{"id":18181,"date":"2015-11-10T11:00:18","date_gmt":"2015-11-10T16:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/?p=18181"},"modified":"2015-11-06T11:05:57","modified_gmt":"2015-11-06T16:05:57","slug":"agriculture-departments-canine-apiary-inspector-passes-certification-test","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/press-release\/2015\/11\/10\/agriculture-departments-canine-apiary-inspector-passes-certification-test\/","title":{"rendered":"Agriculture Department\u2019s Canine Apiary Inspector Passes Certification Test"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mack,<\/a>

Mack and Cybil Preston<\/p><\/div>\n

ANNAPOLIS, MD<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 Despite his good looks and charming ways, Mack\u2019s life didn\u2019t start out so good. He was kept in a garage without much attention and less care. Today, Mack is the fifth dog in state history to work at the Maryland Department of Agriculture, searching and sniffing out diseases in bee hives \u2013 thanks in large part to the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services.<\/p>\n

Mack, a 2-year-old, 74-pound yellow Labrador retriever was rescued by Apiary Inspector Cybil Preston after \u201cfriends of friends of friends\u201d told her about the dog in the garage. She had already started looking for a dog to train but she hadn\u2019t yet found the perfect one. Then she met Mack.<\/p>\n

\"Mack<\/a>

Mack & Cybil training.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cHe needed to get out of that garage and I needed a trainable dog,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was fate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mack began basic obedience training the day Cybil took him home \u2013 something the wild pup needed. \u00a0The Maryland Department of Agriculture then asked the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services K-9 trainers to assist in training and certifying Cybil and Mack as an American Foulbrood detection team, inspecting honey bee hives for the disease. When the K-9 handlers met Mack last March, they thought he might be a little too laid back and fun-loving for real work, so they gave Cybil some drills to work on.<\/p>\n

They did so well that by July, Mack and Cybil were training alongside other Labrador Retrievers, German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois \u2013 only instead of learning to scent and find contraband or drugs, they were learning to hunt down American Foul Brood, a contagious and fatal disease that infects honeybee colonies. Honey bees are critical to the pollination of a myriad of agricultural crops \u2013 as many as 40 percent of all crops grown in Maryland. Cybil and Mack officially graduated from the program and became a certified detection dog team on Nov. 3, 2015.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe commanders at the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services were extremely knowledgeable and accommodating, and they looked out for me the entire time,\u201d said Cybil. \u201cMack wasn\u2019t the typical kind of dog they deal with but they evaluated us together and put us on a path where we were able to accomplish our goal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Correctional Services handles more than 60 K-9 dogs trained to sniff out prison contraband such as drugs and cell phones. The department was more than glad to help teach Mack how to lock on an odor and develop a search pattern.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s basically the same training that we do for our contraband detection work,\u201d said Major Greg Shumake, the department\u2019s K-9 Unit Commander. \u201cMack\u2019s at the point now where he is ready to hit the field.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mack<\/a>

Mack & Cybil training.<\/p><\/div>\n

Now that he\u2019s on the job, Mack and Cybil will work to reduce the incidence of American Foul Brood in Maryland bee colonies during the fall and winter when the bees are dormant. A trained dog can inspect 100 honeybee colonies in 45 minutes. An average human inspector can inspect 45 colonies in one day. Early detection of the disease will save Maryland beekeepers substantial monetary loss from eradication of diseased bees and destruction of infected equipment.<\/p>\n

The Maryland Department of Agriculture has had a bee dog on staff since 1982. Klinker, the last bee dog, retired earlier this year. As far as the department can tell, it is the only one in the country with a bee-disease-sniffing dog on staff.<\/p>\n

###<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ANNAPOLIS, MD\u00a0\u2013 Despite his good looks and charming ways, Mack\u2019s life didn\u2019t start out so good. He was kept in a garage without much attention and less care. Today, Mack is the fifth dog in state history to work at the Maryland Department of Agriculture, searching and sniffing out diseases in bee hives \u2013 thanks  Read the Rest…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18181"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18181\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18187,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18181\/revisions\/18187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/mda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}