Hawaii/Seattle - Five weeks after Labradors Maple and Mikey were born, the two brothers were separated from each other and grew up in different states. Now, five years later, their owners have reunited the four-legged friends - with a surprising outcome.

Even though Maple and Mikey grew up in completely different environments, they have one thing in common: they were both trained as assistance dogs.

Maple lives with Paul from Seattle , who is blind and relies on his assistance dog in everyday life. Mikey, on the other hand, works as a therapy dog in a hospital in Hawaii.

During their training, the Labradors learned to concentrate fully on their owners and patients and not to be distracted by other dogs . Both now showed little interest in the four-legged friends around them. They were much more concerned with helping the humans at their side and supporting them as best they could with their skills.

So it was all the more surprising on both sides when Maple and Mikey were reunited in Hawaii. Owner Paul and his partner Matthew, who have a large fan communityon TikTok , had organized the meeting in advance.

In a video you can see the moment when the Labradors faced each other for the first time in five years. When they were both taken off the lead, Mikey and Maple were unstoppable!

The dogs happily rushed towards each other, sniffed each other excitedly and then began to romp around together.

The owners agreed that they had never observed this behavior in their four-legged friends before, as their trained pelt-noses would hardly ever interact with other dogs.

But Maple and Mikey made an exception with their own brother!

It's really touching to see that the animals recognized each other immediately after all these years and were happy about the encounter.

The clip from Hawaii has been viewed over four million times on TikTok alone.