Posted on 12/27/2017 6:58:59 AM PST by BenLurkin
When devastating wildfires broke out in California's wine country this October, Jenn Thompson felt a tug at her heart to adopt one of the hundreds of cats rescued from the ash.
"I was telling one of my friends out here, 'I feel like I should adopt one of these cats,' because there were so many," said Thompson, of Longmont. "We lost a cat to cancer last spring and I've been telling my husband, 'We have a vacancy.'"
Before she could think about it any longer, she received a call on Oct. 31.
...
Thompson's cat, Pilot, who wandered away from the family's then-home in Santa Rosa, Calif., in 2007, had been found in the rubble by a good Samaritan looking for her own cats a little more than a mile from where Pilot went missing all those years ago.
Pilot was badly burned and in extremely poor shape, but alive and in the care of the Northern California pet hospital where Thompson's sister works. Vets had scanned the microchip inserted when he was a kitten and tracked down Thompson, who had since moved to Longmont.
After a trip to Northern California to fetch Pilot, two surgeries, including one to amputate five of his toes, and lots of healing, he's finally settling into his new — but familiar — home with the Thompsons and their three other cats.
"I think he recognized my voice and that was pretty cool," Thompson said. "When I brought him back, he definitely recognized my daughter. Definitely. She was 8 when he went missing. Right away, he went and cuddled up with her
(Excerpt) Read more at timescall.com ...
Kitty ping
What a wonderful story.
Does anyone know of a cat collar that stays on? One of ours refuses to keep them on. I can’t afford a new collar and tag every other day.
I’d be willing to bet that it’s not the same cat.
It’s been identified by the chip in it’s neck.
Has to be the same cat.
Drat, thwarted by the pesky chip. Didn’t read the article
No worries!
Best to you in 2019!
The Power Of Trump Compels You!
I fostered a cat once. Six years later I got her back. She immediately recognized me and the house.
When I picked her up the second time she cried in the cat box all the way home. When I got to the door she stopped crying and she ran straight into the house. She walked around, sniffing every corner. Then she curled right up and fell asleep.
A FReeper didn’t read an article before commenting? That’s never happened before!! :^)
jk, Happy Trump Year!
Sorry about the cat collars problem. Our Bob lost THREE new collars, all with tags, in September alone. The most expensive one, he only wore overnight, less than 12 hours. I do have another one ready to go for him, but have let him go without, not wanting to just throw another one away.
These were all some “breakaway” type collars, two from WalMart, and one, which was pretty expensive, from Petco or one of the big chain stores.
Before that, our cat had one that was more like a reflective patent leather, also “breakaway”, and it did come apart a couple times, but he never lost it, over 4 years! I wish I could find that type again. It was just getting old, and the vinyl stuff was cracking a little bit, which made me think it might be scratchy to his neck.
I have a feeling that there are 3 collars with tags on them, under a huge blue spruce across the street. It has wiry branches, low to the ground, and if he didn’t intentionally “lose” those collars, he probably caught them in there, going in and out from under the tree. It is a favorite spot for him, because he has 270 degree view on a corner with a side street, and cannot be detected there, and I doubt whether a dog could get through to him, due to the dense branches.
>> Does anyone know of a cat collar that stays on? One of ours refuses to keep them on. I can’t afford a new collar and tag every other day. <<
You really don’t want the collar to stay on and be difficult to shed. Cats tend to climb and go through snaggy obstacles. If the collar doesn’t breakaway then the cat can get injured or die.
Cats need breakaway collars, otherwise they’d strangle themselves on shrubs and branches. All our cats had them for years, and remarkably, we only replaced a couple of them. Now that they’re older two of them don’t go outside at all, and the other two don’t go more than 100 feet from the house. Now they have no collars. We still know who they are.
Yes, I think we are leaning toward not using a collar again. I probably had a sense of security, related to reflective collars, since our Bob does go out at night, thinking a car might see him cross the street, etc.
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