Protect Your Pets From Your Plumbing (And Vice Versa)

If you are a pet owner, you’ve probably read a good number of online articles about how best to make your home safe for your furry and feathered companions. Electrical safety is especially important, as well as knowing what food items to keep out of reach.

But have you ever thought of your pets and your plumbing? You may need to take a few precautions to keep your pets safe from possible mishaps with the plumbing. It works the other way as well—your pets may accidentally cause problems with pipes and drains!

Our plumbers have a few tips on ways to make your pets and your plumbing get along better so they both stay in good health.

Put drain strainers in shower, tub, and sink drains

Any plumber in Acton, MA can tell you that unclogging drains is the most common repair job they do. And among the many causes of clogged drains, hair trapped down in the drainpipe is the one they see the most often. Hair clogs usually occur in shower and bathtub drains. This is where a pet can speed up the clogging process. Animals often like to sleep in tubs and showers, and cats often curl up inside sinks. The shed hair that goes down the drain can mean trouble, fast.

The best defense against this (and this is true even without pets) is to put strainers into the drains. You can easily remove the strainers to clean off the caught hair and keep it from going down the drain in the first place.

Watch out for exposed pipes

Exposed piping in the house is a safety hazard for pets and young children. Since you usually can’t have the pipes removed (although you can always ask a plumber about it), make sure any exposed parts of the plumbing have some type of cover around them to prevent animals from chewing on them. Under-the-sink plastic pipes are the most vulnerable to this.

Reduce the chance of scalding

Scalding water coming from a water heater is a health concern in homes, and a reason that we advise people not to tamper with the aquastat settings on the water heater or ever raising it above 140°F. Scalding water is bad for people, but even worse for pets. You can have plumbers install pressure balancing valves to help prevent scalding if you’ve had trouble in the past with sudden temperature changes.

Don’t let pets drink from the toilet

Letting a dog drink from the toilet used to be an acceptable way to provide water for them. However, this is potentially deadly for dogs because of the many chemicals used in cleaning toilets as well as unclogging them. We want to emphasize that you should never use chemicals to attempt to unclog toilets or other drains. But even standard bowl cleaning chemicals will leave behind toxic traces that can poison animals. Keep the lid down and put out fresh water in a clean bowl for your dogs.

Supervise a dog that loves to dig

Got a dog that loves to dig in the backyard? Make sure the dog always has someone watching, because a dog who digs down too deep may damage a buried sewer line!

Basnett Plumbing, Heating & AC has served the MetroWest Area since 1987. Schedule any plumbing job you need with us today.