We still have rats the size of dogs — or, at least, we have some dog breeds the size of rats. A “dog” isn’t a unit of measurement — nor is a centidog, or a kilodog, etc.
Why not just use standard weights and measures? We can’t all be as dumb as the MSM seems to believe we are.
"the species would have looked similar to modern rats but ranged in size from about 1.5 kilograms to five kilograms."