ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT As both quagga and zebra mussels have increased their range throughout North America, the development of new and innovative management practices in an attempt to contain these highly invasivespecies is necessitated. The primary method of preventing introductions of these dreissenid mussels has been the inspection of transient watercraft moving from one water body to another. However, visual inspection for these mussels alone can be very dif‘cult, and the detection of these mussels’ microscopic larval stage cannot effectively be done in the ‘eld by human inspectors. Trained scent-detection canines can provide inspection personnel with an additional method for detecting these mussels and have been shown previously to effectively detect dreissenid mussels attached to vessels. In addition to this, we found that properly training and utilizing scent-detection canines may be aviable way to detect the larval form of dreissenid mussels in standing water, further reducing the possibility of an introduction to new waters. The canines increase the effectiveness of inspections in general by being able to access scent in areas that cannot be visually inspected and increase effectiveness by their ability to detect dreissenid larva, which human inspectors cannot.
