Safety of Natural Oil Heat Diffusers (Pine and Fir)

[jazee]

Background: I'm not an overly Paranoid Pet Owner (which you can tell from a lot of product reviews, there's a lot of them out there.) I just like to be informed with the REAL facts, not just opinions.

Years ago I switched from real Fir trees for Christmas to artificial. Since then I was on a mission to find a scent that smelled like real Xmas trees. I mean REALLY, like fresh cut, fresh fir sap, smell. It was a lot harder than I thought it would be as everything I tried had a Foresty/Christmasy smell but not just a plain old fresh cut tree smell without smelling artificial.

I hit the jackpot when I tried the pure natural Balsam Fir Oil from Target (under their own brand). Bingo! Smelled like a true real fresh cut tree and nothing else! But it was pain to remember to drip a few drops on the tree everyday and it didn't even last the whole day. So I found the US Company Scent Fill which makes all natural oils that fit in the Airwick plug-in heat diffuser. The set came with the Sycamore Fir and the Fraser Fir+Balsam pine scents. The latter came close but not as true to a tree smell as the Target oil but I figured heck, it's close enough so plugged it in the corner behind the tree on the lowest setting. Makes the scent around the tree noticeable but you don't smell it if you are more than 10 feet from the tree. Even if I leave the house for part of the day and come back, I don't smell it when I walk in from the garage.

To try to make a long story less long, bottom line, does the Airwick with natural fir/pine (no phthalates) oils pose a significant health hazard to cats if the smell isn't that strong throughout your house? The cat does sleep at about the edge (10-12 ft away) of where the Airwick his so I'm sure a tiny tiny amount of oil is problem in his fur (but he doesn't smell like the oil.) I can't imagine how many pet owners use the other artificial scents with the chemicals in their homes to cover up odors. Is having some pine/fir trace oil in the air harmful or is the risk negligible compared to the cat actually ingesting pin needles or drinking from the water bowl of a live tree? Maybe best to ask the Vet but my gut says even they may not have a true idea.

Interesting that this article seems to advocate using the reed diffuser method saying the heat diffusers release more chemicals. I wonder though if that holds true for natural oils without any phthalates?

Essential Oils for Cats: Benefits, Risks, & Considerations

My gut is telling me the real risk is in more direct exposure such as eating/drinking substances/liquids with these oils in them and a diffuser without phthalates set on a low settings may at worst make the cat want to stay out of the immediate area of the diffuser?

 

[Caspers Human]

Certain kinds of pine, spruce or fir tree oils aren't good for cats. It has to do with the blends of chemicals (terpenes) found in different kinds of trees. Terpenes are also the substances that give evergreens their distinctive scents.

The problem is that I forget what "flavors" of terpene are bad for cats and which trees they are found in. IIRC, fir is okay but pine is bad. Don't quote me, though. I'm only going by memory...which often fails me.

It's not such a big deal, anyhow, because most cats don't care for the scent of evergreen trees and will shy away from it. (As you have seen.)

We only have one product in the house with fir oil in it. Dr. Bronner's Sal Suds. It's a household cleaner that is diluted in water before it's used. It's good for cleaning up cat puke, spilled food and similar things. That's mainly what we use it for. The scent of fir oil only freshens up the area, temporarily.

The only scented product that we use for freshening the air is incense sticks. We use "Nag Champa" (frangipani flower) incense. We like the scent and it doesn't seem to bother the cat. We only use it if the cat leaves a particularly stinky one in the litter box or if somebody cuts the cheese or something like that. Even then, we only burn it for five minutes or so. Then we put it out and just let the smoke waft. We're not trying to fumigate the house. We only want to freshen things up.

Maybe there's a kind of incense that you would like. All you need is a metal tray and a holder. Just don't fumigate the whole house with it.

 

[jazee]

Yes, after more searching. I've found conflicting information but you confirmed what I did find is that it appears that relative to other oils known to be toxic to cats, fir is lesser so. So a very moderate use of a fir oil, maybe either applied once a day on the tree, or in a diffuser on a timer at a low setting (so it's not running 24 hours) would probably be reasonably safe.

" Balsam Fir Essential Oil is generally safe to use topically around cats. "

Balsam Fir Essential Oil Benefits, Uses, and Recipes - Simply Earth Blog

I assume topically means not ON the cat, using it topically on yourself while being around cats. Of course one could argue topically using fir oil and putting it in a diffuser to fill a room a very different things.

The oils listed to not use in a diffuser around cats per the blog post the above article links to are as follows and I've seen this list repeated in multiple sources. However I've also seen a mode fundamental discussion mentioning phenols and terpenes which I believe are found in both pine and fir oils. My take is that the level of phenols and terpenes in fir oils are lesser so than pine. Tea Tree is supposedly one of the more toxic. Patchouli is also not good. Bit I think it's common sense to not diffuse any of the below and on the fir, be very sparing. A lot of people can go pretty overboard on the scents in their homes. Since they smell it all they time they get desensitized and when you are a visitor you walk in and it's like WHOA!

• Basil
• Citrus oils (probably won’t harm your cat, but they may not like the smell)
• Birch
• Cinnamon
• Clove
• Dill
• Fennel
• Tea tree
• Oregano
• Peppermint
• Thyme
• Rosemary
• Spearmint
• Wintergreen

 

[CatladyJan]

Here is my take on all of this. I love diffusers, plug ins, wax cubes.... BUT they irritate my skin, membranes including my mouth. For me the issue is that the cats may be experiencing such things or other and you wouldn't know it.

 

[jazee]

The more I think my gut tells me a lot of cat owners are just the type that would use those plug-in diffusers even with some of those scents like citrus and others and may not even know it's bad for their cats. I've never used them but I also never knew you needed to keep cats from drinking out of the water dish of a real fir tree. I suppose though it's not a huge risk as if it were these things would probably be much more common knowledge amongst cat owners.