Cat strays 530 miles from the Netherlands to Austria via Germany

NEWS AND COMMENT: This is one of those interesting lost cat stories with a slight twist and it reveals why lost cats that travel a very long distance always achieve this end result in the same way. In this instance, the cat's name is Milo. He lived in the Netherlands with his caregiver Marlijn de Wal. She lets Milo go outside unsupervised and is an indoor/outdoor cat.

The weather is cold in Holland at the moment and deWal was concerned when he didn't come inside. She admits that she is protective of Milo which by the way is a good thing but with the cold weather she really thought that he should have come inside and he hadn't. And so she became worried.

She admits that she started to live on adrenaline and had trouble sleeping for the next three days as she realised that Milo had gone missing. Like all cats he was a companion of routine and therefore predictable. She immediately realised something serious had gone wrong but couldn't imagine that he would end up in an entirely different country, Austria, in the town of Reutte (via Germany) which is 530 miles from her town namely Veendam.

Fortunately the story ends well although from the beginning to the end Milo lost one of his lives. It has transpired that he had jumped into a van with a trailer (or into the trailer), which was driven non-stop from Veendam to Ruette.

Map courtesy Google Maps.

Fortunately Milo is microchipped. It appears that he got out of the van or the trailer near or at Reutte and was hit it seems by a vehicle which left him in a critical condition according to the veterinarian who saw him. Fortunately a good Samaritan found Milo and took him to this veterinarian who is Dr. Johannes Hartling.

He was then in safe hands because being micro-chipped the doctor was able to scan him for a microchip, found that he had one and it was up to date. He was therefore able to contact De Wal and reunite them because we are told that he made a quick recovery from his critical condition. Perhaps it wasn't quite as critical as they first thought.

Inquisitiveness

As mentioned, the story illustrates how domestic cats can be lost hundreds of miles from their home. The domestic cat, as we know, is invariably inquisitive sometimes to their detriment. And sometimes to their health and welfare. And if a van stops near their home and they are allowed outside and if the van driver opens the door or has a trailer open to the elements then an indoor/outdoor cat might just jump in and that's where the problem starts.

Unbeknown to the van driver and unbeknown to the owner the cat is then transported for what can be hundreds of miles and into a different, adjacent country.

Returning home

Sometimes, exceptionally, cats make their way back home on foot using, it is believed, the Earth's magnetic field to gauge where North, South, East and West are situated for guidance and they will use landscape markers for further guidance. It seems that domestic cats have an unerring ability to find their home range to which they are sometimes more connected than they are to their owner.

This is a cross-post from the main website.

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Influencer's chinchilla Persian believed stolen for satanic purposes

NEWS AND COMMENT-ITALY: this disturbing story of an Internet influencer's pet cat carries a lesson about what to do with your cat when you go on holiday. It concerns a lady, Nima Benati, who clearly loves cats and lives with a chinchilla Persian who was not micro-chipped. She lives in Italy and she has a habit of leaving her cat with her parents when she goes on holiday. She is a social media influencer.

Nima Benati and Bartolo. Image: Social media.

They live in Monghidoro, a small town near Bologna. She went on holiday to Costa Rica. In the past all had worked out well. Only this precious cat which looks expensive and valuable, is allowed to roam outside unsupervised wherever they wish to go when staying with relatives. In the past, he has been away for a couple of days and come back sopping wet with a mouse in her mouth.

In other words, he is treated like any other domestic cat which is fair enough but when a cat is this attractive and almost certainly looks to the public like a purebred cat then you have to supervise them when they go outside.

Anyway, this lovely looking cat whose name by the way is Bartolo, never came back from one of his outings and her disappearance has joined what appears to be a large group of other cats who gone missing their Bologna.

Thirty cats have been reported missing last month alone in a small stretch of the Apennine Mountains. Nima Benati is offering a €5000 reward for her cat's return.

RELATED: ‘Chinchilla’, its meaning in the cat world (infographic).

Benati has commissioned a pet detective, Said Beid, to find her cat. He, tellingly, shed some light on what might have happened because he says that cat disappearances are common during the summer in Italy when owners go on holiday and they leave their companion animals with friends or family.

The cat is suddenly plunged into unfamiliar surroundings and this makes them vulnerable because, for example, they might want to try and go home. They use their great sense of direction to head home and get lost (if it is too far) and then they get attacked by a predator or stolen or they die of starvation and so on.

Or, they might get attacked by a predator when popping outside. The cat might escape but if they end up outside, they are in a vulnerable position to attack by predators and theft. Italy has some large predators.

The Italian Association for the Protection of Animals and the Environment believes that there might be a satanic sect in the area abducting cats for satanic purposes. That seems like imagination running riot but it is quite plausible because there are people engaged in witchcraft and suchlike even today in the 21st-century.

A spokesperson said: "The issue is urgent and alarming, and cat owners are beginning to be afraid". The Association has reported the presence of sects across Italy whose members sacrifice black cats to mark Halloween.

