Your Cat Is Missing: The First 24 Hours, in Toronto

April 10, 2022 · Updated November 5, 2026

Your Cat Is Missing: The First 24 Hours, in Toronto

Updated November 2026: this article first ran in April 2022 as “Why Do Cats Go Missing?” It is now a plan for Toronto owners whose cat is missing, built on two studies of lost cats and the City's own rules. Two claims in the old version are withdrawn. It said a cat can go three days without water and two weeks without food, “so don't panic”; that was wrong on both counts. A cat that has not drunk in a day or more needs a vet, and a cat that stops eating for even a few days, especially an overweight cat, can develop hepatic lipidosis, a liver disease that can be fatal without prompt veterinary treatment. It said a couple of days away is normal and that unneutered roaming cats always come home; neither is true for many cats. A reunion story that could not be checked has also been cut.

If your cat normally comes home for dinner and has not, treat it as missing today. Most lost cats that are found turn up close to home.

The first hour

  • Search the house first. Cupboards, behind and under appliances, inside boxes, under beds, the basement, the garage and the car.
  • Then your own yard, and the neighbours' yards once they say you may, slowly: under decks and porches, in sheds, behind shrubs. Your cat might be trapped or stuck somewhere.
  • Tell the neighbours. Knock or message, and ask them to check their garages, garden sheds and basements, under their decks and in parked cars. In cold weather, the BC SPCA asks drivers to knock on the hood and check underneath before starting a car; ask your neighbours to do the same. A cat sheltering from the cold can climb into the engine bay.
  • Report it. Call Toronto Animal Services at 416-338-PAWS (7297) or dial 311. Have a photo, a description, your licence number and your microchip number ready.
  • Call your microchip company (it is on your adoption or vet paperwork). Say the cat is missing and check that the phone number and address on the record are current.

The first night

Go out again after dark with a flashlight, wearing something reflective and staying off the road. In a 2018 study of 1,210 lost cats by Huang and colleagues, 73% of owners searched at night with a flashlight, and a night search was among the methods linked to the quickest finds.

Move slowly and quietly, and look more than you call. Nearly every owner in the same study called their cat's name (93%), and it showed no clear advantage. Pet FBI and the Missing Animal Response Network agree that an escaped indoor cat hides in silence, often near where it got out.

The next morning

  • Make a poster. Pet FBI's advice: few words, LOST above a clear photo, your phone number below it, on bright neon poster board, with the photo in a plastic sleeve taped down with clear tape. See the City's pole rules below. If your cat is on Petbook, the alert page prints one for you (see the Petbook section below).
  • Hand out flyers door to door around the block. Ask nearby vet clinics, including the 24-hour emergency hospitals, to put one up and to call you if an injured cat is brought in.
  • Check the Stray Animals Report on the City's lost and found pets page. It lists animals found in the last 14 days, where each was found and which shelter has it. A separate list covers animals found dead in the last 30 days.
  • Register the cat as lost with Helping Lost Pets, as the City's page recommends. It now works with Pet FBI: a report entered on either site appears in both databases.
  • Use local networks. Check your local area for organizations that help find lost and escaped cats, and for neighbourhood lost-pet pages on Facebook.

Where lost cats are found

Close to home, mostly. In the Huang study, 75% of cats were found within 500 m of the point of escape. Among cats found alive, the median distance was 50 m. Indoor-only cats were found closer still, at a median of 39 m, with three quarters within 137 m. Cats that went in and out went further, at a median of 300 m.

Of the cats found alive, 83% were outside, 11% were inside someone else's house and 4% were inside their own. Fewer than 2% of the cats that were found turned up at a shelter. The authors' efficient methods: a thorough physical search, flyers and a humane trap.

About a third of the cats (34%) were recovered alive by their owners within 7 days, and about 56% were found by two months. Only 61% were found within a year, and few were found alive after 90 days.

An older study, by Lord and colleagues in 2007, surveyed the owners of 138 lost cats in Ohio, of which 53% were recovered, after a median of 5 days. Of those, 66% came home on their own, 11% were found through neighbourhood signs and 7% through an animal agency. Ohio State's news release on the study said cat owners waited about three days before contacting a shelter, against one day for dog owners.

Toronto Animal Services and the three-day hold

Toronto Animal Services runs three animal centres:

  • West: 146 The East Mall, Etobicoke
  • North: 1300 Sheppard Avenue West, North York
  • East: 821 Progress Avenue, Scarborough

Visits are by appointment, including to redeem your own animal. Book at 416-338-PAWS, 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. The centres are closed on statutory holidays, the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Remembrance Day and Easter Monday.

The clock is short. Under Chapter 349 of the Municipal Code, a cat the City impounds is held for at least three days, not counting the day it came in or days the centre is closed. After that the cat becomes City property and can be adopted out, transferred or euthanized. The Code sets no longer hold for a cat that wears a tag or has a microchip. To redeem a cat you pay $30 plus $10 a day, and you must make sure it is microchipped.

So report and book on day one, not day four.

The cat licence

All cats owned in Toronto must be licensed and wear the City tag. The licence costs $15 for a spayed or neutered cat and $50 for one that is not; owners 65 and over pay half, though not for replacement tags. Toronto Humane Society tells people who find a pet wearing a City of Toronto tag to call 311. A microchip does not replace it.

