Is ArkGuard a Deodorizer? Yes — Here's How Quat Deodorizing Works
Last reviewed 2026-08-20
Short answer: yes. “Deodorizer” is on the ArkGuard label right alongside disinfectant, cleaner, and sanitizer — it’s a one-step product in the most literal sense. The longer answer explains why a deodorizing disinfectant beats a deodorizing spray, and it comes down to where smell comes from.
Odor is biology, not air
That kennel smell — ammonia bite, sour funk, wet-dog-plus — is mostly the exhaust of bacteria metabolizing organic leftovers: urine films, anal-gland traces, food residue, skin oils. Air fresheners and fragrance sprays add a second smell on top and change nothing underneath; within hours the bacteria out-produce the perfume.
A quat disinfectant attacks the machine itself, twice:
- As a detergent it lifts and removes the organic film the bacteria feed on.
- As a germicide it kills the bacterial colonies doing the producing.
No feedstock, no factory, no smell. That’s the difference between deodorizing and masking, and it’s why the smell stays gone until new soil arrives.
The odor-elimination pass
- Remove solids, bedding, and bowls; sweep or squeegee.
- Wash the surface with ArkGuard at 2 oz/gal — or 4 oz/gal heavy-duty where grime has built up — scrubbing corners, wall-floor joints, and under mats and platforms.
- Keep it visibly wet 10 minutes so you get the disinfection kill along with the clean.
- Let it air dry. Don’t rinse floors (bowls and feeders, always).
- Hit the forgotten odor reservoirs: drain covers and the first foot of drain line, squeegee blades, mat undersides, latch hardware, the mop head itself. Chronic kennel smell almost always lives in one of those five places.
Where a quat can’t reach
Honesty section: odor soaked deep into porous materials — unsealed concrete, raw wood, carpet pad, soil — is beyond any surface disinfectant, because the source is below where a 10-minute wet film can go. Those situations call for removal, sealing, or a dedicated penetrating odor product used separately (never mixed with ArkGuard). For routine smells on the hard surfaces that make up a kennel, though, the disinfectant pass is the odor treatment.
For the full room-by-room program, see the kennel odor elimination guide.
Frequently asked
Does ArkGuard cover smells or remove them?
It removes the source. Most animal-area odor is produced by bacteria digesting organic residue; ArkGuard cleans away the residue and kills the bacteria in one pass, so the smell stops being produced rather than being perfumed over.
What dilution for deodorizing?
The routine 2 oz per gallon solution deodorizes as it cleans and disinfects. For built-up grime that keeps regenerating odor, do a heavy-duty 4 oz per gallon cleaning pass first.
Why does my kennel smell come back the next day?
Either odor-producing residue survives in porous or missed spots (drains, grout, mat undersides, wall-floor joints) or the area is being re-soiled. Odor that returns on a schedule is a map to the residue you haven't reached yet.