It is astonishing how many cats and dogs go missing in Benoni every day, as per the dozens of messages on the lost and found pets Whatsapp group I belong to.
Ok, there’s a lot of chatting on groups like this too, which compounds the amount of messages you end up scrolling through and as much as I want to sometimes hit delete, I’m quite addicted to the goings on around our four-legged friends in this town.
If this is only Benoni then what does the broader East Rand/Gauteng/South Africa picture look like – and where are all the pets that are never found?
You’d think that at the rate at which they’re escaping their owners’ yards we’d be falling over them in the street, but we’re not.
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I live, commute and shop in the suburbs the group covers so I always have my eyes peeled for a dog or cat I saw on the group. Nada. Nothing. Not one have I come across and be able to successfully report back.
“I have spotted Molly running along the spruit near Venus Road or I just saw a dog with a blue collar heading past Benoni High School; he looks just like missing Bullet.”
Just when I was beginning to question my worth to this group, my husband walked into our lounge with a black sausage dog.
“He” had bolted in our gate and run and hid behind the house, and apparently tried to bite my husband when he went to pick the little lost soul up.
I’m not a huge fan of sausage dogs (my husband is and has always wanted one just so that he can name it ‘krokodil’) but I’m a softie for animals so instantly ‘rescued’ the poor critter from the clutches of my husband and the towel he had him wrapped up in.
The little thing warmed to me instantly and our own fox terrier, Vicky, was ever the concerned neighbour, not even retaliating when ‘krokodil’wanted to take a chunk out of her.
The doggie didn’t want to be picked up so I made it as comfy as I could on the couch while I posted a message and pic on my lost and found group – at last!
Despite my husband insisting it was male, it turned out to be female and the owners were on my doorstep within 30 minutes to fetch her.
The lost and found group’s tentacles had done their job! Little krokodil was safe.
She was ecstatic to see her owners, and them her.
Her little romp had started with a bolt out of an open gate at their house in Cambridge Street, Farrarmere, took her in peak hour traffic across Mercury Street and then all along the spruit into Atlasville and into our yard.
This is only one success for this highly-active Whatsapp group. There are dozens each day, but also dozens upon dozens of pets still missing.
I’d implore anyone who owns a pet – bunny, chicken, bird, cat, dog or guinea pig – join.
Their chances of being reunited with you if they go missing are so much higher.
The days of hammering a “missing” flyer into a tree are over (and not only because it’s not nice for the tree).
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