been debunked!