"We were training arson dogs for government use," said Whitstine. "Mold training isn't as hard as arson training." The company was first approached for mold dogs by State Farm Insurance, later working with two universities specializing in dog training. "Our dogs can have mold and odor accuracy repeatable in the 90s."
The work is relatively safe for the dogs because they can "purge" their noses, Whitstine said. In addition, "We use common sense. We don't go where there is a visible problem." Instead, they focus on walls and other areas where mold might be behind plasterboard, wallpaper, and so on. A dog's sense of smell is at least 100,000 times more sensitive than a human's, Whitstine said.