When Morgan Daye lost her cat five years ago, she never gave up hope he’d return to her.
In fact, just a couple weeks ago, she spotted a white cat on her walk and immediately wondered if it was Peter.
So, when a local cat rescue Facebook page posted a photo of a missing cat that resembled her pet, she had to find out the truth.
“The details matched up: he could have been around 10 to 14 years old, that he had been on the street for years,” she said.
But as she stood at a Saint John, N.B. vet clinic in front of a white cat with matted fur and covered with thousands of fleas, she just wasn’t sure if it was the same Peter she had raised from a kitten.
“I don’t want to just take the cat. Maybe he’s not mine. So I was like, ‘I’ll come back the next day,'” she recalled.
“And just as I was about to leave, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, he has a kink at the end of his tail. When he was a kitten, he got it jammed in something.'”
When the veterinarian checked, sure enough, there was a kink.
“We both just started crying,” she said.
Peter had originally disappeared from her home in Millidgeville, N.B. in 2018 when he was nine years old. He was an indoor/outdoor cat and often visited neighbours.
One day, he just didn’t come home.
Over the years, Daye put up posts and scoured online groups, but to no avail.
Then a postal worker spotted the cat last week on the lower west side of the city and put a photo on RedHead Strays Helping Stray Cats Strut on Facebook.
“It’s across the harbour. So he would have had to have crossed one of two bridges to get there,” she said.
“Our thought as to how he got that far and crossed the large body of water was that he probably got in a vehicle.“
She contacted Dianne Fox, who runs the Facebook group, to go see the cat for herself.
Fox has been an avid cat lover since childhood, and started rescuing them in 2004. The Facebook group began in 2015, and she estimates the volunteers have rescued, homed, or treated some 2,600 cats by now.
In all that time, she thinks only about 20 times have they been able to connect a missing cat with their owner.
She admits when she first saw the photo of Peter, she didn’t think his chances were great.
“It was a miracle. Like, his bloodwork was good. His SNAP test was good,” Fox said.
“He was anemic from all the flea bites. He was covered in thousands of fleas, and they couldn’t even deflea him immediately because they had to get the fur off first.”
That miracle is now back “home” — a new one because Daye moved — and is settling in nicely. His owner said she’s now certain she’s been reunited with the same pet.
“Since he’s been home, it’s just like if there was any doubt, it’s totally gone. Because all of his little quirks and personality traits are all still there, which is incredible,” she said.
“Five years later and after who knows what he’s been through. It just shows how resilient animals are. So he’s really my cat for sure.”
Daye said she’s indebted to Fox’s rescue, which relies solely on donations.
Fox said it’s a struggle at times to fund their operations, especially since the number of cats in need have gone up in the city.
But this happy ending is just the inspiration they need.
“It’s amazing that he is alive and well, and they found his owner. It’s just incredibly amazing,” said Fox.
“It makes it all worthwhile.”
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