Bunsen (right) and Beaker on a recent trip to the mountains. (Supplied)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

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Two of Red Deer’s best-known dogs are continuing to make waves in the canine-verse.

Bunsen and Beaker, whose dad is Lindsay Thurber science head Jason Zackowski, will feature prominently in a soon-to-be released mobile game called Updog City.

Zackowski’s says the pair’s more than 85,000 social media followers are sure to get a kick out of it.

“In the game, the player goes from different dogs and you have to learn their secret handshakes and high-fives,” the ZedScience creator says. “Bunsen and Beaker are two of the main dogs you have to learn from.”

It’s a little like Guitar Hero, Zackowski says.

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“It’s exciting, but it’s also becoming a little bit surreal, and almost normal. When I tell people who don’t know what I’m talking about, they’re like, ‘Your dogs are on Twitter and in a mobile game?’ It’s hard to wrap your head around.”

Zackowski, Bunsen and Beaker also recently shot footage for an upcoming episode of The History Channel’s History Erased program. He shares that the episode will focus on how humanity would have turned out without cats and dogs, and it will air this fall.

Meantime, the group’s Science Pawdcast is churning out new episodes, with Zackowski making the world’s current events a focal point.

“I’ve made it my goal to have black scientists on the podcast. I’ve gone out of my way to find black astrophysicists, and others, including a lady who does Tik Tok videos about animal facts, and she’s a biologist,” says Zackowski. “I have a cosmologist who studies neutron stars. I haven’t excluded others, but I decided to go out of my way to give them a voice.”

He admits that as a, “middle-aged white guy from Alberta, Canada,” there’s nothing that’s ever held him back in life.

“This is the thing: maybe that’s why people jumped at the chance to be on the podcast, because a lot of scientists have dogs themselves, and they know pets don’t judge you based on the colour of your skin, who you vote for, or your sexual orientation,” he says. “They love you because you’re you, and Bunsen’s kind words and empathy we try to push on social media have made it a really inclusive space.”

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