Your pet is missing. Work this list, in order.
These steps are ordered by what actually brings pets home, starting now. Tick them off as you go — your progress saves on this device.
Your first hours, in order
Do these firstIf you do nothing else, do these now
- Search your own home firstClosets, under beds, behind appliances, before anything else.
- Never chase or call outCrouch low, turn away, and let them come to you.
- Call your municipal shelterFile a lost report today, then check their found-pet listings yourself every few days.
- Line up a professional search team nowA fresh trail is when trained search-dog handlers are most effective. See who covers your area, and say so when you call if cost is a problem.
Hour 1The first hour
- Search your own home completely: closets, under beds, inside box springs, behind and under appliances.
- Search the property: sheds, garages, under decks, and in or under parked vehicles.
- Prop a door open and put out unwashed bedding, a worn shirt, or the used litter box.
- Walk the immediate area slowly and quietly. Stop often and listen rather than calling.
- Knock on neighbouring doors and ask them to check their garage, shed and yard.
- Pick a clear, recent photo on your phone and set it aside ready for posting.
Hours 1–24The first 24 hours
- Call your municipal animal services or shelter and file a lost report.
- Call a professional search team for your area if one covers it — this is not a step to leave for later, since a fresh trail is when they’re most effective.
- Ask how often you should check back, and read their found-pet listings yourself rather than waiting for a call.
- If your pet needs daily medication, tell every shelter and vet you call — it changes the urgency.
- Mark your pet as lost with your microchip registry and confirm your phone number is current.
- Call nearby veterinary clinics and the closest emergency animal hospital.
- Post in the active local lost pet Facebook groups for your city.
- Post to the free national lost pet databases before paying for any service.
- Put up posters at the intersections closest to where your pet went missing.
Days 2–7Days two to seven
- Visit the shelter in person and walk the kennels yourself. Phone descriptions get missed.
- Go back every two or three days until your pet is home.
- Widen the poster radius. Aim for something readable from a slow moving car.
- Ask to post at vet clinics, pet stores, corner stores and community boards.
- For a cat, set a wildlife camera at a feeding station before you set a humane trap.
- Call the shelter again after any long weekend — intake backs up and listings lag behind.
Week 2+Week two and beyond
- Keep the microchip listing active and the registry contact details current.
- Keep visiting shelters in person, including in neighbouring municipalities.
- Refresh your social posts weekly so they resurface in people’s feeds.
- Read the found pet listings as carefully as you read the lost ones.
- Update your poster photo if the season or your pet’s coat has changed.
How did your pet go missing?
Where a pet ends up depends almost entirely on how it got out. A cat that slipped through a door behaves nothing like a dog that took off after a deer. Answer two questions and you will get the right guide.
Step 1 · Is your missing pet…
Step 2 · What happened to your cat?
Your indoor cat slipped outside
Terrified and silent. Almost always hiding within 500 metres of the door — you are looking for a hiding place, not a wandering cat.
Your outdoor cat didn’t come home
Usually shut in a garage or shed, trapped, or hurt somewhere inside its own territory. Search the territory, not the neighbourhood.
It happened away from home
A move, a vet trip, a car journey. A displaced cat hides within metres of where it escaped and will not answer to its name.
Step 2 · What happened to your dog?
Your dog wandered off through an open door or gate
Curious, not frightened. Follows the easiest path, stays fairly close, and is very likely to be picked up by someone.
Your dog bolted in fear
Fireworks, traffic, a bang. In flight mode a dog can cover many kilometres and will run from you — including from people it loves. Do not chase.
Your dog took off after something
A deer, a rabbit, a scent. The chase ends long before the dog knows where it is. They often circle back toward the trailhead or the spot they last saw you.
Or — if either of these is what happened, it overrides everything above
It happened in a crash, a fire or an evacuation
Injured and badly frightened. Pets lost this way usually hide within sight of the incident rather than travelling, and vet clinics are the first place they turn up.
You think someone took them
A different process entirely: a police report, a case number and registry flags come first. Never arrange to meet a caller alone.
Where to report, in priority order
Work down this list in order. Four of the five cost nothing and can be done from your phone in the next hour.
Phone callYour municipal shelter
The single most important call you will make. Strays picked up by the public are brought here. File a lost report with a description and a clear photo, ask what else they need from you, and then check their found-pet listings yourself every few days rather than waiting for them to call.
Online · 5 minutesYour microchip registry
A chip only works if the registration is current. Log in, flag your pet as lost, and check that the phone number on file is one you still answer. If you don’t know which registry holds the chip, your vet or the shelter can look the number up for you.
Phone callA professional search team
Search-dog handlers and missing-animal response technicians work a fresh trail far better than a cold one, which is why this belongs here and not at the end of the week. Coverage across Canada is patchy, so check early whether anyone is within reach of you. If cost is what’s stopping you, say so when you call — some cases are covered by our search fund.
Post onlineFree listings that still work
Post everywhere free before you spend a dollar. Kijiji’s lost-and-found section and the national databases reach more Canadians than any paid alert service, and no legitimate service charges you to get your pet back.
Post onlineLocal Facebook groups
Most Canadian recoveries start with a neighbour who saw the post. Find the group for your city rather than the national one, and post a clear photo, the area your pet went missing from, and a number you actually answer.
Before you send anyone money
Do this before you post anything
Hold one detail back.
Pick something a stranger could not learn from a photo — a scar, a torn ear, a marking under the chin, the wording on the tag — and keep it out of every public post. Then ask anyone who calls to describe it. People watch lost-pet posts specifically to target owners, and this one habit stops nearly all of them.
Stop if any of this happens
- They want an e-transfer, a wire, gift cards or crypto before you have seen your pet.
- They will not send a photo of your pet next to an object you name.
- They say they are travelling and have your pet in another city.
- They know only what your poster already says, and nothing you held back.
Keep going. Most pets are found by someone who kept looking.
Your ticks are saved on this device, so you can close this page, keep searching, and pick up exactly where you left off.
Something here out of date for your city? Tell us and we’ll re-verify it.