Never work with children or animals. It's a cardinal rule in filmmaking but former film veteran Stephan Lentz is breaking it big time.
After 20-plus years as a technician in the film industry, Lentz is embarking on a new venture — a sniffer dog business that detects bedbugs and toxic mould.
“It was my huge hate and fear of bugs that got me interested in this,” said Lentz, a St. Albert resident.
Bedbug- and mould-detecting dogs have been around for a few years and there are already some in the Edmonton area, he said.
With bedbugs now an entrenched pest in the Edmonton region, and increasing awareness of indoor air quality putting toxic mould on people's radar, he feels there's a good market for his new business.
“With all hope, it will just avalanche,” Lentz said.
Bedbugs emit a distinct odour that dogs can be trained to identify and alert upon detection, Lentz said. The same holds true for mould.
With their highly sensitive noses, dogs can detect very slight smells and distinguish specific odours from others that are present. This means that a trained dog can do a faster and more thorough sweep of a room or building suspected to have bedbugs or mould. In fact, sniffer dogs can search an average hotel room in less than two minutes, Lentz said.
The added benefit of a dog is its ability to detect the bugs' hidden nests.
“They like to nest in little crevices and cracks which you're not going to be able to see yourself,” Lentz said. “Without the dog, I'd be hard-pressed to go into a place and do a 100 per cent thorough check.”
The tiny bugs, barely visible to the eye, can travel through walls and ducting in buildings or in people's luggage and briefcases. Bedbugs don't carry disease like some other bugs but their bloodthirsty ways can be physically and psychologically irritating to people, Lentz said. Some people react to their bites and others don't.
Lentz doesn't kill the bugs, but produces a report on their presence. His potential customers include exterminators, property managers, hotels, hospitals, homeowners, schools and camps.
Bedbugs are an epidemic in the Edmonton region and in all metro areas in Canada, said Tom Schultz of St. Albert's Acme Pest Elimination. This is because people are travelling the globe more easily and the more effective chemicals have been phased out over the years due to health concerns. In the business since 1978, Schultz said the pest control industry isn't universally sold on the reliability of sniffer dogs.
“You have an issue of a dog given treats when it finds things. They've had in some circumstances a lot of false positives just because the dog knows they give treats,” Schultz said.
St. Albert hotelier Michael Mazepa sees the value of sniffer dogs. Two years ago his St. Albert Inn began monthly sniffer checks of its rooms.
“Rather than waiting for infestation or a problem, we have our rooms checked,” Mazepa said.
Mazepa agreed that bedbugs have taken off in the area in the last few years.
“I've been managing this hotel for 33 years. Until two or three years ago I never had a bedbug,” he said. “Now there's problems on a continuous basis.”
The Florida Canine Academy, which trained Comet, trains dogs to detect drugs, bombs, money, weapons, termites and fire accelerant. The business added mould detection about nine years ago and bedbug detection about seven years ago, said owner Bill Whitstine.
“It's really come to light the last year or two, the bedbugs anyways,” Whitstine said in an interview.
He's placed about 300 mould dogs and 150 bedbug dogs, mostly throughout North America, including about 15 in Canada.
