Welcome to Animal Posse, the podcast dedicated to the people and rescues making a difference in the lives of animals. Today's guest is Carmen Brothers with Professional Pet Trackers, and we are gonna discuss lost Pets. Hi, Carmen. How are you?

I'm good, thank you.

I am excited to speak with you about Lost Pets. That's a passion of mine. Can you share your story behind the founding of Professional Pet Trackers and how you got started doing this?

Sure. So I was volunteering with a rescue. I. Back in, it's been so long 20 10, 20 11 ish. And they lost a dog. And I got into the logistics of the flyers and the, don't call your dog and everything that goes into loss of behavior and would a cover a lost dog? And it just spiraled from there. I became one of the two lost dog coordinators for City Dogs Rescue in Washington, DC and, obviously we bought in a canine tracker and that kind of thing, and it just grabbed me and I just started going from there. I guess probably in 20 15, 20 16 ish, I started running a tracking dog volunteering with a nonprofit out of Baltimore. Then come 2017, I was approached by National Geographic to do a show like a docuseries on tracking lost pets. And the caveat was that I would have to quit my normal full-time job with, the stability and all that good stuff and benefits and whatnot. Adults like to have and film full-time for roughly a year and kind of see where that took me. So I, I did and I never went back.

That's a very interesting story.

It's a little different.

It is. Definitely. When you were doing the Lost Pets with the rescue, can you explain how that was different between what you did then and then what you're doing now?

So what I did then was essentially. I guess almost delegate more, right? Like I would come up with a flyer and figure out where to post flyers and have volunteers, figure out where to send volunteers to post flyers. Flyering is still probably the number one way to get pets home because even with a canine tracker, you still need sightings. To go to the next phase, which would be trapping. And so I was, again, putting up, getting flyers together, hanging 'em up to volunteers and sending groups in different places of DC to get flyers up to. And then when we brought in a canine tracker who I had, gone online and found, she was able to narrow down that search areas dramatically. And guide us more on the lost pet behavior side of things. The whole lost pet circle and they tend to stay near water and, again, they're most active between desk and dawn. Just some things that normally people don't know unless they've been through it before. And so working with her and then having several other lost dogs follow that while I was still volunteering with City Dogs. City Dogs Rescue in dc we would bring her back in and put all those actions into place and use all the different, all the different systems we could. To gather data per se, to figure out where, Maddie or whomever had gone. And then once we had a sighting or we had a good area to put, a camera and a trap at, we would go from there and do that. And then essentially live trap your lost pet. So that way we. Bring them to us on their terms, right? If they're in a place that they feel safe, I'd rather 'em stay there in that place than have a bunch of search parties or, even a tracking dog come barely through that area and unintentionally move your pet.

What are some of the most common misconceptions people have about finding a lost pet?

And again I get where it comes from. It's human instinct, right? Your dog fluffy goes missing and you see your dog fluffy running down the road. What are you gonna do? You're out, there goes my dog, I'm gonna go chase my dog and call my dog because at home, fluffy comes barely into your lap when you're running around or when you're calling him. But once a pet's been out for a little while, they go into what they call flight mode, meaning they no longer associate you with sight or sound. It's all about scent. Everything to them is predatory, right? So what works at home is no longer a thing because they need to be able to get close enough to mom or dad or whomever to be able to smell them for that switch to flip back and realize, wait a minute, that's mom. That's my person, and approach you. But while they're out on their own, again, everything's predatory. And if you think about it, what do predators do when they're stalking prey? They're standing upright. They're making direct eye contact and moving towards you. So those are the three things that we say you absolutely do not want to do. You wanna get down on the ground you want, don't wanna make direct eye contact, and you need to let them approach you. And it's a waiting game. I've seen it take five minutes. I've also seen it take about seven hours.

Would that be the same with cats as it is with dogs?

