Sometimes it seems as if we’re living under a constant barrage of heavy news. But it isn’t all bad out there. This feature is meant to send you into the weekend with a smile, or at least a lighter heart. Want to get The Week in Good News by email? Here’s the sign-up.

Here are seven great things we wrote about this week:

Honeybees are a vital, invisible work force in the food industry, pollinating about a third of America’s crops. But highly infectious bacteria can decimate hives.

Send in the dogs! They’re trained to sniff out bacteria and tell if any larvae have been killed before the hives are shipped away to help pollinate other farms.

Cybil Preston, the chief apiary inspector for the Maryland Department of Agriculture, and her Labrador retriever, Mack (whom she found in living in a garage), inspected about 1,700 honeybee colonies last fall and winter. Four people working full time cover less than half of what Mack can. Ms. Preston recently received a grant to expand her program, which could serve as a model for other states.