Carpet Catastrophe: Revenge of the Red-eared Sliders

I'm afraid that I've ruined the carpet in the living room of my rented home. I hope someone out there can help me fix the problem.

I had a 50-gallon red-eared slider turtle tank that cracked, leaking water over a quarter of my living room carpet. It soaked through the floor of living room and literally "rained" through the roof of my basement, all over my carpet and furniture downstairs. Even though I mopped up as much of the water as I could as soon as I discovered the leak, put fans up to help the water evaporate, and even steam-cleaned the carpets upstairs and downstairs, my living room *still* smells rank (there is no odor downstairs). I've tried soaking the carpet with antimicrobial Febreeze and using baking soda to remove the odor, but it remains.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with red-eared sliders, they are really poopy creatures. Even with a powerful filter in the tank, the water in their tanks need to be replaced regularly; the water that leaked out of the turtle tank was pretty disgusting and smelly.

My landlord is mean and hates getting any sort of repair phone calls. There's a strong possibility that he will try to evict me if I tell him about this -- I really want to avoid that if at all possible by just dealing with it myself.



Suggestions? Anyone?

Signed,
Desperately seeking fresh air

Well now your stuck with having to buy new carpet, padding and possibly a new sub floor and sheetrock in the basement ceiling if there was any.
The first thing you do when there's a major spill like that is remove the carpet and toss the padding and let the sub flooring dry out with fans blowing on it, spray the sub floor with a midicide, shop vac out the carpet.

Even then if the carpet smells or is stain and a carpet cleaning machine can not clean it, it's trash.
I'd be thinging about a differant kind of pet. I hear snakes are nice.

Thank you for your input, Joe, but I'm really looking for a solution that doesn't involve replacing the carpet. There was no sheetrock in the basement ceiling -- just some tiles -- and they've dried and look fine. I'm convinced that the bacteria from the turtle tank are what's causing the odor, and that if I can only find a way to kills those bacteria, then the odor will go away. The carpet *did* dry thoroughly and quickly, and I'm fairly certain that mold is not an issue here.

I will pull up the carpet and check the subfloor and toss the pad.

Has anyone ever dealt with something like this *without* actually replacing the carpet? Are there any cleaning products that can get the odor out of the carpet and pad?

Wow was the turtle ok? 50 gallons is a lot! did u call a Capet cleaner pro? That might be best bet other then replacing it
Try boiling water and a pinch of mr clean
Scrub and scrub repeat after it drys.
WD40 will brake down any hard chemical like paint can try that but might brake down the carpet as well.

wow - I hope the turtle was ok? I would suggest speaking to a specialist pet shop/breeder of these turtles as they might have some suggestions in the event of this happening. You might also get some advice from an aquarium that might have experience in clearing up after turtles in general.

Another point, not sure if you are based in the UK or US, but in the UK you might just lose your deposit, but if the landlord knows you are keeping the turtles - he might be covered with his landlords insurance anyway (every case is different, but it might be worth checking this out first)- I know thats not the answer for you as you want to sort it out before he finds out.

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