Of course, Bartolo is like a son to Nima Benati. I'm surprised that she didn't have him micro-chipped although that would not have worked in this instance if the cats are being killed. Others have been reported missing such as Eddie, a 12 kg cat that disappeared near Monzumo on August 21. His owners have offered a €1000 reward for his return.

Some owners have found their cats with their collars unbuckled whatever that means. The police are investigating.

The lesson to be learned from this is that when you leave your cat with a friend or relatives when you go on holiday, your cat is exposed to higher-than-normal risk of being injured, killed or lost. And that is a very important lesson. 

There is a great difficulty actually in dealing with a domestic cat when their owner goes on holiday because the alternative is to leave them at a boarding cattery which although safe is very stressful for a cat. There are no easy answers. I haven't gone on holiday for many years mainly for this reason!

In the land of animal lovers, Great Britain, children put a 22-year-old cat in a plastic bag and dumped the bag in a wheelie bin

NEWS AND VIEWS: In the land of so-called animal lovers, Great Britain, the BBC reports that children put a 22-year-old cat in a plastic bag and then dumped her in a wheelie bin. For international visitors, a "wheelie bin" is a rubbish bin where household rubbish is placed to be collected once a week if you are lucky.

Frankie. Image: Feline Cat Care Rescue.

This is a very unsettling story because if children are treating a domestic cat like this - and this is an elderly cat and therefore all the more vulnerable - it does not bode well for the future of animal welfare in the UK. Has there been a deterioration in society's morals in the UK over the past 20 years? I think there has been.

I genuinely mean that. I see that in terms of greatly increased crime especially petty crime which undermines society. The police do not stop minor crimes taking place. They do not catch and arrest small-time criminals. This, as mentioned, undermines the very fabric of society.

This slack police attitude can lead to the sort of behaviour these two kids engaged in. The cat's name is Frankie and she was fished out of a rubbish bin in Wymondham, Norfolk, UK and taken to Feline Cat Care Rescue last Saturday.

The owner and manager of that cat rescue, Molly Farrar, posted the story on social media. She said that security cameras in the area had been checked and the police had been informed about the crime.

Of course, the police will not consider this to be a crime but it is under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

RELATED: some more on kids being cruel: New Zealand's junior school kids love to shoot cats for prize money.

We don't know how people found out about this. Security cameras? If they hadn't found out Frankie would have died of suffocation or starvation in that wheelie bin. Or the wheelie bin would have been picked up by the bin men and she would have been crushed in their lorry.

Yes, this is an example of animal cruelty. That is quite clear. Frankie was checked for a microchip at the rescue center. It was not up-to-date but it did reveal her age which is exceptional.

Her owners have been found and her real name is Cleo. Her name had been changed when she was five years of age. The children are yet to be identified and I would bet they will never be identified.

And therefore, there are children wandering around the suburbs of Wymondham who might do something similar again. I do not think that that is satisfactory.

Frankie is happy to be reunited with her owners. We don't know the whys and wherefores as to Frankie getting lost.

Two Ragdoll cats go missing INSIDE their home!

Yep, this is an example of how domestic cats can genuinely go missing even when they are full-time indoor cats and they have not escaped to the outside. It happened to me once. You're convinced that your cat has escaped the home and that you'll never see them again. You search frantically for what seems like ages and scratch your head to try and figure out where your cat or cats are.

You then finally find your cat or cats tucked away in a place that you never imagined they'd be. That happened to me when I fostered a little tabby kitten who grew up to became my best friend. He'd placed himself inside the double-bed storage area under the mattress.

Zara with her Ragdolls. Image: Instagram

In the case of Love Island's Zara McDermott, her cats were hidden inside an electrical cupboard in the basement with the door jammed shut!

Zara said: "I just had a near mental breakdown because I home and I couldn't find the cats anywhere, I spent 20 mins searching every room and cupboard for them and I couldn't see them.

"Anyway, long story short my brother calmed me down on the phone and I started searching every part of the house top to bottom, I found them inside an electrical cupboard in the basement...

Ragdolls cats go missing inside their home. Image: Instagram

My guess? The cats found a nice cosy cubby-hole to snooze away some hours while Zara was away and the door shut because the cats knocked the broom that was in there.

Zara was beside herself with anxiety believing that she had lost her beloved Ragdolls. I understand her feelings. It happened to me as mentioned but my cat - who's on my legs as I type this - is a humble moggie. Just as good though.

Cat rescued from Turkey's earthquakes goes missing in the UK

NEWS AND VIEWS: The woman is distraught. She blames herself. Her story is interesting and at the same time educational. She tells it on the mumsnet.com website.

She appears to have adopted a rescue cat when she was living in Turkey. She describes her cat as an "ex-street cat". She kept him indoors after rescuing him. He spent two years inside her home in Turkey.

Domestic cat rescued from Turkish earthquakes. This is not the cat in the story. The picture is here to illustrate the page. Image now in the public domain.

