It is a well-established fact that indoor cats live longer, for these very reasons. Depending on their general health and hardiness, on average they may live 3-4 times as long, growing old gracefully in your lap.
But what do you do when a cat goes missing? Sometimes doors get left open, children accidentally allow Kitty to see outside and they're off, or for the very unlucky, your cat is stolen, either from your yard or your house.
Several years ago, in the province where I live, there was a theft ring that picked up purebred cats and dogs from their yards. If they were breedable (not altered), they produced puppies and kittens, if not, they were sold.
In the Fall of 2002, a ring operating in California, were specifically targeting breeders of the Bengal cats. To date, none of these thefts have been solved. In January of 2003, a Cat Fanciers Association judge in California, returned home to find that her purebred Abyssinians had been stolen. While this particular case had some very odd features, (the cats turned out to have been released in a dog park the same night), it was a theft, and the cats were not just possessions, but treasured pets. Many were found within a few days, but three weeks later, they were still looking for a pregnant female and a four month old kitten.
What can you do to prevent this kind of thing? There is only so much a homeowner can do about the possibility of break-ins and even alarm systems are no guarantee that you won't become a victim. But if your cat escapes, or is stolen, there will come the question of identity in the event it is seen elsewhere. What if someone thinks they know where your cat is, but the person holding it claims to have owned that particular cat for "ages".
More and more pet owners are opting for microchipping to identify their furry family members, cat and dog both. The one caution is that you must choose a chip that can be read by the majority of scanners. This can be discussed with your vet who will acquire the chip and do the insertion for you. (I use the AVID chips for identifying my Golden Retriever puppies.) Most shelters, vet offices, and animal control departments now have scanners to check for chips, which will enable them to contact the owners.
Go To Page: 1 2
