cat custody battle. woman tracks down lost cat 7 years later. current owner won't give him up

[tblue37]

45. If he was microchipped, he should have been returned

immediately, because the person who found him should have had him checked for a chip. And if she told her vet that she found him as a stray, the vrt should have checked for a chip right away.

If she adopted him from a shelter as a rescue, then THEY should have checked for a chip as soon as he was brought in.

A year sgo I adopted a cat that had been hanging around my place for months. He was neutered, so I thought he had a home, but he was outdide in terrible weather--freezing cold, dangerously hot--so I krpt trying to follow him to his home to offer to adopt him, since they clearly didn't spend time with him.

I couldn't get close enough to pet him until July 2 last year, but when he finally did let me, I grabbed him and took him inside, because I feared firecrackers around the 4th would scare him into running away.

As soon as I had him safely inside, I started going door to door trying to locate his home. No luck. Everyone had seen him around, but no one knew whose pet he wad.

Then I cslled the Humane Society to see if he'd been rrported missing and to ask if I could bring him in to check for a microchIp. As I described him to the perdon at the shelter, my description of a notch in his ear caused her to say, "Oh, he doesn't have an owner. He's a feral. The ear notch is a sign that he wad neutered by the city's catch-neuter-release program for feral strsys."

I knew about CNR programs, but I was unaware that they marked the cats with an ear notch afterward. Since he was both neutered and clearly healthy and well fed, I'd just assumec he had an owner.

But though he was very sweet from the first and had been hanging around my apartment visiting through the window with my other cats, and had been shadowing me and chatting with me during my walks, it never occurred to me to just keep him without attempting to find out if he had a chip or without trying to find his owner to ASK if I could adopt him.

The new owner probably didn't want to find his original owner.

He is a gorgeous fellow, so I understand the temptation, but she should have found the owner and returned him right away.

HOWEVER, after 5 years, I think another transfer would be rough on him, so probably HE would be better off left with the new owner (maybe with visits from the former owner.)

My sister lost a young red point Siamese in the late 1970s, and 2 years later, when she found that he'd been adopted and well loved by another family, she let them keep the cat, since he'd been just 1 year old when she lost him, so they'd had him longer than she had, and he was clearly attached to his new family and happy with them.