Keeping your home clean and free of allergens and debris is a big part of maintaining your home's interior. Whether you hire a professional cleaning service or take on the regular cleaning projects on your own, it is important to take care of any mold growth inside your home to prevent allergic and adverse health reactions. Here are some tips to help you clean up after moisture in your home has caused mold to grow on your home's interior wood surfaces.
Remove Surface Mold
When you encounter mold growth on your home's wood surfaces, such as wood flooring, baseboards, and furniture, it is a good idea to clean up the mold to remove any spores from your home. Leaving any mold spores, living or dead, can lead to and cause allergic reactions and adverse health effects in your family members.
Wear a face mask or respirator to protect your lungs from the inhalation of mold spores and rubber gloves on your hands. You can use several different types of cleaning solutions to remove and kill mold spores, including bleach, detergent, ammonia, vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, and tea tree oil. Spray your cleaning solution of choice onto the area of mold to stop the spores from becoming airborne.
Moisten a cleaning rag with your cleaning solution and wipe up the spores from the wood's surface. Rinse out your cleaning rag with water in a cleaning bucket when it becomes dirty. Reapply cleaning solution to the rag and continue wiping until all the mold is removed.
Remove Embedded Mold and Stains
When any mold has begun to grow within the grain of unfinished wood, it can leave a mold stain in the wood. To remove the stain, apply a wood bleach to the surface of the wood until the stain lightens. You can find wood bleach at most home improvement stores to remove stains from wood without changing the grain pattern of the wood.
You can also sand the surface of the wood to remove a mold growth stain. Some mold growth can reach deeply into the wood grain, making it necessary for you to have to sand off a larger amount of the wood to remove the mold. In this situation, you may consider staining the wood a darker color to cover the mold stain. Another option for badly molded wood is to replace the wood with a new section to restore the surface to a mold-free section.
Use these tips and instructions to help you clean mold from wood surfaces inside your home.
