When I caught my first stray cat that was microchipped, back in 2020, I was excited! This poor cat had been outside for a while, coming and going from the backyard of a home on the edge of a business district.

The cat would come to the back door and meow and meow but if the homeowner opened the door, he would run away. She put food and water out for him, and asked me if I could catch him.

He was a curious guy, and I was able to get him to eventually take some cat treats from me, but if I tried to touch him, he ran off. I did finally catch him, using a drop trap. And it turned out that he had a microchip.

I was excited because I thought I would be able to reunite someone with their lost cat that they had been looking for. I mean, as a cat person, what better outcome could there be?

So what do you do when you find a cat and you are able to scan it for a chip? I borrowed a microchip scanner from a fellow cat nerd for this task. You wave the scanner around the cat, without touching the cat, normally near the shoulder blades. Chips can move around inside the body, so it does pay to scan all around the body, just in case.

Once the chip reader senses a chip, it might beep and there is digital display that will show you a long number. I try to take a photo of the display with my phone so that I don’t have to try to redisplay the number on the chip reader. (I lost the instructions!) The reader I now own will just turn off the display after a few seconds.

If there is no chip, the reader will give you a message like, “no chip detected.”

What I do next is I just Google “microchip” and the number. The results will usually show which company the chip is registered to, and a phone number to call to report that you found the cat.

Here’s where things get murky. If you call and are asked if you are just a “Good Samaritan” who found the cat, the phone support person will let you know if the cat has been reported as Lost, or not, with the chip company. Then, the company will ask to take your call-back information, if you are willing to give it, and the person will tell you that the registered owner will be contacted. The phone support person will not give you any contact information for the cat owner listed on the microchip record. So, you do not have the option of reaching out to the person yourself.

Last time (2026) I made one of these calls, I was told that the “owner contact,” was done by an automated system. So, no one is actually putting any effort into finding the owner; if the owner just ignores the contact or if the phone numbers and email addresses are no longer valid, nothing else happens. This gets important!

If you can get a veterinary office to call, or an animal control officer, or someone from a shelter or rescue, then the company will give out contact information for the cat owner, and the person who made the call can reach out.

Something I learned this year, from a helpful phone representative, was that as a volunteer with a cat rescue, I can state that and then get contact information for the cat owner directly. (I mean they do take some extra info from the you, the caller). It’s hard to hang up with a microchip company that just takes your info, maybe sort of tries to get in touch with the cat owner later, and won't give you any contact information for the owner, or updates, and feel like your call is going to help at all. Of course, if your own cat disappeared and had a microchip, wouldn’t you be reporting it lost within a day of not finding it? So, I guess finding out that the cat I caught was not reported lost should have been my big hint back in 2020.

One thing the chip company will tell you is what adoption agency the cat was microchipped by, if the cat came from such a group. The cat I caught was from one of our local large shelters. I was able to find out, from the shelter, that the cat had originally been trapped in Troy, and went to that shelter, where he was neutered, vaccinated, and microchipped in 2017, and was adopted out. The shelter won’t give out any contact information for the adopter.

I wrote up a Lost Cat post and had it listed on the Steve Caporizzo Pet Connection Facebook page, and did some other work to spread the word.

I got lucky, in a sense, when an animal control officer saw the Facebook post and emailed me to say that, since he was an official person, he could call the chip company and get all the owner contact info. He was willing to help actually track down the owner, so I took him up on that offer.

In the end, this guy really tried. He went to the address of the owner, and didn’t make contact. He called the phone numbers and sent email to the people, and never got a response. His advice to me was that the cat was purposely abandoned.

I couldn’t believe it. (Now I know better!)

Back in Capital Purrspective Issue #9 I wrote about how companian animals are considered property, in New York State. They don’t have the rights of sentient beings or family members. While sometimes this is very sad, in the case of abandoned pets, it allows for the rescue process to move along in a timely fashion. A rescue or shelter is responsible to hold a microchipped cat for five days before it can be adopted out to a new owner, in New York State.

I am happy to say that the cat I caught in the 2020 situation was adopted to a great home, through a no-kill rescue, and lives the life he deserved in the first place. A new owner can call the microchip company and re-register the chip under their own name. The chip company already has on record that the cat was never reported lost and that the previous owners never responded to contact attempts.