Posters: the City's rules

Chapter 693, the City's sign by-law, counts a poster about a missing pet as a community poster. It may go on a public utility pole on a boulevard if it:

  • is no bigger than 22 by 28 cm, on paper or lightweight cardboard;
  • is fixed flat with staples or removable tape only, no higher than 2 m;
  • is dated on the front and stays up no more than 30 days;
  • faces the property in front of it, away from traffic;
  • gives valid contact information and does not cover another poster.

The by-law's pole rule does not cover Toronto Hydro poles, so check who owns a pole, or use shops, community boards and vet clinics. Posters are not allowed on trees, parking signs, bus shelters or other City property, or on privately owned poles (rules as of June 2024). Pet FBI's own advice is to avoid utility poles altogether, which it calls unsafe.

Traps, cameras and coyotes

If your cat is seen but will not come to you, a humane trap baited with food is one of the methods that worked in the Huang study. The Missing Animal Response Network also suggests a wildlife camera with a food lure. In Toronto, keep any food lure small and take what is left in each morning: the City asks residents not to leave pet food outdoors or uncovered, because it draws rodents, and rodents draw coyotes. Toronto Street Cats lists Toronto Humane Society as lending traps. The site is aimed at people who care for feral cats and lists no conditions, so ask first.

Never leave a set trap unattended: Alley Cat Allies advises watching it from a distance the whole time it is set, because a trapped cat can be harmed by heat, cold, other animals or people. Don't set one in very hot or very cold weather, or in shade that will move off it. Once your cat is in, cover the trap with a towel and do not open it outdoors. If you catch a raccoon, a skunk or someone else's cat, let it go at once where it was caught: the City requires captured wildlife to be released humanely, within 1 kilometre of where it was caught.

Toronto has coyotes. The City's advice is to keep cats indoors or supervised outside. Coyotes are active day and night, most at dusk and dawn, and are seen more in winter. A pet that has been bitten needs a vet first; then report the coyote to 311, as you should for one that approaches people. More in our guide to keeping your pets safe from coyotes.

The following days

  • Repeat the night search, and widen it gradually, as Toronto Humane Society advises.
  • Check the Stray Animals Report every day.
  • Replace posters before their 30 days are up, with the new date on the front.
  • Don't stop at a week. Toronto Humane Society says a search can take two months or longer. The Missing Animal Response Network notes that many hiding cats break cover after about ten to twelve days, while saying the pattern needs more research.

The important thing is not to give up hope, and not to stop checking the shelters and the listings.

What not to do

  • Don't wait it out. A trapped, hurt or sick cat has no time to spare, and the three-day hold runs whether or not you have called.
  • Don't put the litter box outside. The Missing Animal Response Network does not advocate it: the smell could draw aggressive cats into your yard, cats that return would often have returned anyway, and it swaps an active search for waiting. The network says this is its opinion, not a tested finding, and suggests searching neighbours' yards and baiting a trap or a camera with food instead.

Reward scams

If a caller says they have your cat but wants money first, ask for a current photo or a detail that is not on the poster. Meet somewhere public, bring someone, and pay any reward only once the cat is in your arms. Never pay by gift card.

How Petbook can help

A Petbook account is free, and each pet gets a page with its name and photo. Report lost on that page alerts your followers and creates a public page, live for 30 days, that you can link from posters and Facebook groups. That page also has a Make a poster button: a one-page, letter-size poster with the photo, the details, a QR code that opens the alert, and a phone number if you choose to type one (it is printed, never stored). With a city and province on the alert, it also appears on the public lost pets board, where anyone can report a sighting without an account. While your cat is reported lost, its page shows a “Tell their family” door, so someone who has your cat but no tag to scan can still write to you.

The Petbook tag is a QR code on the collar. Whoever finds your cat scans it with a phone camera and sees its page, with the name, the photo and a way to reach you, without an app or an account. While the cat is reported lost, a scan also e-mails you. The tag is not identification: it is not a licence, a microchip or proof of ownership. Join free and add your cat.

After your cat is home

  • If your cat is hurt, go now. Take it straight to an emergency vet, and call on the way, if it is bleeding, struggling to breathe, unable to stand or use a leg, staggering, in obvious pain, straining without passing urine, has not drunk in a day or more, or is limp or unresponsive. A hurt or frightened cat may bite you out of fear, VCA Animal Hospitals warns, so don't hug it and keep your face away from its mouth.
  • Otherwise, book a vet check even if the cat seems fine, and sooner if it is not eating, because of hepatic lipidosis, the liver disease named at the top of this article. Offer water and a little of its usual food unless the vet has told you otherwise, and ask the vet how much to feed at first.
  • Check the microchip record once more, and update it if anything changed while you searched.
  • Licence the cat if it is not licensed.
  • Keep a collar and tag on. Toronto Humane Society says a microchip does not replace them. A chip's details go only to shelters, animal control and vets; a neighbour can read a tag. Our guide to collars covers the choices.
  • Consider spaying or neutering. In the Lord study, 57% of neutered cats were recovered, against 25% of intact cats: a link, not proof of cause, but worth asking your vet about.

Sources

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