Every year, thousands and thousands of pets go missing. Animal rescue organizations and shelters are seeing a huge amount of pets that are displaced from their homes and their owners are unable to locate them. Not knowing where your pet is or how to bring them back can be a helpless, hopeless feeling. It’s a tragedy that happens all too often. Nolan River Animal Hospital offers microchipping as a form of permanent pet identification. This is a safe and simple way to quickly identify lost pets and reunite them with their families.

The microchip is a tiny device that is inserted just under the pet's skin in the shoulder region. It is a painless and relatively fast procedure, and is completely safe. The process is similar to a routine shot, takes only a few seconds, and your pet will not react any more than he would to a vaccination. No anesthetic is required.

While the microchip doesn’t act as a GPS that actively tracks your pet, it does act as a permanent form of identification. So, imagine your pet runs off into the woods. He or she broke out of his or her collar and now has no identification. The identification number of the microchip is registered to the pet owner and can be read by a scanner that most shelters and veterinary facilities have on hand.

This is one of the few forms of identification that provides proof of ownership. Microchips don't have any moving parts that can wear out so, they usually don't need to be replaced, nor do they require a power source. They are made of bio-compatible materials that don't degrade over time and will last throughout your pet's lifetime.

It’s important to remember that the chip itself is only a channel to retrieve information from, and registering your contact information and pet details is necessary for the microchip to be fully beneficial. Some microchips operate on different frequencies, but a universal scanner can read them all. Even then, the only thing a scan will reveal is the microchip’s unique ID number.