Murdoch's Story

We arrived home from work on the day we broke up for Easter to find our next door neighbour, Andrea, sitting on her front step with a bowl of cat foot in one hand and an unaccustomed black cat resting comfortably in the crook of her other arm. Andrea has six cats of her own, each one a regular visitor to our house for fuss and the odd titbit, but the sudden appearance this handsome but collarless boy was certainly a mystery to us all.

 

The previous evening, I had noticed a black shadow duck out of the beam of our front security light. Assuming it was one of the cats from next door, I opened the door to investigate this unusually furtive behaviour! A beautiful, all black, young male cat very nervously approached me and eventually allowed me to fuss him. I noticed that his entire head was severely infested with huge white ticks. I fed him and he ate and drank with gusto, and after lots of fuss he eventually trotted off and disappeared into the front garden of the house across the road. Concerned, although I was a mild night, I put out some extra food and water - and noticed that Andrea next door had done the same.

 

Sure enough, next morning he was there on the doorstep. Both Andrea and I continued to feed and check on him that day. We were a little unsure of his sex at that point, he was quite well built, but possibly had the chubby "apron" of a female, so it was quite difficult to tell. We had to call him/her something, so (tongue in cheek!) we decided on Vivien(ne) - which could apply to either sex! If Andrea needed to provide a permanent home, then a more suitable name could be though of!

 

 He seemed too well cared for to have been deliberately abandoned, though he had clearly been missing from home for some time because of the severe tick infestation. We administered some treatment for this and a worming tablet, and the ticks almost immediately fell off. I bought a collar with a tiny screw cap i.d.holder, and wrote a note for the owner with our telephone number and popped it inside, saying that he was "assumed to be a stray" - just in case he should return home. As the weather was beginning to turn showery, I set up a temporary shelter for Vivien in our outside passageway, consisting of a dog transporting cage with the door tied open, a pillow and blankets inside and wrapped tarpaulin around the whole set up, making a cosy, waterproof "cave". I was desperate to take Vivien into our house, but torn because our own cat, Felicity, has lymphatic cancer and I felt we shouldn't stress her by introducing a lively new cat. The six cats next door were not readily accepting of this new tomcat yet, so this would all take time. We knew our next step was to gain Vivien's confidence enough to get him into a cat carrier to take him to be scanned for a possible identification microchip, which might just provide the name and contact details of his true owner!

 

On Easter Saturday we indeed took Vivien to the vets, who entertained the whole waiting room by popping his head through the hatch in the top of the carrier and peering at everyone like a jack in the box. The vet gave him a clean bill of health and removed a final tick from his tail. Hearts were thumping as the vet passed the microchip i.d scanner over Vivien and announced truimphantly "HE HAS A MICROCHIP!!!" The receptionist rang the owner, warning us that sometimes owners move and forget to update registered details, so we were prepared for disappointment. I think the whole waiting room heard the delighted owner on the other end of the phone! It turned out that the cat was called Murdoch, was a male, 18  months old, and the owners had moved just a few months previously from Welshpool, Powys, to an address in Halesowen which was the other side of town, about two miles, from our house. Murdoch was apparently scared off by some builders who were carrying out work at the house and ran away on the10th February. Not knowing the area, he couldn’t find his way home and just wandered, crossing very busy main roads to eventually find himself outside our house two months later. You could say he eventually "landed on his paws", after obviously suffering some distress in the months leading up to his rescue.

 

With Murdoch's owners' permission, the vet gave us the address and we immediately returned Murdoch home to his delighted family. We would like to say that Manor Vets, Kent Road, Halesowen, were marvellous and even waived the charge for Murdoch's examination and microchip scan.

 

Murdoch's owners had phoned every vet in the area, had registed details with several "Lost Pet" websites on the internet, and had even returned to Welshpool just in case Murdoch had managed to find his way back to his old home.  But most importantly, Murdoch was microchipped - and his owners had the foresight to update their address and contact details with the microchip company as soon as they moved house. A happy, if somewhat tearful, ending - all thanks to microchipping!