Late in January, the CPW shelter team took a call from an 82-year-old lady, who had a cat making himself at home at her place.

The lady knew he came from a neighbouring house where a dog was also living, and she guessed that the two probably weren't getting along.

However, Serge (as he was locally known) didn’t actually belong to that house, as he was a stray who had turned up several years earlier. Although that family weren't the legal owners of the cat, they had done the right thing and taken the cat to the local vet clinic to check for a microchip.

Serge was chipped, but attempts by the clinic to contact the phone number and email linked to the chip were unsuccessful. For privacy reasons, the clinic couldn’t share the contact information, so Serge’s original person was never found. That was two years ago.

Now Serge had practically moved into the lady’s house during the day, only going home late at night. Sadly, she couldn’t take him in properly, as she already had a senior cat who wasn't thrilled by the interloper. Which is why she ended up ringing us in January.

Given that CPW has a huge waitlist, Team Lead Delwyn decided she wanted to have one last try at finding Serge’s original family. So she asked the lady to take him back to the vet, and for the vet clinic to tell Delwyn the microchip number, which they can do because CPW is a registered animal shelter facility.

“This lovely boy was 12 years old,” Delwyn says. “I tried the only phone number on the chip – a landline which was no longer active. Then I sent a message to the email address – which bounced back.”

She says this was where the clinic had stopped, but she had noticed the listed owner’s name wasn't particularly common. So she searched Facebook, came up with a likely match, and sent a message. 

“Almost immediately I got a reply. Yes! This was indeed their cat, actual name Ninja, who went missing two years previously!

“Having asked some questions to be sure this really was the correct owner, a very happy and excited dad of the owner called the shelter. They had just that week had to put Ninja's sister to sleep and couldn't believe he had been found. They had moved to Whanganui but would happily drive down to get him. I put him in contact with the carer and left them to sort it out. 

“A couple of days later we had a phone call to say that Ninja had been picked up and was back with his true family.”

We’ve since heard that Ninja is doing really well and the other household cats welcomed him almost instantly. But, most of all, we’re very sure that he’s glad to be back with his own people.