One of a pet owner’s worst nightmares is to have your beloved furry companion go missing. Even though you might have barricaded your house and covered all possible points of exit, some pets are simply talented escape artists who love going on solo adventures. Of course, what our pets don’t realize is how worried we get when we can’t find them—we’ve heard enough horror stories of what sometimes happens to lost pets.

Thankfully, technology has evolved to put every pet owner’s major worry to rest. With microchipping, you’ll be able to know wherever your pet is—and whoever comes across them will find out who owns them, too!

Here’s what you need to know about microchipping and how it benefits your pet:

The Lowdown on Microchipping

Although the sound of microchipping is pretty intimidating, it’s much less sinister than you think! You might imagine it to look like the chips you see in sci-fi movies, but the reality is that they are so tiny, they’re about the same size as a grain of rice. It’s inserted into your pet through an injection that looks a lot like your regular vaccine. These chips are always inserted at the same location, which is in between the shoulder blades of your dog and cat.

Microchips are a safe, quick, and simple way to provide your pet with its distinct and permanent form of identification. It’s overtaken the popularity of previous methods, such as tattooing because of how easy and painless the procedure is. The needle used has a very sharp tip, which means that pets hardly notice it!

The Benefits

Microchipping boasts a whole host of benefits. For starters, any dog or cat can be microchipped at any time. If your pet has recently given birth to a litter, most veterinarians would suggest having them chipped once they are spayed or neutered. Even if you decide to decline, you can always have them chipped at a later time since it’s such a simple process. And once the chip is in them, you’ll never have to worry about it eroding, breaking, or going missing—it’s there to stay with your pet for the rest of its life!

In fact, microchips are designed to stay firmly in place once it’s applied. On rare occasions, it begins to migrate to other places in our pet, so it’s important to have this checked by your vet once a year or when you bring your pet for a regular checkup. This will give you the assurance that your pet’s microchip is easily detected should anything occur.

Another benefit is that if your pet goes missing and an altruistic soul finds it and brings it to a shelter or veterinary hospital, the staff will be able to identify you as the owner by scanning it. In fact, Canada mandated in 2004 that all chips must be of the ISO variety, which can be read by all scanners. It can even be read by scanners in different countries if you decide to go traveling with your furry friend!

Once the chip is scanned, a unique identification number will appear, with the first few digits indicating the company that produced it and the database the chip is registered to. The shelter or veterinary hospital staff will then contact the company to locate the owner. Once that’s done, you’ll be reunited with your pet in no time! However, you should also verify with the microchip company to ensure that the identification number is correct and consistent. You should also update the company if you change numbers or move residences.

Apart from identification, chips also store important information, such as the pet’s medical and health information. This is extremely useful especially in cases of emergencies, such as your pet getting into an accident. In fact, with the progression of technology, they might even be used to monitor the health of pets!

Conclusion

Microchipping offers security, safety, and much-needed peace of mind for you and your pet. They’re accessible and easy to insert into your pet without harming them. Although microchips were primarily developed to offer a more reliable way of tracking your furry friend, they also offer several other benefits worth considering. You can rest easy knowing your pet will be able to go home safely and quickly with just a scan—after all, they are family, too.

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