I'll say it seems excessive.

In Florida, we never cleaned our carpet the eleven years we lived in one of our houses. We installed it new and it didn't look all that bad when we moved.

Question: why is it the pupster seems to get the carpet dirtier here in East Tennessee than she did in Florida? Is it age? Is it the air? Is it the grass? I'm not talking dirty from pee or getting sick. I'm talking dirty from just laying around on the carpet. The carpet here is almost identical to the carpet in Florida.

I have allergies, and the doctor suggest cleaning the carpet once a year to kill dust mites. I would assume those without allergies could go longer.

The park the puppy and I frequent is very dusty right now, so the whole house seems to be covered with the stuff. I change my a/c filters every couple of weeks, and I bought a cheapie carpet cleaner, like a steamer, but no heat. I use it every couple of weeks also. It does seem to help keep the carpets fresher. It's has a super beater & vacuum on it, so all the little spots that aren't really bad come out. Could the drought be adding to the dust in the atmosphere? Florida didn't seem to have an dust at all, just sand from the beach. Martha Stewart I am not, so this having to dust thing is a real pain. As for professional cleaning, just moving the furniture off my carpet would be a real chore. I also can't afford it.

I think you should clean the carpets as often as the market will bear, and if the terrorists get control of the dust mites, that will be pretty often! You definitely want to vote Republican to keep the dust mites in America's hands.

As long as we are fighting them over there, the terrorists are not winning, and except for the carpet cleaning and voting Republican, all the fighting is over there. The main thing is to not announce a time when you plan to move the table.

I think 6 mo is excessive and I would minimize this process. If it is steam-cleaned, or other process that adds water, chances are good you may instead grow mold spores.

model housekeeper

Ha, ha, ha... snort, ha, ha, hahaha!

you may instead grow mold spores

Oh, geez thanks. Something else for me to worry about.

When we had ours replaced a few years ago the carpet guy said not to clean them until we really needed to. It would remove the protective stuff (thats a technical term he used) that comes on them from the factory. Don't know about after that. Had them 6 years now and they still look good.

Asking a carpet cleaner if you need to have your carpets cleaned is a little like asking a barber if you need a haircut. The answer is always the same.

Depends a lot on the pup, I'd guess...

Curious. I posted this once and it didn't appear, but, I use the Rug Doctor about 4 times a year, and that is not excessive. It is always needed.

I have beige carpet, two inside dogs, and live in Red Holler.

I vaccum once a week and wipe off their feet after a walk.

A lot depends on your allergy level and color of your carpet, I expect.

We had one of the professional cleaners clean our carpet one time and the gentleman asked how often I vacuum. When I replied once a week or more often if needed, he said we should vacuum once or twice A DAY! If this is true, June Cleaver didn't have that much time on her hands after all.

Something I only recently discovered is that if you "rake" your carpet occasionally, (and if you have dogs) you can rake up enough dog hair to stuff a large piece of furniture in short order.

I do use a broom on my tile floors every day, but ain't no way I'm going to vaccum the whole house every day. No way.

And, Carole, the experts say the best way to wash a floor is on your hands and knees and with a brush. Then you rinse and wipe with a towel.

But, who cares what they do? I use a mop and rinse and let it air dry.

(link...)

Since gadgets/tools were mentioned, for any dog owners out there who have issues with pet hair, I highly recommend the 'FURminator'. It's a small rake brush that you can buy at Petsmart (and other places I assume). You'll think it's nuts when you see this little curry-looking brush costs about $60-70, but it is simply amazing.

We have two labrador retreivers and they shed. We have hardwoods everywhere except for carpet in the family room downtstairs (well, tile in the kitchen). So, pet hair generally doesn't 'hide' in carpet at our house. Once we started using the furminator regularly the amount of pet hair we had to clean dropped substantially. We've recommended it to friends and they come away with the same opinion.

See the website and demonstration here (link...)

CBT