What to do when your pet is missing | South Africa

what to do

WHAT TO DO IF YOUR PET HAS GONE MISSING.

If your pet has gone missing please follow the following steps:

1.) Go to all local SPCA's IN PERSON and walk through ALL the kennels to see for yourself if your pet is there. Hundreds of dogs and cats go through SPCA's every month and the person who answers the phone does not know every single dog or cat that is there so you need to GO THERE YOURSELF AND LOOK.

2.) Phone ALL the vets in the area. Some vets for example do keep some found animals in kennels if they are not full.

Emergency vets are worthwhile to check if your pet was brought in injured.

It sometimes happens that a pet is found in a suburb but gets taken to a vet in a suburb dozens of km’s away.

Therefore call vets who are known to have found animals. Ask the vets you call if you can email a missing poster through to them for their bulletin board, facebook pages and for identification purposes.

3.) Inform breed specific rescues: For example if your Husky has gone missing contact Husky Rescue and ask to email a missing poster through to them for their facebook page and for identification purposes.

4.) Post your missing pet on facebook with a photo of your missing pet together with ALL relevant information including where and when he/she went missing plus your name and contact details. Post the poster to your private profile, make the post public and ask that your original post is shared. Remember to check all facebook's "other" inboxes including your spam box for messages daily. Share to all local facebook groups, even if they are not animal related.

5.) Send an email with a photo of your missing pet and all the info in point no 4 above to all your contacts.

6.) Put up posters on bulletin boards at:

shopping centres
library
post office
pet / vet stores

7.) Put pamphlets with your missing pet’s info and your contact details in letterboxes in your area.

8.) Ask the headmasters of the nearest schools if you can hand out pamphlets to the school-children. Children are very observant especially when it comes to animals. Most schools have utilise the D6 Communicator which you could request an alert to be sent out on.

9.) Talk to people; go door to door; people are generally preoccupied and don't take notice of posters etc.

10. ) Place ad's in newspapers

11.) Place a scent trail for pets to follow home. With cats for example, putting their litter out as a trail can be helpful.

12.) DONT stop searching until your pet is safely back home.

13.) If your pet cat is missing, it is advisable to contact volunteers managing feral cat colonies. your cat may use their feeding stations as a food source.

TO STOP YOUR PET FROM GOING MISSING IN THE FIRST PLACE

Please ensure your property is secure and that your pet is safely inside. Do regular boundary checks to ensure that they cannot get out.

Have your pets sterilized. Yes, the males as well. It is the males who go missing because they run off to go in search of all the unspayed females on heat.

And to ensure that you DO find your pet if he/she goes missing

please have him/her micro-chipped (and ensure that your information is up-to-date at the service provider)
and have a collar and tag with your contact no on him/her at all times.

WHAT TO DO IF YOU SEE A LOST OR INJURED DOG IN THE STREET.

1.) Pick him/her up and go drop him/her off at the nearest vet or at the nearest SPCA. Alternatively call the nearest SPCA branch, THEN STAY THERE UNTIL THEY ARRIVE.

2.) Have the pet scanned for a microchip

3.) Check to see if they have a collar and tag and contact their guardian.

4.) Report them as found to the SPCA - this is vital as most guardians will go the SPCA to search for their missing pets!

5.) Report them as found to local vets and put up posters

6.) Once the dog or cat is safely at SPCA or the vet post a photo and ALL THE RELEVANT details on fb, send an email to your contacts and put up posters in the area.

7.) if you decide to keep the pet until the guardians come forward:

Report them as found at the SPCA
please ask for proof of ownership I.e photos, vet book etc.
Also take a photo of the person with their dog as well as vehicle registration no.
Post the reunited pic with your found post (keep the reg for future reference). DO NOT DELETE your Facebook post as its the only proof you have.
Sadly there are people claiming other peoples dogs and are now untraceable.

8.) Parents please take a special note of animals that your children may have brought home. This animal could be a beloved family member and their guardians would be happy to be reunited. There are many animals waiting for their adoption day, and you could rather adopt a pet of their own to care for!

WHAT TO NOT DO IF YOU SEE A LOST OR INJURED DOG OR CAT.

1.) Do NOT drive on by and then post on fb for "somebody" to go help. YOU are SOMEBODY and YOU are RIGHT THERE. Time is ALWAYS of the essence and a few seconds can be the difference between life and death or between a dog or cat ending up in the wrong hands or injured/suffering or lost and starving forever and between EVER getting back home again.

2.) Do NOT sms, whatsapp, tag or fb inbox people who are in all likelihood sitting in their office doing their day jobs or who are on the other side of the province and dont have transport so cant drop everything and rush out there to go rescue the dog or cat that YOU saw or who might only see your message/post hours later.

3.) Do NOT just decide to keep or rehome the dog or cat unless you have tried to find the owner first and have informed all the shelters and rescue organisations. Think how YOU would feel if someone found YOUR pet and just decided to keep or rehome him/her.

WHAT TO DO IF NOBODY CLAIMS THE DOG OR CAT YOU FOUND AND YOU WANT TO KEEP HIM/HER OR CAN FIND A HOME.

Contact 1 of the reputable rescue organisations or shelters to assist with the rehoming so that the dog or cat can be sterilized, homechecks and meet and greets done and an adoption contract signed. You don’t want the dog or cat you "rescued" to end up back in a bad situation in time to come.

IF EVERYBODY DOES THEIR BIT SO MANY MORE DOGS AND CATS CAN BE SAVED FROM DEATH OR A LIFE OF MISERY.