5 Pet-Safe Ways to Remove Ice
Share
I’ll be honest – we don’t have much of a call to worry about ice or snow in my neck of the woods. We experience a hard freeze maybe five times a year, but by mid-morning the ice is gone. That said, we have a lot of readers who do have snow and for this reason, we want to talk about ice melts and the safest ones to use around animals.
Snow blowers, shovels, and even “powered brooms” are simple to use – and given the option, we prefer those for snow removal. But my days growing up in Utah remind me you need something different for ice removal. Rock salt is effective, but let’s face it – it’s hard on cars, people and pets. Besides, who wants to salt a walkway and have it melt into your garden? That’s the stuff of ancient lore (remember “salting the earth” so no one could live there again?).
There are safer alternatives for the paws of our pets and wildlife (and our gardens). We’re taking a look at five of them today…
[heading style=”1″ color=”#006666″ style_color=”#006666″]1. Safepaw from Gaia Enterprises[/heading]
Gaia Enterprises Safe Paw™ Ice Melter is 100% salt-free and is guaranteed pet and child safe (MSDS)! Safe Paw has been used and recommended with confidence for years by veterinarians, animal hospitals, groomers, shelters, and humane societies making it the #1 selling brand!
Safe Paw is a patented dual-effect compound made of a modified crystalline amide core infused with special glycol admixture and traction agents. Once Safe Paw has melted the ice and snow, it leaves an invisible “shield” that prevents ice from sticking to surfaces for up to 3 days. This “Teflon effect” makes shoveling easier.
[load_module id=”210″]
[heading style=”1″ color=”#006666″ style_color=”#006666″]2. Safe-T-Pet from Morton Salt[/heading]Morton Salt’s Safe-T-Pet® ice melt was developed by a veterinarian to be less irritating on paws than plain salt.
Here’s an adorable video that they developed to help show off how :
[youtube url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2yaReWVlOc”][heading style=”1″ color=”#006666″ style_color=”#006666″]3. Nature Safe from Green Valley Earth Products[/heading]
Nature Safe is made by Green Valley Earth Products and its safe for use around pets and children. This product uses ingredients that are similar to lawn fertilizer, so it can even be argued that it’s good for your lawn! This product safely melts snow and ice and even the coloring agent is even organic and photo-degradable.
[heading style=”1″ color=”#006666″ style_color=”#006666″]4. EcoTraction[[/heading]
EcoTraction is made from hydrothermal volcanic mineral. Basically, it was formed from super-heated mineral-rich water, which was crystallized and deposited into lava rock. Pretty fascinating stuff. Best of all, it has no “working temperature” limits like standard salt and other minerals. Each granule contains microscopic channels that absorb the slippery layer of water found on ice, which allows it to quickly embed itself into ice and snow.
[heading style=”1″ color=”#006666″ style_color=”#006666″]5. Ice Subzero[[/heading]
IceSubzero is a pet-friendly way to keep your walkways clear of ice. Just sprinkle the concentrated flakes over the ice (and by the way, it covers twice the area of rock salt) and it will not irritate pets paws or skin. Since it works in temperatures as low as -15 degree Fahrenheit, you can use it almost any time. The timed-release formulation helps prevent re-icing for close to three days.
Still not sure? This is a resource we just stumbled upon from Epic Gardening, a group that has done some intense research on De-Icing. No matter what method you choose to remove ice, be sure to do it in a way that will keep your pets safe and do the least amount of damage to the environment.
Since we’re not dwelling in the tundra to the north, we’ve decided to borrow a handy little graph that Consumer Reports put together – this should help you understand the “good, bad and the ugly” sides of ice removal.
[load_module id=”582″] 
