I Tested The Theory That Dogs Cover Double The Distance Their Owners Do When Out Walking

You know how dog-owners often speculate their dogs cover tons more ground when they take them out for a run? I decided to put it to the test, by placing a GPS tracker on my dog, Simba, and one on myself, as we took a couple of hikes. I then put the recordings into Google Earth, playing simultaneously, to show a birds-eye-view of a typical day walking the dog. They came out well and made for some funny viewing! Both videos, mine and the dog’s GPS’, are embedded below the photos. If you’re wondering, the answer is dogs cover 42% extra distance, henceforth known as Adams’s Dog Constant.

The back-story with Simba is she was rescued off the streets of Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania, in 2013. She was the very first dog adoption of my friend Brittany, who went on to found the country’s first animal welfare center last year.

My wife and I adopted her from Brit a few days after rescue. She was only five weeks old – we never managed to find out how she’d come to be on the streets so young. After just over two years in Tanzania, we moved with her to Chamonix, France, in November ’15. Here she’s been getting a copious amount of dog walking in the mountains and has adapted very quickly to being a snowdog. Overnight, she’s made the transition from a tropical climate, with 35-celsius daily temperatures and 100% humidity, to freezing cold and snow. We still have to dress her up in a few layers when we go out, but she’ll happily hike for four or five hours in the deep powder, continuing to amaze us with her tenacity. You’ll see from the dog tracker videos that she’s a bit of a nutter and charges all over the place! I hope this story gives a couple of interesting facts!

More info: Instagram