Removing Household Yellow Mold

While black mold gets most of the attention, ordinary yellow mold is still an obnoxious and sometimes even dangerous presence around the household. At least one type of yellow mold is toxic, while another is infamous as a source of dry rot in homes, and any type of yellow mold might be enough to trigger serious allergy attacks. Because it is difficult to determine what type of yellow mold has infested your household, any removal effort needs to be undertaken with caution.

Preparations
Don rubber gloves, safety goggles and a respirator mask before tackling any yellow mold cleanup task. These steps will protect you should the mold turn out to be toxic or an allergen. Ventilate the cleanup area, but also close it off to the rest of the house. You want to flush out the yellow mold spores liberated in the cleanup process, but also to shut them out from the rest of your house. In some cases, this may be as simple as opening a couple of windows and closing a door, but in others you may need to mount a fan and hang plastic.

Make your mold-killing solution. For wood surfaces, mix one cup of borax for every gallon of water to create a suitable solution. For concrete or masonry, mix one cup of TSP detergent per two gallons of water.

Cleaning
Vacuum the surface of the mold with a HEPA vacuum. If you do not own one, these can be rented from hardware stores. This preliminary step reduces the amount of spores liberated from the yellow mold during cleaning. Then scrub the moldy surface with a plastic scrub brush and the mold-killer. Wait a few minutes to allow the mold-killer to penetrate and then rinse with a rag dunked in clean water. Spot dry the cleaned area with a dry rag.

Follow-Up
Leave the room that was infested with yellow mold ventilated for several hours,to ensure the spores have been flushed out. Also expose the room to as much natural light as possible because sunlight is a potent mold-killer. Prevent a recurrence of yellow mold by eliminating excessive moisture and adding more light to the room. Keep shutters and blinds open, plug any leaks that might be letting water in and/or install a dehumidifier to relieve dampness.

Considerations
Cleaning yellow mold out of drywall only exacerbates the problem by adding more moisture because dry wall is slow to dry. Yellow mold in such cases should be cut out of the wall and that part of the dry wall replaced. This is best done by a professional.

Particularly severe cases of the yellow mold that causes dry rot can be addressed by exposing it to soil fungus, which is a natural biological competitor. However, this is best done by a professional.

Avoid using bleach as a mold cleanser. According to Canadian authorities, bleach is at least as harmful to you as most forms of yellow mold.