During the earthquakes which were well reported he went missing for two months. He was found and rescued. He was kept in a tent for a week on a harness. He was then transported by car in a 20-hour journey to Istanbul. He was then looked after by a different person and then transported to the UK by road in a three-day journey to be reunited with his owner, the lady in question who is distraught and now living in the UK.

When the cat was returned to the UK, he apparently settled in initially. The lady has another cat who doesn't get on that well with the cat from Turkey.

She knew that she had to keep her Turkish cat inside the home for a few weeks before letting him out. The idea behind cat confinement when moving to a new home and a strange environment is to allow the cat to begin to own that environment and feel at home in it. This prevents him or her from trying to return to their previous home and getting lost.

The Turkish cat squeezed out of the cat flap as the other cat was coming through it. He returned to his home but he was asking to be let out all the time. He was howling according to the lady.

Against her better judgement she let him out. He came back a couple of hours later and so she let him out again but this time he didn't return and the days have gone by. At the time of her post on the mumsnet website he had been missing for four days.

She said:

"I just don't know what to do. I literally can't do anything other than just sit around all day crying and hating myself for being so stupid and not following the advice."

Her cat is micro-chipped so there's hope there. She has posted on social media and placed familiar items such as his litter tray and his bedding in the garden to try and attract him to it. She's going to print flyers and post those around the neighbourhood. She asks for help.

Lessons?

Educational? Unfortunately, this lady's life for a while was unsuited to a domestic cat. She travelled from Turkey to the UK after the Turkish earthquakes. This was discombobulating for her cat. It's not her fault but circumstances have created a very unsettled lifestyle for her cat. The earthquakes must have been traumatic for the cat.

RELATED: Live the life that your cat wants with consistency and routines.

In addition, the second cat doesn't appear to get on that well with the Turkish rescue cat. This unsettled lifestyle plus the other cat has resulted in the Turkish cat leaving the home. He might not come back but live outside and become skinny and dirty and suffer ill-health unless somebody rescues him (again for the 3rd time) and has the presence of mind to have him scanned for a microchip at which point he can be returned and reunited.

But the educational aspect of this is that domestic cats like and indeed need a settled lifestyle with routines and rhythms by their human caregiver. They want those reassurances. I wish her well and the same goes to her cat. She rescued him from Turkey so this is an excellent woman.

Infographic - videos on animal rescue from Turkey's earthquakes

Air Canada flies man's cats to California without him

Abbas Zoeb, a software engineer, has two cats, Mimi and Bubba. They are young siblings, brother and sister from the same litter, 19 months of age. He was flying to San Francisco, USA from Toronto, Canada on Air Canada as he was relocating for a new job.

Before he embarked on the aircraft, he was questioned about the start date on his visa. The questioning went on for a long time causing him to miss his 8 AM flight.

His baggage was offloaded from the plane but Mimi and Bubba were not taken off and they were flown to San Francisco without him.

Abbas Zoeb’s cats, Mimi and Bubba. Photo by Abbas Zoeb.

After the questioning about his visa he spent hours looking for his cats. He was very worried. He thought he had lost them. Cats travelling by air are sometimes lost at airports and it can take a long time to find them.

RELATED: How long can it take to find a lost cat at an airport?

Air Canada called him in the afternoon to tell him that they Mimi and Bubba had been flown to San Francisco and that he could wait to see his cats in San Francisco or he could have someone pick them up in San Francisco.

Zoeb requested that they be returned to Toronto which meant waiting until 11:45 PM because the flight takes 5.5 hours.

He told the Washington Post "I just had a bad feeling that something has happened because they are just too nonchalant about this". He was referring to the attitude of Air Canada personnel. I guess that they don't always understand the relationship between cat and human.

As I understand it, there were flown back to Toronto. When he saw them they looked tired. He said that they were sneezing for about a week.

Air Canada said that they will refund his ticket, baggage, pet fees and other fees for the missed flight. They also offered C$200 in compensation to use towards a further flight.

They apologised but Mr Zoeb thinks that the amount paid in compensation is derisory and he wants the airline to give him a more public apology. He is considering taking legal action over the amount of compensation that he received.

He said: "C$200 is totally insignificant for how much I’ve been going through and how much time I’ve put towards this and what my pets have gone through.

“I did let them know that that is not an acceptable apology or not an acceptable amount if they want to rectify anything ... They said that’s the most they can do.”

Air Canada refused to pay any more in compensation. Apparently, in Canada airlines must compensate travellers up to $2300 to replace lost items or damage to items while in the carrier's control. That would not seem to be irrelevant in this instance.

Air Canada are no longer taking requests to transport animals in the cargo hold until September 12, 2020 because there are unusual delays at airports which, incidentally, reflects the problems encountered in the UK.

How long can it take to find a lost cat at an airport?

Sometimes 2 months or never based on research.

Obviously, it depends on many factors and you might be lucky but it seems to me that it can take a very long time indeed to find your cat if he or she has escaped their carrier at an airport. And in that time, your cat may become very unwell and injured. Here are some examples.