Over time, I have gotten somewhat bitter over the lack of care from our local large shelters about these abandoned cats!

What am I talking about? When someone dumps cats or dogs right at the door or gate of a local shelter, these days, the shelter gets the incident to the news. A “manhunt” begins, we see any surveillance photos or video footage, and the person is caught, and charged under the laws New York State has for abandoning pets. And of course the shelter uses the news to raise funds to help the abandoned animals. That’s all good.

Now, say you find an abandoned cat that has been microchipped and find out the local shelter it came from. That’s easy.

Try contacting the large local shelter the cat was adopted out from, if that is the case. As you learn, shelter staff won’t tell you who adopted the cat. OK, I get that. But, if you are hoping that the shelter will easily take the cat back, you might be in for a surprise. It has been known to happen to rescuers that the shelter staff will say things like, “Well, maybe we’ll take it in as a stray-surrender.” Maybe? Of course, if the shelter euthanizes for space, maybe you’d rather find another rescue to take it in for the five-day hold and find a new home for it that way.

It’s disheartening to me that some local shelters do not care to help the cat after the people who work there adopted out the cat and it was later abandoned. Some shelters have no sense of lifetime care for cats they once helped. Why?

The thing that bothers me the most is that our local large shelters just don’t seem to care about the literal criminals who abandon microchipped cats adopted out from their very own shelters.

No need to do a manhunt or go to the news or social media. The shelters already have the contact info, the addresses, the emails, the phone numbers. Sure, maybe the people move. People can be tracked down. But the shelters do nothing. I’m sure lack of manpower would be cited, but how does that make sense when they do go after people who are caught on surveillance, dumping pets? I just don’t get it. You care or you don’t care. I don’t want to feel bitter about it, but each time you see a news event about another dumped pet outside the shelter, please know there are a dozen more microchipped cats just let out on the street, out of sight. Go get those people, too!! Start with all their personal information already on file at the shelter!

The next time I catch an abandoned microchipped cat, I would love to be able to call the shelter it came from and talk to a person who would tell me that they care, that they will have the person arrested, that they will add that person to a publicly accessible animal abandonment registry, and that they will guarantee really checking out future adopters and find the cat a better home. I want to know that the shelter will guarantee to that adopter that they would take the cat back in a heartbeat, if that person can no longer care for the cat anymore, for whatever reason. That’s what I want to hear. I hope we can all do better for cats!

Last week I was cat sitting for a regular client of mine, and they have a cat they adopted from me that they named “Trebuchet.” He is affectionately called “Tre” (pronounced “Trey”). Every time I see him, of course, I think about what a cool cat he is. If you aren’t sure what a trebuchet is, do a quick Google! This will give you an idea of part of what is special about Tre. (The rest is his awesome catsonality and his adorable looks!)

Tre came into my life 9 years ago, in December. The introduction of the Go Fund Me page I created for him gives you the low down:

“This little cowboy, now named “Tex,” was born and living outside of a store on the outskirts of Albany, NY. Tex and his many siblings, mom, and several other cats were fortunate enough to be fed by the store owners, but the area around the store is industrial, with lots of equipment, pallets of supplies, and storage areas. Not really safe or cat-friendly — and somehow Tex hurt one of his hind legs during his first three months of life. 

The store owners noticed Tex wasn’t using his back leg. All the cats and kittens seemed semi-feral in that they would come close to eat, but if anyone tried to reach out and touch them, they would run away. Even Tex, on his three good legs. There seemed to be no way to help Tex.

So, the owners started talking to people about Tex, and this is how things start to happen. Word of mouth.”

If you want to read about his capture, the Go Fund Me page is still live, and has the details and photos.

Tre (then “Tex”) had a dead toe, and old leg fracture, and a bone infection in his leg. Short story, he had his leg amputated, but we were super lucky that he was a kitten and didn’t seem to notice that he was missing a leg later, and he became friendly very quickly.

I adopted Tre out myself, not through a rescue. He really got the best home ever with my client! I already knew the people and all the other cats they had, and the loving care all of the cats received. Tre loves to run, fast! He runs up and down stairs and jumps up on his cat condos and furniture, no problem. He has plenty of room to run in his permanent home!

