Dog years, nonsense?

[vanordinaire]

This is Misty,just back from a five mile run/cycle this morning (I was on the bike, she was running). Today is her 14th birthday or 98 in 'dog years'.
Clearly the method of multiplying a dog's age by 7 to get an equivalent human age is nonsense. I seem to remember some sort of graduated scale (eg. the first few years are equivalent to 10 human years, the next few to 7 years , and the rest about 4 years. Has anyone else heard of this and if so, how exactly do you do the calculation? And should she be thinking of retirement and getting a Honda Jazz?

Edited by vanordinaire on Wednesday 25th November 10:23

[RB Will]

I heard the same on telly a number of years ago. Again I cant remember the exact way its set out but yeah its about 10-12 years for 1st 2 years then 4-6 from then on.

Makes sense as they go from pup to fully developed adult in about 2 years then good for a bit before deteriorating into old age.

My old GSD was still jogging around at 15, not miles distance though but much better than my in laws Lab is doing at 14.
I do canicross and find most people seem to retire their dogs by 10 years old
but they are generally larger dogs that have spent their lives running hard.

[Disastrous]

I read recently that most mammals hearts beat approximately the same number of times over the course of their life. So, short-lived mammals tend towards higher heart rates and long-lived towards low.


I'd guess that dogs tend towards higher number of beats per minute (anecdotally, mine does) and you could probably work out the 'dog year' number from this.

Might be bks though!

[SpudLink]

A while ago there was a graph on the BBC News web site showing that the average lifespan is related to size, with smaller dogs generally living longer.

Edit:
I've found an article about it...

https://www.insidescience.org/content/large-dogs-a...

Edited by SpudLink on Wednesday 25th November 16:10

[RB Will]

Thats what puts me off about big dogs. I would love a Bernese or a Newfie but as my dog is now coming into the prime of her life had I got one of those 2 I would be preparing to loose it

[PositronicRay]

I talking to an Irish Wolfhound owner the other day, they reckoned 8 yrs was about it. It'd break my heart, lovely looking beasts though.

[Joey Ramone]

OP, I'm glad you clarified that it was you on the bicycle.

[Dand E Lion]

I think it's hugely complicated and/or completely random - I've rehomed ancient greyhounds rescued after years of awful conditions and thought they'd only have months left, but they've gone on for years afterwards, and the dog I lost at the earliest (10.5 years) was a well bred working springer. There is no doubt however that giant breeds (as opposed to just big dogs) don't live as long.

And you can guarantee that the ones that are most troublesome and proper PITAs wayyyyy outlast the expected lifespan!

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

Disastrous said:

I read recently that most mammals hearts beat approximately the same number of times over the course of their life. So, short-lived mammals tend towards higher heart rates and long-lived towards low.

That's true.

It's also true, apparently, that mammals over about 3kg all urinate for about 21 seconds, give or take a few seconds. This piece of research won one of this year's Ignobel Prizes.