Rowdy was finally caught after spending three weeks on the run at Boston's Logan International Airport. The report says that she escaped from his cage in pursuit of some birds. I think that is a ridiculous comment because it can't be true. She escaped her carrier because the carrier was defective or it had somehow opened perhaps through rough handling.

Rowdy. Photo: AP.

Rowdy was in a normal hard carrier and travelled in the cargo hold. The family was flying with the German airline Lufthansa. The airline told them that their cat had escaped her carrier while cargo was being unloaded.

After three weeks it is believed that she became hungry enough and perhaps acclimatised enough to people at the airport to give herself up. Her owner was in disbelief she said: "I thought, what are the odds were actually going to get her back?"

She escaped on June 24 on her owner and husband's return from 15 years in Germany. The airline did a lot to find her. Agency staff and construction workers were involved. The used traps and relied on the fact that she was very hungry.

CNN reported in November 2011 but a cat called Jack had been lost at an airport for two months. He was lost at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport. Jack turned up at the airport's customs room after being missing for a long 8 weeks. 

On a health checkup he was found to be suffering from a range of health problems having extensive wounds which had not healed due to malnutrition. He was euthanised.

Pepper is a female cat who ran away as her owner was checking into a flight to China. The owner had to leave in any case. She was missing for a week and eventually found when the owner's friend called out her Chinese name.

In another case, Dinky, a Ragdoll cat became lost at Dubai Airport for two months. Her owners had travelled from Dubai Airport to Gatwick Airport. When they arrived at Gatwick her carrier was empty. He escaped at Dubai airport and was found at a rescue centre.

They realised that he had escaped his cage at Dubai because the cage was to clean clearly implying that he had not been in the cage for a while.

Obviously, the problem with cats breaking free of the carriers and airports is that they become very frightened and hide. Airports, air side, are noisy frightening places and a cat is going to run into a place where they feel more secure. I can recall one cat ending up in the ceiling space between a hanging ceiling and the concrete construction above.

My research indicates that it might take a long time to get your cat back. My gut feeling is that the problem is down to a cat carrier which is inadequate for the job combined with indelicate handling of the carrier. If you take your cat on a flight and they go into the hold of the aircraft I think the carrier has to be particularly robust and designed for the job.

In 2019 I wrote about a policeman who allegedly shot a friendly ginger cat Durban airport. I don't think the cat had escaped a carrier but was a well-known cat who hung around King Shaka International Airport. However, it does point to the possibility of a domestic cat escaping their carrier at this airport and not making it out alive!

In another rather macabre story of a cat lost at an airport, George, was lost at Edmonton International Airport. It was reported that he was found later frozen to death. However, the report may have been misleading because they may have got the wrong cat. George like other cats managed to escape his carrier on two occasions but nothing was done to repair the carrier after the first escape. We don't know whether he was found. He was a ginger tabby.

In another story, Milo was last at Dulles Airport, Washington DC. They were flying with Lufthansa. It appeared that the baggage handlers had carelessly damaged the carrier. The report stated he was missing but we don't know for how long. We don't even know whether he was found. I am sure that some cats lost at airports are never found.

Cat reunited after 10 years and from 260 miles away

Chubbs is an elderly, male, tabby cat missing all his teeth. His owner lives in Weymouth, Dorset, UK. That's where Chubbs lived and lives normally but he went missing about 10 years ago. He was seen by a kind person, Kelly, wondering along a main road with traffic in Greater Manchester. He was soaking wet and bedraggled. 

Kelly said that: "The day that I picked him up he was slowly walking across the main road in random directions, weaving between moving cars and narrowly being missed. He was so friendly and lovely but extremely skinny, covered in fleas, soaking wet-it had been raining heavily the night before-and generally looking like a stray.

Donna Gallagher and Chubbs. Image: The Times.

His owner, Donna Gallagher, had been distraught for a long time after he disappeared. They carried out the usual neighbourhood search and erected posters. She said: "I couldn't sleep and I couldn't stop crying". Her children were distraught.

Kelly took Chubbs to a veterinarian where they found that he was missing his teeth, covered in mats and struggling to walk. Fortunately, he had a microchip implant and the information that it contained was up to date. The chip revealed Donna's details and the veterinarian emailed her to say that he had been found.

Donna said: "When I saw Chubbs's name my heart skipped a beat". They don't know how Chubbs ended up 260 miles away but suspect that he was stolen by a tourist or tourists. He is now recovering and here is the clincher: he recognises his name when Donna calls it. I have always said that domestic cats have good long-term memories and this supports that assessment.

She said: "And he remembers his name-when I call him, his head comes straight up. He is happy now and I'm going to let him live out his older years. Until then he's going to be a very spoiled old man."

Family mistakenly donated their cat to a Denver thrift store

The owners of this ginger tabby accidentally donated him to a thrift store in Denver, Colorado, UK. The way it happened is interesting. The cat had hidden inside a recliner chair. No doubt he had made a little nest for himself there. He had probably done it before several times. 

