Bird cages get crud on them. Not just in between the tightly spaced bars, but in the crevices where the bars join, inside the wheel housing, behind the screws of the food dish holders, etc. If you have a powder-coated cage like Stewie and Mika have, food and poop (and anything that sticks to food and poop) cling to the coating of the cage. You can wipe it down when it’s still fresh, but if stuff dries between the bars, in the crevices, in the corners and behind the screws, a simple wipe-down won’t suffice.
So you can sit there with a spray bottle of special enzymes, a toothbrush and a rag and scrape out the dried up crud (and you DO have to keep your birds’ cages clean!) all the while cursing yourself for not cleaning more often so it’s easier.
If you have a backyard, you’re in luck. You can wheel the cages out the door (assuming they fit through the door) and power wash the gunk right off. Poop and food, after all, are water soluble. The first spray softens it up and then it blasts right off.
Unless you live in an apartment building without the ability to power wash anything. Our cages, after all, are way too big to fit into a bathtub.
Or… you’re lucky like me and discovered that there’s a car wash in the garage of your building!
No, not a covered full-featured drive-in car wash. Just a space with a coin-op hose. Four quarters (and a friend to help me schlep my cages down to the garage) was all I needed to finally get Stewie’s and Mika’s cages extra, super, sparkly clean. Barely had to use the toothbrush at all. Of course, it goes without saying, I just used water and did not use the sudsy/waxy cycle. Ten minutes of a high-powered spray got the gunk out of the corners that I could never reach with the toothbrush (and various other MacGyver methods to try to clean out the crevices) and then I dried everything with a rag. The cages looked better than ever.
If you don’t have access to a power washer next to your building, maybe you can throw your cages in the back of a pickup and find a gas station car wash that has a “rinse only” option. Maybe this advice won’t work for everyone, but it just goes to show that a little out-of-the-box thinking could make life a little bit easier.
Happy cage washing!
Creative Commons photo credit: Dayna Bateman
I’ve done this with my oriental rugs. Works like a charm!
Hmmm, that’s an idea. Isn’t there a power wash thing for sale on tv? I’m in an Apt, and there’s no garage, but there’s a spigot out back. I could get one and a pocket hose, and take the cages outside one at a time and blast them each before winter. Thanks.
This is such a good idea. I wonder what other things you could do this with? It didn’t harm the cage at all?