Really???

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verdilith
verdilith Posts: 12
in Fitness and Exercise
Added some gardening to my exercise tally today - I've spent a couple of hours mowing and digging - and myfitnesspal tells me I burned over 740 calories!

Is this really accurate? If so, my garden's going to be *immaculate* :D

Replies

  • hillyhilly
    hillyhilly Posts: 20
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    Sounds a bit too good to be true to me - as does the calories given for walking sometimes. I think that some people have checked with a heart rate monitor and found MFP on the generous side. However, I raked my lawn last week and I can well believe that burned the calories, I ached for days afterwards, so if you were digging and mowing maybe it was.
  • erxkeel
    erxkeel Posts: 553 Member
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    Its over estimated. Much like every other exercise on here hehe
  • bcattoes
    bcattoes Posts: 17,299 Member
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    It's possible. Gardening and yard work calories will vary greatly depending on exactly what you do and how you do it. Many things can affect it, such as What you were mowing with (push mower (no motor) vs. motorized vs. self propelled motorized vs. riding), the terrain you were mowing (flat vs. hilly), even how high or wet the grass was before you mowed. The same for gardening. Digging is going burn a good bit of calories, but was it loose dirt or hard soil? Were you lugging bags of soil or fertilizer or just carrying packs of seeds. Etc.
  • verdilith
    verdilith Posts: 12
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    looking round on the internet, it varies (according to weight, mostly) but it's averaging out at 250 per hour. I think I'll alter it to reflect that, just to be on the safe side.
  • verdilith
    verdilith Posts: 12
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    @bcattoes - I see what you mean... myfitnesspal says "gardening - general" which could mean anything.

    Mowing - large (fairly unruly) lawn, push mower. Digging involved moving a large wisteria and re-training it on a new arch. Oh, and digging the beds over a bit. I'm going to hurt tomorrow!
  • Jujubie
    Jujubie Posts: 130 Member
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    If you compare activities, you'll notice that for gardening, you get just a bit more calories spent that walking the dog. I know that when I garden, I certainly work harder that walking a dog so I have to trouble logging it. I know that I get sore from it too so something is definitely working out!
  • TS65
    TS65 Posts: 1,024 Member
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    I wore my HRM to garden once (included digging, etc.). Digging is hard work. It showed 90 minutes burning 509 (which was 5.65 cals per minute).
  • verdilith
    verdilith Posts: 12
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    well, I've definitely burned something - I'm flipping starving now!

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