As a side note, it should be added that recliner chairs are dangerous to kittens and puppies and even adult companion animals because they go underneath them and when a person sits on them and reclines,  the mechanism under the chair shifts position and it can crush the animal.

Montequlla inside the recliner inside the thrift store. Photo: the store or Denver Animal Protection.

But that is another issue. In this instance the cat, whose name is Montequlla, was hidden inside the recliner and the family donated the recliner to the thrift store. They did it because they were moving home

They realised that they were missing their cat and had no idea what had happened. In the meantime, the store noticed the cat (meows) and called Denver Animal Protection. They scanned the micro-chip but it had not been updated. Therefore they could not contact the owners.

Jenna Humphreys of Denver Animal Protection, told the Denver Channel: "Sure enough, there's a recliner out front, and there's a little orange tabby stuck inside. Very friendly, couldn't get out. They said that they had noticed the meowing shortly after somebody had dropped it off."

The recliner. Photo: Denver Animal Protection (believed).

In the meantime, the family were frantically searching nearby houses but then realised that he could be inside the store, inside the recliner. They returned to the store. The employees of that store gave them the phone number of Jenna Humphreys at which point they were able to reunite with their cat.

They put the event down to Montequlla being stressed and a bit frightened about the impending move to a new home. Perhaps there was quite a lot of noise and commotion in the home. His home territory was being disrupted quite dramatically. He decided to hide in a place which she had used before.

Humphreys said that "It's not uncommon for us to be call to help remove animals from those situations, but this was a new one."

Good ending 👍. Photo: the husband I expect.

The family are very happy that the story ended well. And they are thankful to everyone involved who managed to arrange the reunion. I bet Montequlla is happy too. Although he now has a move to do. He won't like that. It is going to cause some more problems.

RELATED: 5 tips to make moving home with your cat a success.

There is a Facebook post on the event by the Denver Animal Shelter which is below.

Montequlla's family donated a recliner to the thrift store when they were moving. They didn't realize that their cat was...

Posted by Denver Animal Shelter on Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Microchip your cat or face £500 fine cat owners are warned (UK)

Compulsory dog micro-chipping has been in place since 2016 in the UK. It's now the turn of cats. In England, from 2023, all cat owners will be required to have their feline companions microchip or face a fine of up to £500. It's finally coming about. There's been a discussion for a long time about compulsory micro-chipping in the UK. However, it is not as simple as simply enacting a law because with respect to dog micro-chipping the law is marginally workable as there are too many microchip databases.

You don't have to rely on a veterinary clinic to scan for a chip. You can do it. If you find a lost cat you can reunite that cat with their owner. You can purchase a scanner on Amazon for about £50. The scanner will tell you the chip number. You can then find out online which chip company has that number and contact the chip company.

There has been a delay in introducing mandated cat micro-chipping due to a review taking place into the regulations on micro-chipping of dogs. Veterinarians have raised concerns that the system which requires registering the microchip on about 15 separate databases can cause problems when trying to reunite dogs with their owners.

Microchip. Pic in public domain.

Defra plans to improve the database system before introducing mandated micro-chipping to cats.

There are over 10.8 million cat companions in the UK. I'm told by The Times newspaper that as many as 2.8 million are un-chipped. And 80% of stray cats brought to Cats Protection are not microchip.

Under the new law, can owners will have to ensure that their pet is microchipped before they reach the age of 20 weeks. Further, the contact details will need to be kept up-to-date on the database. Failure to comply with the law could result in a £500 fine if they do not rectify the problem within 21 days.

Lord Goldsmith, an animal lover and a friend of Carrie Johnson, who I suspect is pushing for these changes to animal welfare laws, said:

"Cats are much-loved parts of our families and making sure they're microchipped is the best way of making sure that you are reunited with them if they are ever lost or stolen."

The new rules will help protect millions of cats across the country. They are part of the government's Action Plan for Animal Welfare according to Lord Goldsmith.

Jacqui Cuff, the head of advocacy at Cats Protection said:

"Every day, we see how important micro-chipping is for cats and for people who love them - whether it's reuniting a loss cat with their owner, identifying an injured cat, or helping to ensure an owner can be informed in the said event that their cat has been hit and killed by a car."

The BVA (British Veterinary Association) are very much behind the new law but they are adamant that the database issue is dealt with in order to make the law effective.

P.S. In 2016, the Daily Record reported that at that time there were up to 6 firms operating separate databases in the UK which, it is claimed, made it almost impossible to operate. Some veterinarians said that the compulsory micro-chipping of dogs was unworkable as a result. There are other databases in Europe, the US and Canada. These databases are meant to be part of a network so they are cross-referenced but apparently this is not always the case. On occasions it seems that you can key in the microchip number for a dog that you know is micro-chipped and registered but the database comes up with a "no registration found" warning. This is the problem referred to by Lord Goldsmith.

