What is that smell?? Please Help.

Please help. There is a smell in my 1 year old's bedroom (no joke, it's not nappies). I want to find out what's causing it, firstly to eliminate anything that could be dangerous to his health and then secondly so that I can get rid of it, but I am not having much luck. It smells like natural gas and seems to have got worse since the weather has been warmer. It doesn't seem to be coming from a particular place in his room, the room just has a smell in general (which passes out onto the landing if the door is left open)

I have already had the gas board out (twice now): he did every test going and could not detect any gas in the room, on the pipework, around the boiler. He agreed that it smells like gas though (hence why he was particularly thorough in his testing).

Other things considered:

Dead animal/mouse/rat in wall cavity: this seems unlikely as the smell has been around for at least 2 months and most sources seem to say that the decaying process lasts a couple of weeks

Black mould: we did have quite a bit of mould on the walls when we took the property back from tenants 5 months ago (they didn't take great care of it), but eliminated all visible mould with heavy duty products and it has not returned since (we also ventilate well and use dehumidifiers). I've read it's possible for mould to exist in a wall cavity (which would result in us having to strip the wall back totally to resolve, so i'd want to be pretty certain it was that before taking action! The gas man and environmental health didn't seem to think it would be mould.

Sewer gas: it doesn't smell like sewage and there are no drains on that side of the house. The bathroom is adjacent and doesn't smell at all, so seems unlikely. We have recently noticed an increase in tiny flies in the house though.

As I say, I also contacted Environmental Health but they were not able to help. I am looking for (constructive!) suggestions of where I can get professional help and/or thoughts on what it could be based on your own experience - it's impossible to pinpoint where it's coming from and it's infuriating. As I say my primary concern is for the health of my little boy as at the moment I'm uneasy with him sleeping in his room.

Thank you.

I once had a dead mouse under the floorboards and the smell lasted way more than two weeks - more like three months. Could be that.

Hi we had a similar problem in a room under the stairs the council checked gas 3 times and said nothing wrong even serviced the boiler and it still smelt so got the main gas provider to check and turned out there was a tiny leak in pipe that council machine content detect they fixed pipe and smell went hope this helps but not sure about the little fly though hope this helps

Thanks both for your replies.

It was the emergency gas line I called - he tested the metre for leaks as well as his monitor, and they've been out twice now so don't think it's that.

Detetcive: interesting to know that your mouse smell lasted for longer - the gas man did say decaying animals smell 'gassy', we are starting to wonder if something larger, say a pigeon or squirrel, has found its way in which would take longer to decompose. Daft question - how do you locate it? We have laminate floor so think it could be difficult to lift the floorboards.

Thanks both for your replies.

 

It was the emergency gas line I called - he tested the metre for leaks as well as his monitor, and they've been out twice now so don't think it's that.

 

Detetcive: interesting to know that your mouse smell lasted for longer - the gas man did say decaying animals smell 'gassy', we are starting to wonder if something larger, say a pigeon or squirrel, has found its way in which would take longer to decompose. Daft question - how do you locate it? We have laminate floor so think it could be difficult to lift the floorboards.

We never did - we just had to grin and bear it. Sorry

If you think it's under floor you don't have much choice as to pull a few boards up or find some one with a cable camera like they use on drains . Has the bedroom got a chimney breast in it as there where birds normally get stuck

No chimney breast (or rather it's sealed off including on the roof) but we've been having some renovation work done to the room below so some of the brickwork around the outside wall was disturbed/left open for a while - it's possible something could have got in then.

I'm ok sitting out the smell, can use odour neutralisers and such, but my concern is if we're not sure and it's actually mould and we ignore it we could be doing harm to our son's health

Gas is supposed to smell in case of a leak .Would have thaught G.B.would have located it though . Work done outside any gas pipe near . You been knocking any nails in anywere . i hate laminate floors so time to get em up and have a look round its got to be sorted . Do you know any handy men builders that are a bit savy to come round for a gander. Any water on leaking pipes causes the wood to rot check toilet area and watch concealed systymns

I have had an appalling smell on a landing and could not locate the source.

Smell is hard to describe – but a combination of gassy, dirty drains and bad fish

What made it worse is it was intermittent.

We finally discovered the problem to be an electric switch – the wires that led to the switch and the switch were slightly melted caused by the switch being faulty.

I would never have guessed it could possibly have been that so may be worth checking?