On average, dogs live between ten and 15 years. Bobi, a Rafeiro dog from Portugal, has clearly exceeded this mark. He reached the almost biblical age of 31 – making him officially the oldest dog in the world.
According to the Guinness World Records, Bobi died in a veterinary hospital at the age of 31 years and 165 days. “Although he lived longer than any other dog in history, his 11,478 days on earth were not enough for those who loved him,” veterinarian Karen Becker wrote on Facebook. Just this year, Bobi was named the oldest dog in the world by the Guinness Book of Records. His date of birth was confirmed by the Portuguese authorities. Until then, a dog from Australia who was 29 years and five months old had held the record.
Bobi spent his entire long dog life with a family from the village of Conqueiros on the Portuguese west coast. His owner, Leonel Costa, reports that the dog was lucky to be able to live at all as a puppy: his parents didn’t want to keep the young dogs from the litter of four puppies because they already had enough animals. So they decided to kill the dogs. But Bobi managed to escape.
Costa and his brothers later discovered him in his hiding place, but kept it to themselves. The dog was later adopted into the family. His parents “shouted a lot and punished us, but it was worth it. It was for a good cause,” remembers Costa, who was eight years old at the time.
If you believe the popular calculation that a dog year is equivalent to seven years in a human life, Bobi lived to be 217 human years old. According to Leonel Costa, the secret of this old age is that Bobi spent his life in a “quiet, peaceful” environment. He was always able to move freely and was never put on a leash. In addition, Bobi was not given any special dog food, but simply ate what his owners ate.
Sources: Guinness World Records / Dr. Karen Becker on Facebook
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