Lost Cat advice
- Thread starter Chris Brown
- Start date
Chris Brown
Super Member
I think they have a small dog. Not sure about the cats unless they are indoor only.
A few years back we had one of our cats come back with a very bloody torn up tail. We had to clean and bandage her tail every day for over a month (with her doing her best to remove the bandages at first). After that we shifted to a significantly more indoor policy with our cats. The only cats we tried to let outdoors are the ones who went outdoor prior to our change, as it's difficult to bring a cat back in once they've experienced the outdoors. Even then, we try to bring our cats in at night. This cat (the one in the picture who went missing) was somewhat of an exception, since she was so determined to go out, it solved the issue of her doing her business on the carpet, and it seemed to be doing wonders for her weight. I hope she can learn to strike a balance like the other cats have done.
Well Chris, I am praising God that your cat is back, if a little worse for wear. Right now, I don't think I would be able to handle any more bad news, especially if it's cat related.
MudSlideSlim
Well-Known Member
Wow... I feel so much better ...I'm sure you feel 'more better' too. (excuse the grammar)
jhtstone
StarShine 10/23/2014
It is likely that she got hung up somewhere on the collar and could not get loose. Break away collars are an option, including for those that tie their cats outside. I did almost loose a cat to hanging but found her just in time.
Your persistent and diligent visits are what brought her back home. If you lose a cat, door-to-door flyers and talking to everyone in the area is your best bet. Hopefully, a cooperative neighbor will be the one to find the cat. A live trap left where the cat was last seen also can work.
The risk, however, is that someone or something will intervene first.
As for the comment above about the remaining survivor of a close pair...be it cat or dog. Since my avatar, StarShine became sick and eventually passed, her companion and sister has grieved for the loss of her best friend. It will never be the same when two companions are separated.
From your description of her injury she may have tangled with another cat...the back of the neck is a cat's preferred spot for the coup de gras. Either that her collar got caught in something & she injured herself getting free. Glad she's back!!
Our cat wears a break away collar. It's came home without it a few times, I guess that means it works.
Rodzilla
Super Member
both of our cats came from the SPCA and both are chipped,i can't say if its the same for every SPCA or shelter but here its not optional,it's part of what you're paying for and agreeing too when you pay the adoption fee.there is some peace of mind in knowing that if they do go missing and ever wind up at a shelter or vet,we'll be contacted and we can bring them home...the problem is that they do have to wind up in pretty specific places to be scanned for ID,and landing in the ditch after being hit by a car is not one of them,nor is being killed by people or larger animals that they may encounter,or even well meaning people who adopt "strays" without ever taking them to the vet....we love both of our cats,we rescued them both from shelter life and from worse lives before that,we're happy that they're both chipped,but because we love them,they stay in the house
Mystic
We're all born mad
It can be unnerving. @ the Inland Empire I once witnessed a trio of coyotes taking on a good-sized dog, shepherd-type mix. Dog got away but it took a few bites. A few years before that a coyote found its way into my uncle's compound in Covina. Coyote was greeted by our 140+lb Rottweiler. That coyote went the way of "a small cat", its head damned-near torn from its trunk. Varmint, pest, what-have-you, I nonetheless buried it on our property.
Mystic
We're all born mad
Seconded, thirded, or whatevered @ this point @ the thread. Glad yer kitty is back @ the ranch & safe.
jhtstone
StarShine 10/23/2014
Microchips are a good thing and provide an extra bit of protection against a cat or dog being lost. However, there are two very important things to remember.
First, not everyone scans for chips. Some shelters flat out refuse to. The pound in the Flint area is one that has for years made excuses for not scanning for chips. Even when they do, if they do, they scan dogs only. The cats are considered to be to much trouble for the few that are actually chipped. They also have the policy that if a cat is brought in, if you say it is yours and you no longer want it, it's put down immediately. There have been documented incidences where someone claimed the animal was theirs and it was not. In one case, the real owner showed up within 20 minutes. It was too late.
Second, there are a few different manufactures of chips. Not all scanners will read every brand of chip. Some only read one brand. Therefor, even if the animal has a chip, the scanner may not pick it up. Oftentimes too, even if the chip is found, the owner never registered the animal with the chip company or failed to provide updated contact information.
I had one cat push the screen out of the window and escape. The cat was not chipped but we did locate him about a week later with the help of a neighbor and a trap. It is always a good idea to microchip and immunize your animals, even if they are strictly indoors. If they do get lost, do not rely on the chip to bring them home. There is no substitute for doing everything possible.