Cats are a little different. Cats are actually, cats are a little harder. While they don't actually go as far they tend to not, you don't get the sightings called in that you would with the German Shepherd because cats are gonna stay, close to a house or under bushes and slink around. And then a lot of times people will see your cat and they even see the flyers. They're gonna assume that it's an outdoor cat or it's a feral cat or community cat and what have you, and not necessarily call you. So getting the sightings for cats is just, again, it's a whole process in itself. And I find people, that call in sightings for lost cats are actually, trying, right? But ideally they take a picture when they see the cat and text it to the number on the flyer because. No one knows their cat, like mom and dad, like there's, a tuxedo cat out in Richmond and how many tuxedo cats do you think there are in Richmond? And so people will be like, oh, that's a black and white cat. That must be, our missing cat. And we have yet to get a picture. But I can tell you the one area we're focused on, there's probably about eight tuxedo cats in that area that are not the one and only we're looking for. So without that picture or without a sent dog to verify, it's significantly harder to determine if that's actually the missing pet. Or is it just, the neighbor's cat that's out and about during the day?

I see that all the time. I do run some lost pets groups, and if it's a tabby cat, oh, that's the tabby cat that's missing. And it's no. Clearly it's a totally different tabby cat.

Or sometimes we'll actually get the picture and we're looking for like a black cat and we get a picture of a Persian, and I'm like, huh. Thanks for calling. However, and again, getting sightings on cats is a struggle. The struggle is real. And so the fact that they're actually taking the time to take the picture, obviously I'm all about that. Yay. Thank you so much. The fact it's the wrong cat and it's the totally wrong color. Yay. Okay. But at least you got the picture, so you know, we're getting there. It's a process.

Absolutely. In your experience, what are the most crucial first steps a pet owner should take immediately after realizing their pet is missing?

So if you're within the first, hour or two, right? Again, no chasing. I would say the first hour two, sure. Call your dog like you normally would at home. By no means am I saying get a megaphone out there because I've seen people do that and that's really never a good idea. But ideally, you're gonna get something with the owner scent out outside to wherever you last saw your dog. If you can get some kind of stinky food, whether it be hamburgers, bacon, throw something in some liquid smoke and get it to the wood liner or whatnot, that would be great as well. And then start working on a flyer. I'd say within the first 24 hours. Ideally, you have roughly anywhere from a hundred to 150 flyers posted throughout the area. And then make sure you're, updating your social media, whether that be next door. I find that the Neighbors by Ring app is really useful, and a lot of people don't think of that one because they're like, oh, I don't have a ring product. I can't post on there. Actually, you don't need a ring product to create a ring account. You just put the address in and you can upload it to their, animal activity section. And that way we're utilizing the people in the neighborhood who already have cameras out to let's see what they get on their camera. Your dog could be running up and down the street at three in the morning, but no one's there to see 'em. But the ring cameras won't pick it up.

Yeah, I didn't know that. I thought you had to have a subscription in order to

A ring product.

Yeah.

No Ring product needed to create the account and, download the app and just put it out there.

Yeah, that's some great advice. As far as the scents, I always hear different things about. Items that you should be putting outside because I've heard that certain items that you put outside could be attracting wildlife that might not be necessarily so good. So is that true?

You're not gonna attract anything from 22 miles away. Anything that is going to show up on your camera for the food, it's already there. It's just we're probably not paying such close attention to it. So generally, again, the best way to attract your dog home is number one, the owner scent paired with, bacon or so any, even if you don't have food, just the liquid smoke in a spray bottle and kinda spray the area down so it smells like the barbecue is gonna help. And I strongly recommend a camera going on wherever you're trying to get your dog to come back to. Because if he comes back at two in the morning. You're not there to see it. You know the food's gonna be gone, but we're gonna have no idea what ate the food. Was it Freddie the Fox, or was it, was it the dog? So a camera is also a critical thing, and these days they're not super expensive. You can get a good cellular trail camera on Amazon for $50.

Would you suggest more of a trail camera type thing versus I guess one of the little outdoor products that you can get?

If you're at home, either works because you're gonna hopefully have access to wifi. But if you're like, for instance today I was tracking a cat at the Virginia Arboretum, which there's no wifi, so a trail camera that comes with its own data plan is much more useful. Sometimes People will Put like flour down to try to get paw prints and what have you,

uhhuh.

But I found that the flour, it can be a quick go-to, but one little, wind gust or too many foxes or or if you're looking for a cat in particular, who's to say how many cats you have in that area,

Anything else that you could use in addition to that or in place of that?

