In Honor of National Pet Week

Today I came across a lost dog. This is something that happens to me fairly regularly. Just like the homeless cats who seem to spread the word on the street that I'll take them in, I often cross paths with lost dogs. So, I always carry my cell phone with me and I always have several spare hospital leashes in my car. Something I see fairly regularly with these dogs is the lack of id tags. This particular dog did have a rabies tag with the hospital phone number that issued the tag...but guess what...when I called the hospital they could not locate the dog using the rabies tag number.

In honor of National Pet Week I wanted remind people of the importance of having accurate, readable id tags. Here are some tips:

1.) Make sure tags have current up-to-date information that can clearly be read.
2.) If your dog is microchipped call the company and reconfirm they have all your accurate information on file. This is good to do once per year.
3.) If your dog has a health condition you may want to have a separate tag made indicating health issues and any emergency instructions.
4.) Have both home and cell phone and possibly even work numbers on id tags. If you are out looking for your dog you want people to be able to reach you on your cell phone. Or, if your dog goes out with a dog walker during the day while you are at work you can be easily reached should an issue arise.
5.) Have temporary id tags made for vacations. I usually use those plastic key holders where you can slip in a piece of paper with info on it. I use the same key holder and just change the information depending on where we go. I always list the address and phone number of where we are staying.
6.) Finally, inspect your ID tags regularly. After the incident today I inspected Kona's tags. Two were completely unreadable and had to be thrown away and the phone number on his microchip tag has completely worn off.