How to remove Blu Tack and Chewing Gum from hair . . .

Last Updated on 23 February 2023 by Colette

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This is a “How to . . . ” post that I really wish I hadn’t had to discover but if you want to know how to remove Blu Tack from hair, you’ve come to the right place!! (I’ve also been told that this same trick works if you need to get slime out of hair too!)

Ben, like lots of small boys, has somewhat of a penchant for Blu Tack.  I don’t really understand what the appeal is but he’s a right monkey for bringing it home from school – yes, also known as stealing it! I’ve explained to him that he mustn’t take it and that his teachers spend ages putting things on the wall so that he can learn (his response to this was that “It was ok cos it wasn’t learning things, it was just other people’s work!“) I’ve made him take it back and apologise to his teacher, I’ve banned him from watching tv . . . all to no avail.

Today I’m hoping he managed to teach himself a lesson in why he really should stop messing about with Blu Tack!

This morning, before we had got up, he shouted from his room that he had Blu Tack stuck in his hair and that it really hurt when he tried to pull it out – cue enormous frustrated sighs from Mummy and Daddy. It was my turn for a lie in so I told Dave to just leave it and I would deal with it later.  Dave decided to have a go himself and I could soon hear Ben’s shouting and crying from my cosy bed.  Unsurprisingly Blu Tack doesn’t just come out of hair if you pull at it!! Before long we’d also discovered a clump in Chloe’s hair too – obviously this had the potential to be far worse as she has pretty long hair.

My first thought was the we would need to treat it like chewing gum and use ice but a quick google suggested otherwise . . .

The magic solution to remove Blu Tack from hair is BABY OIL!

How to get Blu Tack out of hair

1. Pour a generous amount of baby oil on the offending Blu Tack

2. Gently rub the baby oil into the Blu Tack

3. As the Blu Tack starts to loosen you can gently comb it out

4. Wash hair as usual to get rid of the oil

5. Breath a sigh of relief that you didn’t need those scissors!

UPDATE – November 2018

This week Chloe gave me the opportunity to test out my trick for removing Blu Tac from hair once again.  She had the Blu Tack matted into the lengths of her hair, right underneath, goodness knows how she had got it there.

This time round I didn’t have any baby oil to hand but decided to try coconut oil instead and was pleased to find it equally as effective.

So this tried and tested trick from removing blue tack from hair works just as well on long hair as it does on short . . . I’m just crossing my fingers I don’t need to use it again!

Alternative methods for removing sticky tack or chewing gum from the hair without scissors:

• Baby oil, vegetable oil and coconut oil are all tried and tested methods for getting blue tack out of hair quickly and painlessly
• Peanut butter is good for getting blu tack out of hair too though I’ve not tried that personally
• If chewing gum in hair is a problem for you – I have it on good authority that vegetable oil works a dream!
• If you don’t have any baby oil, freezing the gum or blu tack in the hair can be really effective – use ice cubes in small plastic bags / cling film and hold them on the hair for 15 minutes before combing through
• A toothbrush is a useful tool for removing blu tack and hardened gum matted into hair as it breaks down the gum or sticky tack without ragging through the hair itself. Rub oil or peanut butter into the hair first.

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