Comment: one problem I foresee is enforcing the law. How does an official know whether a cat is micro-chipped or not? I suspect that the only time it will become apparent is when a lost cat is found and scanned by a veterinarian. If that cat is not microchipped and the owner can be found then they will be in line for a fine, potentially.

Mum has cried herself to sleep for 8 weeks over her lost, possibly stolen, snow Bengal cat

NEWS AND COMMENT: The story is a reminder that people who live with glamorous purebred cats really have to keep them indoors all the time. And because of that they should also seriously consider building a catio or a garden enclosure for their full-time indoor cat. The story concerns an 18 months old snow Bengal cat called Meeka. She has been lost since August 21, 2021. This post is dated October 19, 2021.

Snow Bengal cat lost for weeks and owner cries every night. Photo: Asia Sattar.

It seems that the owner, Asia Sattar, 51, and her family including her 20-year-old daughter Mariyya allowed Meeka to go outside unsupervised. That is quite unusual for a snow Bengal cat because they really are striking in appearance. They are bound to catch the eye of anybody who notices them. You're going to get somebody who perhaps isn't a thief but who is predisposed to being a thief being provoked into stealing this cat. That may be what has happened.

Meeka and Mariyya. Photo: the family.

It is unusual to have professional cat thieves roaming around your area but you will have ordinary citizens and neighbours who suddenly want to possess this wonderful looking cat and they can't resist it. And then when they keep the cat inside all the time you are never going to know where she's gone to.

Sattar believes that Meeka has been stolen. The presumed theft was reported to the police on August 28 but they did nothing as far as I can tell and they have closed the file. That's another problem in the UK at the moment. The police are sitting on their hands. They do not get off their bottoms for this sort of crime.

They don't do anything for a whole range of crimes including thefts up to thousands of pounds. They simply wash their hands of them. The criminals know this and they know that they will not be caught. This promotes criminality. The police are in acute dereliction of their duty at this present time. It is shameful behaviour and citizens like myself and this lady who has lost a cat are on our own. We have to deal with things without the support of law enforcement in the UK.

Asia's father was very close to Meeka and he still searches for her. He still puts up posters and they have offered a £1,500 reward. Judging by the length of time that the cat has been missing I think we can be very confident that they will not get their cat back unless something big changes.

They might seek the assistance of the cat detective. There is one in the UK who is pretty successful. I am surprised that they haven't contacted him. Sometimes cats do come back after a very long time. Perhaps she hasn't been stolen and is just wondering, having become a stray cat living in the wild. Sometimes domestic cats do that. But I doubt it.

And this, I think, is one of the downsides of owning a purebred cat especially the glamorous ones. You have to keep them in. A lot of people would say you have to keep all cats inside but in the UK it is not the default position. She got to build a catio if she has not done so already, and you've got to leash train your purebred cat if you want to take them outside unsupervised. There are extra things to do and extra responsibilities when you own a snow Bengal cat.

Kitten escaped car on ferry and jumped into the sea

NEWS AND VIEWS - THE SOLENT, UK: The Red Funnel ferry runs between Southampton and the Isle of Wight as I understand it. On that ferry there was a kitten inside a car and he or she managed to escape the vehicle and then proceeded to jump off the ferry into the sea. Comment: I suspect that the kitten's owner left one of the car's windows slightly ajar to ensure that air got into the car in the interests of cat welfare but it backfired.

 Kitten escaped car on ferry and jumped into the sea. Launching rescue boat. Image: Danny Grist.

Witnesses saw the kitten jump which happened at about 5:30 on 19 July 2021. They alerted the crew who in turn alerted the captain and who in turn issued orders to recover the kitten if possible. A rescue boat was launched from the side of the ferry and two members of the crew frantically searched for the kitten and through a stroke of good fortune located him or her. The cat was brought back on board and the ferry proceeded to its destination.

Comment: it's the first time I have heard of a cat jumping into the sea from a ferry. I guess the moral of the story is to leave your cat or kitten in a carrier inside the car while you are on the ferry. Then you can leave the window ajar slightly to allow fresh air to come into the vehicle. And keep the vehicle cooler. I think the kitten and the owner were incredibly lucky because the chances of finding a kitten in The Solent must have been remote.

Bengal cat trapped in neighbour's bathroom and found after two weeks

NEWS AND VIEWS: This is a novel way for a cat to become lost so it is worth mentioning. Also, the cat is a purebred Bengal. His name is Batty. It's unusual for such a glamorous cat to be allowed to wander outside. I'm not sure that I would be able to accept that if I lived with a Bengal cat. Too much worry about the cat being stolen.

Bengal cat Batty. He was trapped in a neighbour's bathroom for two weeks! He is recovering nicely. Photo: Colin McNeil, the owner with his family

Batty lives in Midlothian, Scotland. He was missing for about two weeks because he was trapped in a bathroom in a neighbour's property that was being renovated. The owner left the property unaware that the Bengal cat had entered her bathroom. The report does not tell us this but the door to the bathroom must've been closed on her departure. How else would the cat have been trapped?

