A CAT who went missing in the North East for more than four months has been reunited with her family thanks to the power of a microchip.
Beloved pet Roxy was discovered in a garage at a commercial property in High Street in the Norton area of Stockton-on-Tees, after leaving the family home a mile-and-a-half away last October.
Her owner, Rob Harris, believes she was trying to return to the family's former address in Norton and had been living rough before taking refuge in the garage.
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The owner of the garage fed Roxy some fish and contacted the RSPCA for help.
Animal Rescue Officer Shane Lynn scanned Roxy's microchip and was able to contact Rob.
He then used a cat trap to coax Roxy out of her hiding place in the garage and she was soon heading back to her home in the Roseworth district of Stockton.
Roxy’s owner, Mr Harris said: "The whole family, myself, my partner and three kids were pleased to have her back. She was a bit ragged, but she had been getting fed.
"We've had her for nine years from a kitten. It is the second time she has vanished, but we were concerned this time.
"Where she was found was close to where we used to live, so I don't know if she was trying to go back to our old home.
"She's very much a house cat, but she slipped away when my partner was putting some rubbish into a bin. We were thinking we weren't going to see her again, but we'd had her microchipped and we put an appeal on social media."
The RSPCA advises all owners to microchip their pets to offer the best chance of them being identified and returned if lost.
It is a legal requirement to have dogs over the age of eight weeks microchipped, while rules on the compulsory microchipping of cats are to be introduced by the Government after strong public support during a consultation.
Currently, though many cats are not microchipped, and, unlike Roxy, face never being reunited with their owners should they go missing.
A microchip inserted by a vet under the animal's skin provides the pet with a unique code which can be scanned and matched with the owner’s contact details on a database.
A spokesperson for the RSPCA said: “Microchipping of cats is nowhere near as commonplace as we'd like it to be.
“Most cats we pick up aren’t chipped. Doing it means it is so much easier to contact their owners.
“Roxy had been living in the garage for three weeks. Her owner had moved house and it looks like she was trying to get back to the old address.
“The family's children were very pleased to have their cat back.”
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