Pet microchips are an excellent tool. However, despite being lauded by many high-kill shelters, they in reality only serve only one purpose – identification. They don’t eliminate shelter killing. Nor are they some kind of gold star predictor to an owner being ‘good’ or ‘bad’, or deserving of their pet back. They are simply a form of ID, generally more reliable than a collar, but open to all the same administration issues as any other large, human dependent database.
Shelters sell microchips as the key to saving lives, but they are actually only one piece of the life-saving puzzle. Microchips as a tool for protecting pets against being killed in a shelter, are only as good as the animal sheltering system which supports them.
Seatbelts save lives. But we still need to invest in roads. Driver training. Complimentary safety devices like airbags & ABS. And a health-care system to help when seatbelts either fail, or are not used.
Just as we wouldn’t defend the refusal of life-saving treatment to a person simply because they weren’t wearing their seatbelt, neither should being chipped be a prerequisite to every pet receiving optimal care should they enter a shelter. However too often, shelters failing in their basic duty to process pets effectively, is simply explained away with “well, if he’d been chipped this would never have happened”. Often euthanised rather than protected, and with their lives given no value whatsoever, simply for the lack of this basic identifier.
This year, the Victorian Department of Primary Industries warned veterinarians in the state, that they were in breach of animal laws should they use their own microchipping equipment to scan pets and return them home – risking fines of up to $700 per pet. Meaning one large segment of the microchipping system designed to protect pets was effectively disabled. Now all pets must go to the pound.
So, how are the pounds doing? Let’s take a look at one.
Bubba was a 15year old cat, who escaped her owner’s house. Despite her owner’s efforts, she wasn’t able to be found. A neighbour took her to the Lost Dogs Home North Melbourne. As Bubba wasn’t chipped, she was identified as ‘unsavable’ and was killed within a few hours of arrival.
The system which killed her, claims that a microchip would have saved her life.
But the question remains – how does anyone in the field of ‘animal welfare’ not recognise that a cat who has reached the ripe old age of ten plus years, MUST have someone looking out for their welfare?
This cat was not a young street cat. This cat wasn’t starving or feral. This cat was an elderly, desexed pet who had only been missing a matter of hours. Microchip or no microchip she clearly had a family.
Bubba was wanted and loved. As an senior indoor only cat, identification – to ironically protect her from being ‘sheltered’ to death – was not made a priority. And while a microchip would have made the reunion potentially straightforward, she still had the right to be given every opportunity to be found. But instead she was killed.
Brindle was the dog in a three human-kid family, who became lost during a thunderstorm two days before Christmas. She had a christmas gift under the tree that was never opened, because she was killed by the Lost Dogs Home Cranbourne even after her family came forward to claim her.
When Brindle’s Mum came forward to collect her, the family was told they couldn’t as the dog was in Brindle’s Dad’s name. When Brindle’s Dad went in to claim her, the family were sent away because the microchip was in Brindle’s Mum’s name. This administration loop would cost Brindle her life, as the pound killed her during the Christmas holiday break.
Flash was kept by whomever found him when he was lost. After many months, his family had given up looking assuming the worst.
Then, when watching the evening news, they happened to see Mike Larkan’s Melbourne ‘Give a Dog A Home’ segment and saw their little dog being offered for adoption.
The Lost Dogs Home blamed this owner for not having their dog chipped. Luckily for him, Flash had passed the temperament test, wasn’t killedm and thanks to this one-in-a-million TV connection, and was able to return home.
Archie is a young, large breed, black dog, with a distinctive explosion of white marking on his chest. He was adopted by his family from a rescue group about twelve months ago.
Last week, Archie escaped. As he was microchipped, his owner was confident that should he enter the pound, his dog would be returned. Regardless, he called the Lost Dogs Home every day to see if a dog matching Archie’s description had been handed in – to no avail. Not one person in the organisation knew of a young, large breed, black dog, with a distinctive explosion of white marking on his chest being held in their facility. Archie, he was told, was not in the pound.
Luckily for Archie, his owner wasn’t content to take the pound at their word. He visited in person and… there he was. Microchipped Archie was potentially enjoying his last few days on earth, held in the pound while his chip did him no good whatsoever.
The two have now been reunited.
And they are a tool which works well, however other aspects of animal sheltering also need to be developed. Despite the existence of seatbelts, we still need efficient hospitals. And they need to work effectively whether you were wearing your seatbelt when you require their help, or not.
‘Microchipping days’, as often offered by kill pounds and shelters, are largely a waste of resources. We know less than 5% of pets enter shelters each year. That is, about 250,000 pets enter shelters*, from a overall dog and cat population of about 6 million (4%).
We know most owners microchip. There are more than 4.5 million microchip registrations on the five pet microchip registries in Australia, meaning more than 2/3rds of the pet population will be chipped in their lifetime.
To expend the energies of a kill shelter, on microchipping many thousands of pets, to try and catch those few owners who wouldn’t otherwise chip, in an effort to maybe effect outcomes for just 5% of the pet population – makes little sense.
A much greater result would be realised by those same kill shelters simply offering an online, photo-based lost and found service for every single pet entering the shelter, to help all pets, not just ones with current microchips that do get scanned successfully. These pets we know need all the help they can get.
Every pound, including the Lost Dogs Home, need to offer an online lost & found facility to help owners find their pets. Every animal needs to be given the chance to be reclaimed.
We need to stop finger waggling at owners. We need to stop using microchips like ‘gold stars’, and an indicator of a pet who deserves to be saved. We need to stop punishment-killing people’s pets for not being chipped. We need to stop excusing away poor shelter performance, with the microchip placebo. ALL pets deserve care and protection. Chip or no chip.
Microchips are neither a fail safe protection, nor a guarantee of shelter performance. Programs which give lost pets maximum exposure save lives. Without them, we will continue to see back-door killing, near misses and dysfunction at our nation’s shelters.
*These figures obviously exclude unowned cats, which make up a significant percentage of cat intakes, and would see a much smaller number of pets overall with the potential to be microchipped by ‘owners’.
all my friends are chipped and speyed but l was told the trainee vets that do the Vet Multi micro chip days sometimes do it wrong and the chip will wander in the animals body… and also about 6 yrs ago l lost my kelpie ,, had the lust prior to speying rang pound said they had a kelpie but not microchipped.. so l went down there he ws micro chipped and they could not find it ….so l took him to a vet and they rechecked him Chip Had slide from his back /neck area to his leg!!!!!! so had to get him re chipped ,, the Vet said in the old days a chip could wonder but now they should not with special adhesives added ..Also if the batteries were running low on the scanner or the vet nurse /vet missed an area …Death I like the idea of pnone numbers on pets a Better ideaon their tags