Rodzilla
Super Member
yikes,you paint a pretty grim picture of the shelter situation where you are..as a rule the SPCA and smaller shelters here are no kill shelters,they will only put an animal down if it's medically necessary.they do not euthanize to make space,and there is no time limit on how long an animal can stay.they genuinely seem to care about the animals in their charge.the Provincial animal shelter is the SPCA...there is no city or govt run pound that i'm aware of.
while i don't doubt you're right about there being some issues with incompatible scanners and chips from different sources,one would hope those who use this technology would know of this and equip themselves to deal with it.
when we adopted our last cat,her records didn't show that she had been chipped,so being that it's not an option for them,they agreed to do it right then before we left with her,i can tell you it literally takes about the same amount of time to scan a cat as it does to scan a can of soup at the supermarket checkout..she waved the scanner over her back and *beep* there it was,it wasn't recorded as being done because she already had one.we saw her scanned several times first to confirm there was a chip and to get it's ID number,the info on file was updated to our info[she was surrendered by her previous owners]...and all this was done in less than five minutes while we stood at the desk.granted our cat Bella was pretty relaxed and cooperative,but its far from difficult or time consuming,there's really no reason not to check every animal.
Chris Brown
Super Member
After we got her home that morning she spent the rest of that day and the next night sleeping on the couch. At that point she got up and wanted to go outside, so we let her. At that point we noticed that she had peed on the couch, which we had to then go through quite an effort to clean. We were worried about this given her previous issues with going inside the house. We wanted to keep bringing her in at night, especially since it was finally starting to get colder at night, but having her go wherever she wanted in the house was not sustainable. As a compromise we built her a fairly elaborate shelter using multiple layers of thick cardboard, with blankets and padding inside, and put it in an area protected from the rain outside our back porch. The first time I brought her up to the shelter she walked right inside and laid down as if it was a shelter she had been using for years. For the next week or so she slept in that shelter quite a bit, usually at nights while leaving the shelter and going somewhere else during the day. We made sure she had access to water and food right beside the shelter.
Yesterday evening our dog started barking at the door the same way he usually does when a package is delivered or something. We opened the door and saw our cat (same one who went missing) laying there on the cement, making a very weird meow sound and moving her head around strangely. We wrapped her in a small blanket and tried to comfort her as we made quick preparations to take her to the emergency vet. As we were about to leave, it became apparent that she was no longer moving, not even her eyelids. Her eyes were open and her pupils were fully dilated (made sense because it was dark out there). I took my phone flashlight (very bright) and brought it up to her eyes, which remained fully dilated. As that is a function of the autonomic nervous system, I took that as clear evidence she had indeed passed
This caught us all by surprise and we are all very confused as to why she died. She seemed to have recovered or at least mostly recovered from her previous experience, though she may have had internal injuries or otherwise that we were not aware of. The last two nights have been pretty cold (low 40's) but in each case she was not the only cat outside nor did she express a desire to come inside. Of course now in retrospect I wish I had brought her in anyway.
I am very glad that she chose to come home to die as otherwise we may have never known what happened to her. I just wish I knew the cause. We have a neighbor which had specifically blamed her for an outdoor flea infestation and was pretty angry about it (we have determined she was not the cause). I certainly hope there was not a nefarious cause to her death... but I guess we will never know
Thanks again everyone for all of your support, and I apologize that this story had a sad ending after all
Yesterday evening our dog started barking at the door the same way he usually does when a package is delivered or something. We opened the door and saw our cat (same one who went missing) laying there on the cement, making a very weird meow sound and moving her head around strangely. We wrapped her in a small blanket and tried to comfort her as we made quick preparations to take her to the emergency vet. As we were about to leave, it became apparent that she was no longer moving, not even her eyelids. Her eyes were open and her pupils were fully dilated (made sense because it was dark out there). I took my phone flashlight (very bright) and brought it up to her eyes, which remained fully dilated. As that is a function of the autonomic nervous system, I took that as clear evidence she had indeed passed
This caught us all by surprise and we are all very confused as to why she died. She seemed to have recovered or at least mostly recovered from her previous experience, though she may have had internal injuries or otherwise that we were not aware of. The last two nights have been pretty cold (low 40's) but in each case she was not the only cat outside nor did she express a desire to come inside. Of course now in retrospect I wish I had brought her in anyway.
I am very glad that she chose to come home to die as otherwise we may have never known what happened to her. I just wish I knew the cause. We have a neighbor which had specifically blamed her for an outdoor flea infestation and was pretty angry about it (we have determined she was not the cause). I certainly hope there was not a nefarious cause to her death... but I guess we will never know
Thanks again everyone for all of your support, and I apologize that this story had a sad ending after all