I was wondering if anyone could offer some advice on dealing with mold growing on hardwood floors. My wife and I recently got a Chinese Shar-Pei puppy and, as most Shar-Pei do, he makes a HUGE mess when he drinks water. We have been using a rubber mat to catch some of the water but it doesn't seem to do much good because water ends up under it and I think it creates an ever worse problem.
We choose the location of the water bowl because we could tell it was where the previous tenants had their dog's bowl. It seemed a little darker than the rest of the hardwood but nothing bad at all. Much to our dismay, the little discoloration has quickly turned into a full-blown mold problem.
Important - We're renting. This townhouse is only temporary so we want to limit the money and effort put into it. We have to put down an extremely large pet deposit for our two dogs so we'd rather the landlord take any major repair costs out of that.
My questions are:
- Is it possible for us to fix this ourselves?
- Can we sand, clean, and then refinish this spot without having to refinish the entire floor? Since we're renting, we're not looking for it to be perfect, rather we just want it to look decent.
- If all of this is possible, what type of finish do we use (e.g., water-based floor finish; gloss clear floor polyurethane; water-based polyurethane gloss; etc.)?
Here's what the floor looks like:
Finally, here's the little trouble-maker:
Linear Mode