The Bengal cat's owner is Colin McNeil and his family. They spent 12 days searching for him, putting up the usual posters et cetera. Colin feared that Batty may have been stolen which is the point I'm making.

Colin was being interviewed by Edinburgh Live when he learned that his cat had been found. As expected, he was hungry and dehydrated. It seems that he had nothing to eat or drink for two weeks. He is being nursed back to full health. They say that he is underweight.

Building contractors were working in the house where he was trapped. It seems odd that they did not spot him. I would have thought that the cat would have made some sounds to notify people of his predicament. Colin McNeil went along to the house and made enquiries but they said that they hadn't seen him. Strangely, McNeil said that the bathroom was wrecked while his cat was in it! I don't understand that part of the story.

I'm not sure that we're getting the full picture here except for the fact that the cat was trapped in a bathroom. It is the first time that I have read about a cat being lost in this way.

Domestic cat survives 10 days down a well in Northamptonshire, UK

In another story which is yet again a testament to the endurance qualities of the domestic cat, a black cat named Flea went missing from her home in Loddington, Northamptonshire on April 24 and spent 10 days down a well. She was found about two days ago and throughout that time her owner, Keira Hill, had been searching for her.

 Domestic cat survives 10 days down a well in Northamptonshire, UK. Keira and Flea. Photo: Keira's sister (believed).

It transpired that she had fallen down a well in a neighbour's back garden. Neighbours heard the cat crying for help last Tuesday and called firefighters to rescue her.

Flea is less than a year old. Despite there being a foot of water at the bottom of the well, she had managed to clamber up onto a narrow ledge away from the water where she presumably stayed for approximately 10 days. Perhaps she returned to the water to drink some from time to time but I am speculating.

Keira Hill, a freelance gardener, said that she and her sister had done all they could to find her cat including appeals on social media and putting up posters in the village. They were beginning to fear the worst, perhaps that she had been hit by a car.

The well Flea fell in. Photo: Firefighters?

Like many domestic cats she likes to jump into cars and ends up taking unplanned road trips. Cats are inherently inquisitive and they will jump onto lorries for example which can lead to disastrous results.

Also like many cats once they are rescued they look as though they are completely unfazed by the experience and wonder what all the fuss was about.

The story reminds me of quite a common occurrence in India where leopards end up at the bottom of open wells. In the stories that I have read, the locals invariably rescue the cat with great difficulty which is surprising because I also see many stories of leopards being beaten to death by local people when they encroach into the urban environment. It's rather strange human behaviour.

Stress of moving home can makes us leave behind our cat

Moving home is stressful. People do forgetful things at best and crazy things at worst when they are stressed. So when we move home we tend to leave things behind or, to put it another way, we lose them. And I will put it in a third way: removal company employees steal items. Are you like me when I believe that removal company employees steal valuable items which you have hidden away and forgotten about?

5 TIPS ON HOW TO MAKE MOVING HOME WITH YOUR CAT A SUCCESS

It is so easy to do and we might only discover that an item has been lost months if not years later. That is why I believe removals companies become involved in this form of theft. It's a personal viewpoint perhaps but I also believe other people have the same thought.

It is also possible to mislay your cat when you move (or for a cat to be stolen, I'd argue). This is according to Animal Home Insurance. Their research tells them that about 50% of UK homeowners have lost or misplaced something when moving home. And among that long list of items which I reproduce below you will see the domestic cat.

And I'm going to speculate some more. I have seen on more than one occasion a cat companion inquisitively hopping onto the removal lorry or van (on CCTV). You know how inquisitive domestic cats are. Something new like that will always appeal to them. They become either trapped or if they jump on towards the end of the removal they are locked inside. Then they are transported perhaps hundreds of miles across the country to their new home.

In the meantime the cat's owner's are scratching their heads as to where there cat has disappeared to. Only when the removals employees unload the lorry do they find the cat. Regrettably this may be days or even weeks later. The cat's life is in jeopardy but they are great survivors as we know.

I suspect, too, that sometimes when the relationship between cat and caretaker is somewhat loose, the homeowner forgets about their cat at this panicked time. The cat may have run out of the home because of all the commotion. They may hide somewhere nearby. They may only emerge when the lorry has gone and so have their owners.

It is sometimes said that the domestic cat is more attached to their home (and therefore their home range) than their owners. There is an argument that a cat should remain in their home when it is sold and should become a cat belonging to the new owners provided they like cats and accept that extravagant and extreme concept.

On a more financial note, some people do like to hide cash in safe places in the home but they hide the stuff for so long that they forget about it. One homeowner mislaid £30,000 in this way. The same goes for jewellery and indeed any other expensive item which is put away for safekeeping.

There is an argument that we have too many possessions nowadays. Many possessions are not used or seen for years. Perhaps we should not own them? Divest yourself of unused items but never do that with a cat.

