In a case like this, vets may get a warning to check dogs of the right age.
I hope the owners keep some fur for DNA-testing, just in case the dog is found and they have to prove it’s theirs.
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Probably not a bad idea to have a collar with a tile (or similar tech) hidden in it. Would be easier to hide in the collar of a bigger dog
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Yeah, chips are mainly helpful for rescuers and people who want to find the owner. Vets aren’t typically checking them to verify ownership if the humans who bring pets in don’t ask, though they arguably should. Of course then pet thieves would seek out dishonest vets.
Pet thieves are scum of the Earth.
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I would not be surprised if its possible for pet thieves that do it often to have a guy or a dishonest vet who can take the chips out
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Same, only I’d be John Wick with menopause. Even scarier.
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That’s why I take estrogen.
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I was xmas shopping w/mom many years ago and saw a big van with a bumpersticker that read, “Look out! I’m out of estrogen and I’ve got a gun!” I cracked up, and approached the driver, a middle aged lady smoking a 100mm cigarette. (I can be fearless AF at times.) She rolled down her window, and I told her I loved her bumpersticker. She LHAO, and said, in a deep, husky cig voice, “It’s true, too!” and I cracked up again.
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I wonder if they can easily remove the chip? I thought my vet told me that they’re fairly small, like a grain of rice. And they can migrate.
I think if you bring in a new dog/cat or puppy/kitten, the vet may scan it especially if you’re a new to the practice. If you arrive and you have records from a previous veterinarian, they may not.
We should ask @Bobo if they scan every new patient? Also, can the chips be easily removed?
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This sort of thing is becoming a problem where I live too, though it’s typically done by two people on a scooter. The scooter stops, one person jumps off and shoves the dog-walker to the ground, then scoops up the dog and jumps back on the scooter. Because of the means of transport, they typically target puppies and small purebreds.
It’s pretty common practice to scan any “found” animal. Not common practice to scan animals of known origin, with the exception of animals from shelters or rescue groups. Always good practice to scan those as rescue groups don’t always have scanners, and shelters, well “unreliable” is a pretty good term for their scanning.
I’ve actually scanned one newly adopted pup from the shelter, and had to advise their new happy family that their dog may already have a family. It did, and luckily, they had been desperately trying to find their dog. The new family was happy to get it back to it’s original home, and they adopted another dog.
The chips could be easily removed. They’re like a big fat grain of long grain rice size wise, and if you took radiographs to locate it (you can sometimes even feel where they are in thin skinned animals), it would be easy to cut out the little bit of subcutaneous scar tissue that contained it.
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Thanks for the info. I didn’t realize that the chip could that easily removed, but that makes sense. Our cats were all strictly indoor and we never left the dog outside by herself, but we chipped them just in case we all got separated after major earthquake.
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I’m going to add that, in the absence of a pretty good reason (infection, overexuberant scarring reaction, maybe chip company goes out of business so you can’t change owner info through the usual means), I’d argue that surgically removing a chip would be pretty unethical. Any vet asked to remove a chip no questions asked is going to have a lot of questions like “where did you steal this dog from? Maybe we’ll scan it to find out who the actual owner is…”.
That doesn’t mean that someone couldn’t just heavily sedate a dog and cut it out with a scalpel and sew it up with a little dental floss in their garage. Less tidy, but people crop ears in their garages…
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Thanks for reminding me that I hate people.
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