bedbugdogexpert

The dogs appear to be less than perfect but my experience in watching a termite dog work - they are exponentially better than humans alone and as was mentioned above much faster. NESDCA should bring this method to better use by consumers and provide a greater confidence level. It is not an inexpensive proposition for the business owner to provide this service. It requires or should require time to learn the procedure, then the cost and maintenance of the dog or dogs, and periodic recertification etc…
In the field of medicine we require and expect this type of dedication and certification. Eventually, this increased standard will bring better and faster results for consumers. But it will probably mean many smaller operators will be out of certain aspects of pest control unless they subcontract for the use of such dogs. I applaud these pioneers and many more will do so also if bedbugs and other pests become the problem many predict they will be in the future.

Richard,

I hate to do this, but I must respectfully disagree with you on some points. In regards to claims of 90%+ accuracy, the certification standards developed by NESDCA REQUIRE at a minimum, a 90% accuracy rate. To date there are several dogs that have certified meeting that accuracy standard. It is true that the market has been flooded with dogs trained to a much lower standard, and it is very difficult for the end consumer to tell the difference by simply looking at a dog or talking to a handler which dog is which. It may be those dogs that your are referring to. That goes to the very core of why NESDCA was formed. Will every dog perform well above that 90% mark every inspection? The simple answer is no. But even if a dog meets the minimum standard of 90%, you are looking at a tool at least twice as effective as a human inspector alone. And several orders of magnitude faster.

buggeroff, as an aside, I believe it is Customs dogs that are REQUIRED by their standards to be 100% accurate. So it certainly can be done. It is expensive, and time consuming, and huge numbers of dogs wash out. That is the difference between 90%, 95%, and 100%… it an almost exponential growth in cost vs. return. What any particular task requires is determining where the point of diminishing returns reaches the point of “good enough”. If it a dog that is dealing with a life or death situation, I want that 100% dog a bunch more than I do a 90% dog. If it is termites or bedbugs, honestly, 90% is probably a very reasonable expectation.

As to the multiple dogs with multiple handlers… I agree there is a very real need for 2 dogs. I see no reason you need multiple handlers. The truth is, even with 1 dog you could in theory work out a decent protocol to deal with the threat of a false alert.. something along the lines of barring visual evidence at the location of the hit, returning on a different day and just working that area. But this increases the labor cost by a huge factor. The biggest cost in any inspection or treatment practice is not really the dog. It is the handler and the associated labor cost. With two dogs and 1 handler, you reduce that labor cost (at an increase in fixed cost), and still can get the confirmation on the hit. I guess this debate on 1 or 2 handlers could fall under the category of getting a certainty factor of 98% instead of 90-95%.. but at a 100% increase in the cost.

From a marketability standpoint, there is no way hotels would pay the added cost, and while the very wealthy residential customer could foot the bill, most of the discussions I see on this forum are on how to get costs of treatment and inspections down to the level of affordable for most.

Richard, I very much respect your opinion, even if I differ from it on this topic. You certainly also hold many people’s respect for your ethical standards. I certainly look forward to seeing you in Las Vegas in a few weeks.

There have been comments on the bedbugger site about Cooper Pest Solutions returning a bed bug dog. We spent a number of months evaluating a bed bug sniffing dog and did in fact return it once our evaluation was complete. Our assessment of the inspection technique is that we believe it can be a highly effective method if the dog has been trained correctly and is handled correctly. In addition, we also believe that a two dog system for verification purposes is also necessary to better address the subject of false alerts. I recently had a discussion with a dog trainer in Florida who made the point that in order to truly address the false alert issue you need to use two different handlers in addition to two different dogs which I would fully concur with. The question becomes how much assurance do you want in your results and how much are you willing to pay for the increased level of assurance? Suffice it so say, if my organization chooses to offer bed bug dog detection services it will be with a two dog system. I have the utmost confidence in the trainer that we worked with (J&K Canine Academy) and would work with them again in the future should we decide to move forward with canine scent detection for bed bugs.

Richard Cooper

I appreciate the participation of K9Handler and Sam Smith. I hope you’ll come back and participate any time.

Sam–I will link to the nesdca.com site, and I hope you will link to Bedbugger too. We all benefit from more interaction–here, there, and everywhere.*

*At Bedbugger you get extra points for comments quoting Beatles lyrics, in context, of course.

Keep up the good work NESDCA. It is clear to me and others what your agenda is and we applaud you for taking the first step to making sure the public has a choice (a good choice) when it comes to K-9 Inspections.