Everyone loves their pets and often does all they can to make them happy. If you have a pet water fountain to facilitate effortless water dispersal, you must have noticed slime in the fountain at some point. Whether you choose to ignore it or not, slime is a huge concern for you and your pet. Even more, you should find measures to help you prevent slime in the fountain. Failure to do so might lead to serious health complications for your pet. That is something you would want to avoid because you love your pet.
So what can you do to prevent slime in your pet water fountain?
Causes of slime in pet water fountains
Before we tackle the significant causes of slime in pet water fountains, it would be essential to define slime.
Slime is a bacteria that forms over wet surfaces, resulting in a slippery film, also known as a biofilm. In the worst-case scenario, your pets could develop severe illnesses if they get in contact with slime. However, your pets may experience dental problems, tear stains, watery eyes, digestion issues, and more in the best case.
Besides causing health issues among pets, slime in your pet water fountain can cause sickness among human beings when they touch it.
Note that a pet water fountain provides fresh moving water for pets. Typically, it attracts pets whose instinctive response is to drink water when they hear the sound of flowing water. That is why you must keep your fountain free of slime always.
Now let us look at the four major causes of slime in water pet fountains:
- Saliva from pets:When pets drink from the fountain, they are likely to introduce saliva into it. Also, pets can drop food remnants into the moving water after taking their meals. Such droplets facilitate the formation and growth of bacteria, resulting in slime in the pet water fountain.
- The stagnant Water: Most pet water fountains come with tubes that enhance the upward flow of water for pets to drink from the nozzle. However, some water may not be used and remain within the bowl. This stagnant water is a notorious breeding ground for bacteria that leads to slime formation and growth.
- The water quality:The type of water you use in the pet water fountain is critical to slime formation. Tap water, for instance, comes with planktonic bacteria, which may cause the growth of slime. It is important to treat or filter this water carefully before letting your pets drink from the fountain.
- Sunlight: Ensuring that your pets get warm water is an excellent way of making them happy. That is why you considered putting up heating units to provide your pets with warm water. However, placing your pet water fountain close to sunlight or heat sources may result in slime growth.
How to Prevent Slime in Pet Water Fountain
Preventing or removing slime from your pet water fountain is not that difficult. We will provide you with the best ways to help you avert slime in pet water fountains. Continue reading to learn these strategies:
- Replace the pet fountain's reservoir with fresh water daily
Regular changing the fountain water is among the best and easiest ways to prevent the growth and formation of slime in the pet water fountain. That means replacing your pet fountain's water with fresh water every day. You should do this even if some water remains in the fountain. Fortunately, you can use the old water for irrigation purposes or anything essential to help you minimize water wastage.
You should replace the water in your pet fountain's reservoir daily if you want to thwart the growth of slime. Some may ask, " how would you know that your pet fountain's reservoir needs water replacement?” The thing is, most innovative pet fountain reservoirs have indicators to alert you when the water is finished. All in all, it would still take time to empty all the water if you have one or two pets. It may take more than one day for the pets to finish up the water from the reservoir. Slime formation will be already underway by the time you decide to replace the water. Therefore, you aim to replace the saliva-stained water with fresh water daily to prevent the growth of bacteria.
- Clean the Pet Fountain Regularly
If you want to successfully prevent slime formation in your pet water fountain, consider cleaning it regularly. Sometimes, water replacement may not solve the slime formation problem because the bacterial formation can stick in the tubing or other inner segments. It is challenging to prevent slime when it surfaces in out-of-reach places. However, when you clean such areas thoroughly and regularly, it becomes easy to remove the slime in its entirety.
It would help if you used baking soda, bleach, vinegar, mild detergent, and more for thorough cleaning. These products help you wash off pink residues and any other remnants within the pet fountain. Having a weekly cleaning session ensures that all the residue is washed away. Otherwise, the remnants can easily mix with the water and cause serious health concerns for your pet.
- Place the Pet Water Fountain away from Sunlight and other Heat Sources
Even with your efforts of regular cleaning and daily water replacement, slime could still build up within the fountain. If you are experiencing this, you should check the location of your pet water fountain. Check whether it is near the sunlight or other heat sources. If it is in an unfavorable place, you should consider relocating it. The reason for relocating the fountain is that warmth facilitates bacterial formation, leading to slime growth.
- Consider a Stainless-Steel, Ceramic or a Porcelain Fountain
If the above efforts do not solve your slime formation problem, you should consider using a Stainless-Steel, Porcelain, or Ceramic pet water fountain. It would help to consider using a fountain made from the above materials because they are less prone to slime build-up.
Veterinarians also recommend using porcelain, ceramic, and stainless-steel pet fountains because they are less porous and less susceptible to bacterial growth. You can get some of these materials from the happyandpoly.com website.
Conclusion
Slime is a critical issue among many pet owners. Often it builds up in pet water fountains because of various reasons. It would help if you understood some of the significant causes of slime growth and formation to prevent it. Also, there are multiple strategies we have outlined in this post to help you remove or prevent slime build-up in the pet water fountain. Another way to do this is to consider pet water fountains made from less porous and less susceptible materials such as Porcelain, Ceramic, and Stainless Steel. Contact happy-and-poly today to get a good pet water fountain for you and your pet.