The list:

• Books
• £30,000 worth of cash
• Photographs
• Jewellery
• Pictures
• DIY equipment
• Thermostat
• Family cats
• Passports and ID cards
• Bolts and screws
• Barbecue
• Guitar
• Kite
• Ornamental chimney pot
• Sewing machine
• Sledge
• Old whiskey bottles
• Fridge full of food
• Garden furniture
• Outdoor pots and plants
• Children's teeth
• Dirty nappies

More domestic cats jumping into vans and being lost during Covid lockdowns

NEWS and VIEWS: The Edinburgh Evening News reports that, in Scotland, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of domestic cats being carried away from their home by delivery vans or removal lorries. This is because during lockdown many more people have taken to ordering products online which of course necessitates the arrival of a delivery van. The driver darts up to the front door leaving the van doors open. At that particular moment the family cat is wandering around the front of the house and being as inquisitive as ever jumps into the van and is driven away.

Photo by Dids from Pexels

Fortunately it appears that the majority of cats lost this way are microchipped but there are calls for delivery van drivers to check their vans before driving off which won't happen because they are so pressed for time. They barely have time to wait for the owner of the house to come to the front door. In fact nowadays they simply bang on the front door, leave the package by the door and scarper.

One worrying aspect of this is that at the next stop the van driver opens the doors again at which point the cat jumps out but this could be several miles away and therefore the cat is lost. Perhaps they can make their way home because cats are fantastic navigators but it's a worry.

Nicola Zellent, a senior warden at the Lothian Cat Rescue, suggested that drivers should not leave the doors open when delivering or someone should guard the van but neither of these suggestions will be taken up. I know that because, as mentioned, the job is too demanding to be distracted by these added activities.

Perhaps the best prevention is for cat owners to become enlightened to the problem and when the delivery van turns up they go out to the van to collect the item. Of course, this is only viable if they are at home and often they are not. Microchipping nearly always saves the cat but it's troublesome.

Many People Help To Reunite Tsunami Lost Cat

This is a Japanese black cat story.  For me the outstanding aspect of it is the number of people who helped to reunite a black cat who was lost after the Japanese tsunami that destroyed the nuclear reactor  3 years ago.  You may remember the disaster and trying to contain the radioactive material from the destroyed reactors. Many cats and dogs were abandoned in fact.

Photo copyright Asahi Shimbun / Wataru Sekita

Mr and Mrs Yamagishi were lucky to escape the devastation of the tsunami.  Their home survived unlike the rest of the town in which they lived.  However, their much loved black cat Suika was nowhere to be seen.

I'd just like to make a comment about their black cat. Suika has a notably different appearance to your typical Western random bred cat.  His facial appearance is different but I can't put a finger on the difference right now.

The couple searched for their cat high and low without success for 3 months.  And then about a month ago another couple saw a black cat in a pine forest.  He wore a collar. They took him to a local health centre.  No one claimed  the cat.  So they kindly put an advert in the local paper.  So, thus far there's been a couple and a health centre and a newspaper involved in his reunion.

Then somebody noticed faded letters on the cat's collar.  The faded letters were the name and telephone number of Mr and Mrs Yamagishi.

From that point on it was easy going.  As you can see there was quite a chain of events and people involved in reuniting this cat with his owner.  I'm very impressed with that.  At any stage someone could have given up and the reunion wouldn't have happened.

I suppose the key element in the reunion is the collar.  Without that I'm not sure it would have happened.  This leads to the obvious point which is that any outdoor cat or even full-time indoor cats should have some sort of identification on them because you never know what might happen.

It seems that Suika was not micro-chipped, which is probably the best form of identification other than an identifying tattoo in the cat's ear.  Tattoos are safer than microchips as it happens because there are some incidences of micro-chipping causing problems at the site of the microchip.  Also, there is a need for an updated database for microchipping to be effective.

In some ways you can't beat the old-fashioned cat collar.

Cat Found in Charity Sofa

This little feline story is an amusing warning to others and a lesson in cat behavior and how they can hide in places and be difficult to find and see. A couple bought a sofa from a charity shop. The three-seater sofa had been donated to the charity shop run by St Luke's Hospice, Grays, Essex.

Emanating from this desirable piece of furniture was a meow, a soft and muted meow. The meowing came from a cat whose name is Crockett. The purchasers investigated and noticed two claws poking through the fabric of the couch. They had purchased a sofa with a cat inside it, an added, little bonus!

Crockett's owners, Pauline and Bill said that there had been very upset to lose him. Apparently, Crockett has slipped into the sofa as it was being taken apart before being moved.

Talking about cats and furniture, I have another warning concerning loungers. These are pieces of furniture which change shape and in doing so the machinery underneath the chair can crush a small cat or kitten who happens to have crawled into that space.

I do not think that furniture which changes shape such as loungers or chairs that are suitable for senior people are in fact suitable for homes where there is a domestic cat. It is too dangerous for the cat. It's as simple as that. Unless the owners do something about the chair and modify it slightly to make sure that it is safe and that it prevents the cat from crawling into the space below the seat, then personally I would not recommend that a cat owner buys one.