Mack, a two-year-old yellow Lab is the newest addition to the Maryland Department of Agriculture’s apiary inspection team.
Mack joined the team last fall to help his owner, Cybil Preston – chief apiary inspector – inspect beehives for American foulbrood. AFB is a highly contagious bacterial disease that infects honeybee brood, and eventually kills the colony.
Maryland has a thriving beekeeping industry, and most of their beekeepers have thousands of hives that travel from one state to another for pollination.
Part of the Maryland Department of Agriculture’s job is to make sure that no infected beehives cross state lines. They are the only state agency in the nation that has a “bee dog” on staff to help detect AFB.
Mack was taught basic commands and was partnered with the team at the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services to complete a 14-week training program for him to become a certified detection dog.
He works from November to April in the field, moving from beehive to beehive – sniffing each one for the distinct odor of AFB infestation. When he smells AFB in a hive, he sits to alert Preston that a manual inspection is needed.
With the use of his nose, he can inspect a total of 100 hives in 45 minutes. Preston has to open each hive to do a visual inspection, slowing her down; she can inspect only 10 hives in the same amount of time.
A year ago, Maryland state inspectors were able to check 2, 200 hives and found 13 cases of AFB.
Mack’s success rate isn’t clear yet as hives were dormant when he started doing inspections last fall. In field trials, he was 100 percent successful in identifying AFB.
In Maryland, having a canine apiary inspector is an economical way for performing greater number of inspections and improving AFB detection. Not only that, having a canine in the team also brings an essential attention to control the spread of the disease.