Each year, 6-8 million dogs and cats enter shelters and 3-4 million of these animals are killed due primarily to a lack of space. These animals come from a variety of sources; they may be strays, relinquished by their human companions, or simply lost. Unfortunately, only 30% of dogs and 2-5% of cats entering shelters are claimed by their human companion. Returning more lost animals to their families can help reduce shelter populations and make many cats, dogs, and people very happy.

————————–

There are various reasons lost animals do not return, including a lack of trying all routes to find missing animals and a lack of knowledge by people who find lost animals on how to best reconnect them with their human companions. Recent research shows that the best things a person can do to try to protect a companion animal is to have a microchip implanted and use a collar and a tag.

Many lost companion animals will never be found again—and for some it is simply a lack of trying. While some with lost animals will try any means necessary, others only search briefly and in their immediate area. Researchers in the United Kingdom found that people were most likely to conduct a personal search of the neighborhood (68%) and quiz neighbors for details (65%), but fewer than half (40%) searched local shelters and only (8%) placed ads in the local newspaper. Even if a person searched the shelter, there is no guarantee that they would find the missing animal, as many finders do not bring animals to shelter. One study of missing companion animals found that over half (57%) of the people who found lost companions chose not to take the animals to a shelter because they feared that the animal might be killed in the shelter.

According to the ASPCA, a collar with a tag on it is the very best way to ensure a companion’s safe return. While collars and tags are typical for dogs because a collar is functional for attaching a leash for walks, the only function of a collar for cats is to hold their tag. Many people therefore think the tag is unnecessary, particularly if their cat lives indoors full-time, and others feel that collars can be dangerous. To test the effectiveness and safety of cat collars, veterinarians conducted an experiment, providing over 500 cats with one of three types of collars—plastic buckle, break-away plastic buckle, and elastic stretch safety. Six months later, 73% of the cats successfully wore their collars and most of their human companions reported the cats had an easier time adjusting to the collars than initially expected and only 3% caught a forelimb in their collar or caught the collar on another object or in their mouths. Though the risk is slight that collars will pose any danger to cats, they should still be given break-away or stretch collars that will easily come off if a cat gets his or her collar snagged on something.

Because cats should wear break-away collars, and because collars and tags can fall off, ideally all animals should also be microchipped. A microchip is implanted into the skin of a cat or dog and stores contact information that can be read by a scanner at most veterinary offices and animal shelters. Although microchips are not as easily found as a simple tag, it will get many animals surrendered to shelters home safely. There is plenty of anecdotal evidence to support the use of microchips and recent media attention has surrounded the journey of Willow who made her way home five years after being lost.

Microchips are highly effective. Dr. Linda Lord, coauthor of many of the studies mentioned in this article, along with a team of researchers followed over 7,700 animals with microchips entering 53 shelters in the course of one year. They found microchips to be very effective at returning animals to their homes. Comparing animals without microchips to those with microchips, the return-to-owner rate was 20 times higher for microchipped cats and 2.5 times higher for microchipped dogs.

I can only speculate as to why there were higher rates for cats than dogs. One reason may be that cats are more likely to have been strays before being adopted than are dogs. According to the American Pet Products Association, in 2008 only 6% of dogs in U.S. households where taken in as strays while a quarter (26%) of cats were. People may assume that former strays can take care of themselves if lost, and they may wait longer to search or do a less thorough search for the cat in their neighborhood. This may lead to more cats with homes ending up in shelters. Further, cats are more likely than dogs to live outdoors given that many people allow their cats to roam. For this reason, cats with families who are roaming in their own neighborhoods may be picked up and assumed to be strays.

Dr. Lord and colleagues found that the main reason microchipped animals were not returned to their human companions is that the contact information stored on the chip was not up-to-date. This highlights that methods of finding lost companions can only succeed if they are used and used properly. People need to update their information with the microchip registry if they change their phone numbers, move, or adopt an already microchipped animal from someone else. Not only will microchips (and collars) fail if the contact information is incorrect, they will also fail if there is not adequate infrastructure in shelters to read the microchips. As an article on the increased use of microchips explains:

“While Europe uses microchips with a single frequency that can be read by all scanners, U.S. competition for market share initially resulted in sales of microchips with three different frequencies, each of which could be read only by its own type of scanner. Some owners who microchipped their pets for safe return were horrified to learn that their lost animal had indeed been found and brought to a shelter but, since the shelter’s scanner read a different frequency, the animal remained unidentified and eventually was put to death.”

Although a universal scanner has been developed, underfunded shelters may not have this newer technology and so microchips are not a replacement for contacting your local shelter if a companion animal is missing. And, again, microchips are not the quickest way to find a lost pet; that honor goes to simple collars and tags because they are easy to see and read. Even so, only about a third of humans place collars and ID tags on their animal companions. Clearly, more education and intervention is needed among the general population on this topic.

A study by the ASPCA and researchers at Ohio State University, assisted by Faunalytics, found that giving a free tag and collar to the animal is a good way to increase the rate of tag use. A sample of animals being adopted out of shelters, as well as animals visiting vets, were all provided free ID tags and collars. While only 14% of those who were in the vet group had collars and tags for their companions coming into the study, 83% were wearing a tag and collar 8 weeks later. Of those in the shelter group, 94% were wearing an ID tag and collar 8 weeks later. This suggests that shelters will benefit from providing adopters with free ID tags and placing them on the animal before they go into their new homes.

So, to improve on Bob Barker’s famous adage, I will end my post with this reminder: Help control and protect the companion animal population: always have your companions spayed or neutered, tagged and chipped.