Dopey the missing cat has come home.
When the orange tabby disappeared from Donna Lane-Mills' home in south Sacramento six years ago, she thought he had been hit by a car and she would never see him again.
"He was a favorite of my youngest daughter, who was just 6 years old at the time," Lane-Mills said Tuesday. "She was crying herself to sleep at night saying, 'I miss my Dopey.' "
But thanks to an American Kennel Club Companion Animal Recovery microchip implant, the cat is back home after living in Rancho Cordova and Yolo County.
Lane-Mills said the AKC left a voice-mail message last Wednesday that her Dopey had been found in the Yolo County Animal Shelter in Woodland.
"Dopey?" she thought. "I was shocked when they told me he was found," she said.
She asked an employee to describe the cat. The shelter perfectly described Dopey, so named because of his unorthodox features. "He has a distinctive face," said Lane-Mills.
When she got to the shelter, Dopey sat up. She began petting him and he purred.
According to Lane-Mills, Dopey lived for a while in Rancho Cordova, where he was cared for by a woman who later gave him to her grandmother in Yolo County. When she died, Dopey was turned in to the shelter.
As a 9-year-old cat, Dopey had little chance of adoption, and without the information from his microchip, he likely would have been euthanized, shelter workers said.
Lane-Mills said she got the pet implant when cats started disappearing from her neighborhood.
Today, Dopey's "a little chubbier," she said.
"He settled right in at home. He's in the spare room for now. He sits in a window and sleeps on a spare bed."
And he's becoming reacquainted with his old friends: Spencer, the 17-year-old American Staffordshire terrier mix, and Inni, a 15-year-old cat. Even Dopey's standoffish mother, Fluffy, is still around.
Call The Bee's Bill Lindelof, (916) 321-1079.
What You Should Know About Comments on Sacbee.com
Sacbee.com is happy to provide a forum for reader interaction, discussion, feedback and reaction to our stories. However, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments or ban users who can't play nice. (See our full terms of service here.)
Here are some rules of the road:
• Keep your comments civil. Don't insult one another or the subjects of our articles. If you think a comment violates our guidelines click the "report abuse" button to notify the moderators. Responding to the comment will only encourage bad behavior.
• Don't use profanities, vulgarities or hate speech. This is a general interest news site. Sometimes, there are children present. Don't say anything in a way you wouldn't want your own child to hear.
• Do not attack other users; focus your comments on issues, not individuals.
• Stay on topic. Only post comments relevant to the article at hand. If you want to discuss an issue with a specific user, click on his profile name and send him a direct message.
• Do not copy and paste outside material into the comment box.
• Don't repeat the same comment over and over. We heard you the first time.
• Do not use the commenting system for advertising. That's spam and it isn't allowed.
• Don't use all capital letters. That's akin to yelling and not appreciated by the audience.
You should also know that The Sacramento Bee does not screen comments before they are posted. You are more likely to see inappropriate comments before our staff does, so we ask that you click the "report abuse" button to submit those comments for moderator review. You also may notify us via email at feedback@sacbee.com. Note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us the profile name of the user who made the comment. Remember, comment moderation is subjective. You may find some material objectionable that we won't and vice versa.
If you submit a comment, the user name of your account will appear along with it. Users cannot remove their own comments once they have submitted them, but you may ask our staff to retract one of your comments by sending an email to feedback@sacbee.com. Again, make sure you note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us your profile name.
About Comments
Reader comments on Sacbee.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Sacramento Bee. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "report abuse" button below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.