Ever pondered on a question and searched online just to find that the same answer is repeated time and again without any reference to the original source? Well we have the definitive answer to one such question – just how long does a dog spend asleep every day?

“He’s sleeping more than normal.” How often does that phrase appear when you take a clinical history? But what’s normal? Can you rely on the owner’s observation? Is the increase in sleep accompanied by other worrying behaviors or is the pet just having a lazy day?

It’s those sort of questions that Vetrax was designed to answer. Vetrax doesn’t stop at tracking – it monitors behaviors over time and against what’s ‘normal’ for the pet and the general population of pets. As a result, Vetrax has accumulated an evidence base for what is ‘normal’.

Dr Google says dogs sleep for 12-14 hours per day. Based on 28,000 dog days of data, across all breeds, genders and weights of dogs, we can confirm that the mean time dogs spend asleep is 10.4 hours over a 24 hour period. On some days some dogs sleep for less than an hour and others sleep for 19 hours, so, as we would expect, there’s massive potential for variation.

Surprised? And perhaps a little envious as you put your head down hoping to catch eight hours? It sure is a dog’s life!