Every dog and cat owner should have a microchip fitted and registered with a trusted database, but it is also essential to keep that information updated.
Whenever your contact information changes, from home addresses to telephone numbers and primary email addresses, that information should be updated to ensure not only that you keep within the law, but also that if your pet goes missing, they can be easily relocated.
There are so many cases of this happening every day, including a cat in Stoke-on-Trent reunited with his owner after two years of being lost, according to the BBC.
However, one story in the United States reported by CBC was even more astonishing, and showed how much hope was provided by a tiny chip smaller than a grain of rice.
Forty-Cal, a pitbull belonging to owner Jourdyn Koziak of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, went missing for 11 years when he disappeared along with another dog owned by the same family out of the backyard, with Mrs Koziak suspecting foul play.
The other dog came back quickly, but Forty-Cal never came back. She moved away to Luzerne County, got married and had a child, but every time she moved, she kept updating her dog’s microchip so she would always be in contact and find out what happened to her beloved dog.
Over a decade after she went missing, a girl in Philadelphia found the dog and took him home. As they already had pets, they could not keep the dog, so they contacted an animal control team.
They scanned the chip and called Mrs Koziak, who thought she had been the victim of a cruel joke. After seeing some pictures with his distinctive markings, she knew she had Forty-Cal back.
It was a truly happy ending, and had she stopped updating the details or removed the information from the database, she may have never had a chance to get her dog back.
