Lost Pet Tips
If you've lost a pet, the following tips may help you recover them.
Search the area thoroughly
Make Flyers
File a Lost Report with GMHS
Call Local Veterinarians
Don't forget to call and/or post flyers at veterinary clinics, to include emergency facilities, in case your pet is found sick or injured.
Contact Local Rescue Organizations
Use newspapers, the internet, the radio to assist in your search
- Start searching in the area where your pet was lost immediately after you realize they are missing. Do not delay the search.
- Call the pet's name repeatedly.
- Use a favorite food or toy to entice the pet. Shake a box or bag of treats or use any other familiar noise such as the rattle of your keys.
- Stop periodically to listen for your pet - a bark, a meow, a rustle in the leaves.
- Think like your animal. Search low, under sheds, in tight spaces, and search up high as well.
- Ask neighbors if you can search their yard or property.
- Place something your pet may recognize by scent outside: dirty clothes, bedding, favorite toys, odorous food such as tuna, mackerel, liver, chicken. Placing a litter box outdoors may assist in recovering a lost cat.
Make Flyers
- Put a good quality color or black & white photo of your pet on each flyer; use 8 1/2-inch by 11-inch paper; using colored paper will draw more attention.
- Include your pet's species (cat, dog, etc), breed or breed mix, sex (including whether it is spayed/neutered), age, weight, color, markings.
- Leave out one or two distinguishing marks or characteristics - a floppy ear, a stubby tail, a missing canine tooth, one blue eye), so you can determine whether someone claiming to have found your pet, actually has.
- Do not put your name or address on the flyer; include your phone number instead.
- Offer a reward, but withhold the amount.
- Post as many flyers as possible within a one-two mile radius of where your pet was lost. Drop flyers at veterinarian offices, local shelters, and local animal control shelters.
File a Lost Report with GMHS
- Email GMHS at intake@gmhumanesociety.org to file a lost report. Also call your local animal control, as well as shelters and animal control shelters in surrounding jurisdictions and file a lost report.
- Visit local shelters often - every day or two - to look for your pet. Remember that your description may not match someone else's description, so in-person visits are important.
- Provide the shelter with a flyer containing pertinent descriptive information and a photo in case your pet is turned into the shelter.
- Virginia law requires municipal shelters to hold animals for five days if found without a collar; ten days if found with a collar. Do not depend on a shelter to hold your lost pet indefinitely.
Call Local Veterinarians
Don't forget to call and/or post flyers at veterinary clinics, to include emergency facilities, in case your pet is found sick or injured.
Contact Local Rescue Organizations
- Circulate flyers to local rescue organizations that can spread the word through their network of animal welfare contacts.
- The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) picks up animal remains, including pets, found on the road. Call your local VDOT office about animals killed on a roadway.
Use newspapers, the internet, the radio to assist in your search
- Place an advertisement in one or more local newspapers.
- Xtra 99.1 FM will announce lost pets on the radio.
- Take to Social Media! The following Facebook groups post found/lost pets: Gloucester, Mathews, and Middlesex, VA Lost & Found Pets; Gloucester County Pet Connection; and Gloucester County Pets Lost, Found, And Looking For Their Forever Homes.
