Well, one of my cats has gone missing

Dang - that's never easy. Are you sure he got out? I had some scares that ended with finding a cat in a weird hiding place - up under the bed on a storage box. And they would stay there for hours, even through a mealtime once... no idea why.

The few other times they got out, they stuck close to home. Found one up a tree outside my room after 12 hours... never so much as mewed.

Fingers crossed he'll come home soon!

Ohh, that's sad. Put notices up around the building, someone may have him. Is he chipped? If not get the other one chipped in case and this one if/when you get him back. Do they have pet chips in Iceland?

We have a neighborhood web site called NextDoor. See if your neighborhood is on it, they are spreading fast and could be in Iceland, you never know. And visit the local humane society or shelter, someone could have taken him there.

Put a notice up in the closest store or other hangout.

If you're in Iceland, he couldn't have gone far.

efreysson said:

I live on the fourth floor, and one of my two indoor cats has either made it out of the windows, or off of the balcony in spite of my precautions.

I realised it was missing less than an hour ago. I took a token stroll around the neighbourhood, but a cat has a million places to hide.

He's a year old, and neutered. How do cats typically behave in these situations? He has no way of getting up to the apartment, but can I expect him to show up meowing below the balcony when he gets hungry/bored?

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Cats tend to come home when they're ready to, so it's very possible he will do this. My main worry is that something could have scared him and be lost or hiding. Worst case scenario is that he could have wandered into a street and been hit. It's also possible that he is trapped in someone's shed or garage (we had a cat that disappeared for three days and it turned out he was trapped in the neighbor's garage when they were out of town for a weekend). Put up signs around the neighborhood and consider walking around and listening for miaows. Also, while it's more common for animal control to pick up roaming dogs, it's possible someone could have taken him to a shelter, so don't rule out going to animal control to see if he's there.

I've put up a Facebook ad for the little guy, but other than that there seems to be very little I can do, and I'm far, far from happy right now.

Any advice?

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Consider posting on Craig's list (or anything similar you might have in your country) too, and put up signs around the neighborhood offering a reward. A stray Pomeranian plopped itself on our doorstep one afternoon (hi, I'm lost and I can tell you like dogs, so...), and when I was going to craig's list to place a notice, I found a notice that had just been posted for a missing pom in our neighborhood, and it turned out to be the dog's owner. We called her, and she came straight over to get her dog.

A troll ate him.

Then burped. So it's no wonder kitty was freaked out when you took him back. Remember to wash your hands after handling him; troll saliva, ew.

Kitty is safe!

So glad to hear that.


Edited to add, my bad joke wasn't about the weather, it was about the fact Iceland is an island. (I have been there and it was just a joke, I know it's a big place for a cat to get lost in.)

Yay! Wonder if you'll ever know why he left, or what he did?

(Incidentally, if the police come to the door about a murder, remember to say that the cat was with you all day... he knows where you sleep, after all... )

Glad the little guy is back at home. How DID he get out??

Oh, yay. So glad the little guy is back. You probably don't have anything like this in Iceland, but in the western US, one of the fears we have when cats disappear is coyotes.

I'm glad my two boys are pretty lazy and content with their life as indoor cats. The big guy sneaks out the door past me once in a while, but all he does is circle the back yard miaowing at me until I corner him and scoop him up. So far, he hasn't attempted to climb over the fence.

Roxxsmom said:

Oh, yay. So glad the little guy is back. You probably don't have anything like this in Iceland, but in the western US, one of the fears we have when cats disappear is coyotes.

I'm glad my two boys are pretty lazy and content with their life as indoor cats. The big guy sneaks out the door past me once in a while, but all he does is circle the back yard miaowing at me until I corner him and scoop him up. So far, he hasn't attempted to climb over the fence.

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I've read that, thanks to "easy living" in cities, coyotes are spreading eastward. And there are always neighborhood dogs, who can do in an unwary cat. (And other cats, and birds of prey, and pest poison, and antifreeze...)

Great horned owls can be an issue out here for smaller dogs and cats. Cars are probably the biggest killer, though, and diseases they catch from fighting with other cats. I keep mine in for that reason. When I was first dating my husband, he let his cats out, and they were always getting bites and abscesses that needed patching (a steady drain when you're in grad school, even though vet fees were much cheaper back then).

Is there any possible way he snuck out through a few open doors? Anyone move into your building recently? Someone could have seen him roaming and may have been unable to stop him or just didn't bother to intervene. I can't see a small animal surviving that kind of fall, unless there's a tree next to your window.

Might not hurt to check him for illness or injury - one already established before the cat went missing. They will hide if they are not feeling well. I thought I lost my cat this year when I couldn't find her for a whole day. She wrangled herself inside a closed dresser drawer! Turned out to have injured her back.

Glad he turned up.

Well your little guy showed up before I saw this thread, so I'm just tagging along here with my own cat story.

The internet is made for cat pictures and stories, right?

We went on vacation early August for 10 days and our cat disappeared the day we left. The petsitter who came in said Smokey was gone - we'd been using this same petsitter for several years. We have 2 dogs as well as our kitty and have a dog door that opens into our fenced yard.

Smokey was gone the whole time. Petsitter checked the county shelter, which is just a few miles from us and is where stray animals are taken. Smokey has collar, tags, plus a microchip, and is registered with the county, so if she showed up there, she'd be safe from adoption or (sob) euthanasia.

She's done this before, though - so I wasn't supremely worried. She's gone on walkabout just because she can, I guess. Longest she's been gone was about 2 weeks.

We returned home about 1:30am on a Saturday and went out back to call for her. Then again that afternoon. That evening about 7 pm we were out in the backyard again and she came strolling casually out behind some bushes. Just walked over to us like, "Hiya, what's going on?"

Silly cat. She had her collar and tags on still. She was hungry - went right for her food bowl inside - but not thin. Don't know where she'd been. If only she would tell us.

I do suggest you get your cat microchipped. Even for indoor cats and dogs - if they escape while going to the vet or manage to get outside themselves, a microchip could get them returned to you. It cost about $35 here I think.

So glad your kitty is safely back home!

Cats can jump that height, no question. Do the windows all have screens? Have you checked the screens? I know someone whose cat could shove the screen, climb out the second-story window and somehow get up on the pitched roof, then meow for help. Repeatedly. They had to lock the screen and keep the window closed.

cornflake said:

Cats can jump that height, no question. Do the windows all have screens? Have you checked the screens? I know someone whose cat could shove the screen, climb out the second-story window and somehow get up on the pitched roof, then meow for help. Repeatedly. They had to lock the screen and keep the window closed.

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I got curious and looked into this. Apparently cats can fall from extreme heights and most likely survive. A study by the American Veterinary Medical Association concluded that cats who fall from an average of 5.5 stories have a survival rate of [approximately] 90% with 2/3 requiring some form of medical treatment. One cat survived a fall of 26 stories. Crazy. Maybe someone should market feline parachutes.

They survive because they right themselves midair and land, as cliched, on their feet. They actually often get more hurt falling from a shorter distance because it's far enough to do damage, but not far enough to allow them to twist into a good landing position while in the air. There are slo-mo videos of cats turning in midair to land on their feet, if you find such feats (heh) of nature interesting.

They're not generally dumb though, and know there are humans about, so the cat that got on the roof -- who I assume is the one you're talking about -- would go out there and then look down and figure he was better off being rescued by the help.