It’s hard to believe that he is about 10 years old already! Thank you to Diana for bringing Tre to my attention, he would have died outside with his bone infection; thank you to Lora and David for giving Tre such a great home! Thank you to Whiskers for loaning me a drop trap and giving me advice on how to use it (it was my first time). Tre was treated at the ER at Capital District Veterinary Referral Hospital and had his surgery there as well.

I sent this article to Tre’s mom, and she wrote back, “Tre has an incredible origin story (thanks to Lori and many more folks). We are so happy we became a part of it. We have had many, many feline friends and have met them right where they were. Lori knows one of our rescues lived with us for 6 years and we never really touched her....her rules.  But this crazy kid is so interested in being our friend. We are infatuated with him and honored to call him a friend.”

This week’s story is from September 2025; I’m still covering cats from the feeding station where the cats are being named after birds of mythology. (Are you starting to wonder when we run out of names?) Please meet Pamola!

I also have a new human to introduce to you! Her name is Bonnie, and she lives one door over from the feeding station! She loves cats and has done her own rescue of neighborhood cats over the years. I was introduced to her by the guy who started all of this when he asked me to help out with “Bob.” Capital Purrspective Issue #1 will take you back to those days.

I had spotted Pamola on the cat trail camera, and was very concerned, knowing that her fur colors meant that she is a female cat. Her pattern is called torbie. The patched part of the fur pattern is called tortoiseshell. Nearly 100% of tortoiseshell cats are females. Two XX chromosomes are required to make the tortoiseshell colors and pattern. If you recall from biology class, XX means female. (I think I got a “D” in college in biology, but I did learn about XX and XY!) Fun fact, a male cat can be a tortoiseshell, but then it has three chromosomes (XXY) and is usually sterile and cannot reproduce.

Anyway, since I know she was a she, I was very worried that she might be pregnant or would become pregnant, and in my mind she moved to the front of the line of cats to be captured. It is SO much easier to catch the mom cat and kittens BEFORE the kittens are born! The only problem is that I was about to go away on vacation. (Galaxy, Alan, and I went to Chincoteague Island, VA; Galaxy showed off her vacation photos in last week’s newsletter).

Enter Bonnie! I texted Bonnie to see if she would be willing to help out. Best thing I ever did! Bonnie responded right away and was more than willing to feed and water the cats while I was gone and to try to catch Pamola.

We left for our vacation and Bonnie kept me up-to-date. It helps so much to have a person who can be at the feeding station nearly every day. It is impossible to tell from the trail camera which cats are friendly and which ones are not. Once you have a person putting food out daily, or at least checking on things, the friendly cats might watch from a distance at first. (A feral cat would run for its life.) And after time, the friendly cats might approach the person, which is so helpful!

Bonnie saw Pamola, and after a bit, Pamola did come closer. Bonnie was actually able to pet Pamola! Very exciting!

Bonnie had set up a trap, but was able to just put Pamola into a cat carrier. Such good news to get while I was away!

Bonnie took Pamola to her usual vet office, where we found out that Pamola was already spayed and microchipped through one of our larger animal shelters in the area. The vet office was able to find out that Pamola was about four years old and when she last had vaccinations, so that was very helpful. She was treated for fleas and worms. The staff also tried to contact Pamola’s original adopter. That person never responded to phone calls, or email and the backup contact also never responded. More about that, in general, in the first article of this week’s newsletter.

So, officially abandoned, Pamola needed a place stay until I got back. Bonnie is not able to foster any cats. My friend and fellow cat nerd, Laurie, went to the vet office and took Pamola to her house to hang onto her until I got back.

Pamola’s story is a quick one! We brought her home and she got settled into the cat room. Whiskers agreed to take her on as a Whiskers foster cat, which basically meant that we could get Pamola into the PetSmart adoption center, she could be listed on petfinder.com and a Whiskers adoption counselor could handle the applications and approve an adopter.

In a little over one month from Pamola’s intake, she found a great home! She was so sweet and friendly that she went to a family with two children, who were very excited to have Pamola join them. It’s so nice to have an easy rescue!