By Michael J. DeCicco, Enterprise correspondent
LAKEVILLE — Joseph Tomaselli believes his one-of-a-kind business partner helps beat the competition by a nose.

Tomaselli owns and operates Mold Rover Inc., a service that uses a dog to sniff out mold in homes across the region.

His partner, Cosmo, a yellow Labrador retriever, is the only certified mold-sniffing dog in Massachusetts and one of only about 100 in the United States and Canada.

Tomaselli said the doggy detection method is a growing trend and claims it is a more effective way to do the job.

"We humans smell in parts-per-hundred of a scent," said Tomaselli, 61, of Lakeville. "Dogs smell in parts-per-trillion. So if you took a baby's tear drop and cut it in half, put it on a football field, Cosmo would find that in less than two minutes.

"You can't fool a dog," he said. "Dogs have been used for years to track bodies, to track animals, drug detection, bomb detection .... Scientists cannot fully understand their smelling ability, that it's so good. I could bury mold in 10 feet of dirt and he would find it."

Tomaselli described the time he and Cosmo went into a home that the owner believed had been cleaned of mold years ago, but in which the man and wife were regularly coughing and sniffling.

Cosmo walked past an obvious place for mold, an attached greenhouse, without a response, but went right for a basement closet, where the owner found his water pump was leaking.

"Mold is everywhere," Tomaselli said. "There are 1,800 types of toxic mold ... Mold gets triggered by water and it needs food, like paper, wood, cardboard and fiberboard."

He said ordinary methods — such as air sampling using an aerosol can; bulk sampling, which involves taking a piece of a wall or dust to the lab; tape lifting and dust sampling — only find mold in the general vicinity of a room. A dog's sharp nose can detect an exact location, such as behind a wall.

"You can save your money on remediation costs because a dog will show exactly where the mold is," he said.

The cost for the Mold Rover service is 25 cents per square foot of space examined. The fee does not include the cost of having a lab analyze samples.

A native of Brockton, Tomaselli was working for a Cape Cod contractor when he got the idea last year to start the service. Although he was intrigued by the use of dogs in detecting mold, the contractor was not, so Tomaselli started his own company to do it.

Tomaselli found Cosmo at the Florida Canine Academy, a facility that rescues dogs from shelters and trains them in the field of mold detection.

Now he works daily to keep Cosmo trained. A wagon-wheel-shaped training wheel on the floor of his garage holds small Tupperware containers of mold.

He also stashes packets of mold throughout the house or outside for the dog to find. These practices are to maintain Cosmo's certification, Tomaselli said. The dog must be re-certified every three months.

Tomaselli, who has experience training hunting dogs, said Cosmo has been trained to stop and sit, or "park it," wherever he finds mold. Tomaselli then uses a variety of methods and machinery to withdraw the mold from the wall so it can be sent to a lab to be analyzed.

"Helping people protect their health," Tomaselli said. "That's hugely important to me.

"A lot of people look at it and say, I don't want to spend $300 to $400. And they're sucking in dangerous air. It's crazy. So you're really helping people identify issues that are causing bad health."

Health problems most often associated with mold include asthma, chronic fatigue, sore throats, headaches and other flu-like symptoms, and respiratory illness.

Tomaselli said mold is not dangerous to a dog because a dog has a different smelling system.

"A scent runs over his olfactory system," he said. "His nose then pushes it right out. It doesn't even go to his lungs."

Tom Hamilton of Mansfield has been a certified industrial hygienist involved in mold detection projects for 23 years. He likes the idea of using dogs for mold detection even though he hasn't tried it himself.

"I've read the reports on the technique," he said. It's another tool in the arsenal. I think it's a great idea. I haven't worked with one yet, but I look forward to it."

Hamilton said his role is to locate where mold is and develop a remediation plan.

"We look for a water event," he said. "From an ice dam, an overflow, a leak. It gets into a cavity of the house. You've got three days to get it into a drying mode. If you don't, you're growing mold."



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Jimmy McDonald
http://www.StartRemodeling.com
Jimmy@StartRemodeling.com

http://www.ToxicMoldUSA.com
McMoldMan@ToxicMoldUSA.com

Jimmy McDonald ( RemodelingGuy) specifically assumes no legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness or usefulness of any information or process disclosed. The above further expressly advises that any use of or reliance upon the information and or opinion disclosed is at your risk .
_________________________
Jimmy McDonald
http://www.StartRemodeling.com
Jimmy@StartRemodeling.com

http://www.ToxicMoldUSA.com
McMoldMan@ToxicMoldUSA.com

Jimmy McDonald ( RemodelingGuy) specifically assumes no legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness or usefulness of any information or process disclosed. The above further expressly advises that any use of or reliance upon the information and or opinion disclosed is at your risk .