In place of the flour? You could try some sand. Which compacts down a little, right? Better so that the random gust of wind is not gonna necessarily screw that all up. But again, a picture is worth a thousand words. The cameras are really a kind of ideal, The sand's really not even needed. Because we're gonna get a picture. Ideally, is it our cat? You know the cat Rex we're looking for? Or is it gonna be Ricky the raccoon? We're gonna have a picture either way.

As far as placing the camera, should you be placing it out of the door You think that they went out of?

It depends on where you're at. If you're in New York City or something like that, it's gonna be strategically, significantly harder. To find a good place to put that camera. But if you're, in Virginia, for instance, about where I am, then if your dog ran out the back door of the front door and into the woods, I'd place it more facing the wood line.

Now, what about the average time a it takes to find a lost pet? Is there an average time?

It depends on the pet and the terrain and the circumstances, oddly enough, cats can take a little longer than dogs do. Just again, because you're not getting the sightings as quickly as you would be for the tabby cat as you would be for the German Shepherd. It depends on if, do they go missing from someplace other than home or do they go missing from home? Are they missing in a state park or are they missing from, the groomers type of thing. I would say on average for a dog, anywhere from one to four weeks. And for a cat, for an indoor only cat, I would say one to three weeks. As long as they're missing from home and haven't been displaced. For instance, the cat I do today at the Arboretum, they're what, 45 minutes from home. He's an indoor only cat who's now been displaced totally out of his elements into the wild. And the thing with this cat is that number one, there's gonna be nobody there to see them, right? Because it's the arboretum. So the odds of somebody seeing a cat during the day when they're walking around or so to none, he's probably gonna be most active at night. So we do have a couple cameras placed, but we're also gonna be competing with anything that Stanley is going to catch on his own. We're just hoping that my mackerel and sardines is way more attractive than, any kind of birds or chipmunks or whatever he may be finding to eat by himself.

For the lost cats, and let's say indoor only cats i'm in agreement of course with the whole scent thing. So I always tell people if it's an indoor only cat, chances are that cat is very close by just hiding somewhere in a really safe hiding spot. And I always tell people to just crack open their front door. And I find like a lot of the times at when they do that, they'll either start seeing the cat or the cat even sometimes runs back in the house.

And I do the same thing. And I've had it work a lot actually, even after a week or two, sometimes the cat finds its way home and comes right back into the window that it left from.

Yeah. And I found that out by accident actually. Like I always heard the thing about putting something on your porch, say your shoes or dirty laundry so that they could smell it. When my cat got out we just happened to open the front door and when we opened the front door, like within like maybe five minutes, he ran right back in.

Oh, that's perfect.

At that time, that's when I realized, oh leaving the front door open. I think that's actually like a thing, because cat behavior is they go out there, they find someplace to hide and they're just hiding, looking around, waiting. I know people always say, go out there, shake the treat jars and stuff like that. My experience with cats is you just have to let 'em alone and let 'em come to you opening the door, and a lot of the times they run back in.

I agree. And the thing with lost pets that a lot of people don't understand for say, and again, 'cause it goes against, human nature, right? Once you start searching actively for a lost pet, like literally beating bushes and stuff like that, or if everybody goes tromping through the woods and that kind of thing, you actually run the risk of moving your pet and pushing your pet out of that immediate area, right? Because. Again, they're somewhere that, where they feel safe and whatnot. As soon as you invade that space, they are not taking the time to realize, oh wait, that's mom. They're just saying Uhoh. Something's here. Predator. Predator, run. And so they, they move. And then once they associate that area with fear, they're actually less likely to return to that area than they would have before.

That makes a lot of sense. It really does.

And so a lot of times on the trapping side of things, when you'll see trappers like, please don't chase, please don't chase, please don't chase. And unfortunately, everybody thinks that they can go get the dog or the cat or whatnot, and they wanna play the hero card. And literally it's like pulling teeth, trying to get people to stay away and don't chase, just let the dog be. But again, once you chase that dog. All the trapping efforts start from scratch again. 'cause now they've shifted areas, right? So now we have to find the new area and we have to, sometimes recondition for the trapping portion of it. And it just makes it so much more challenging.

You did mention that it is harder to do cats because people will see a cat outside and when they see the cat outside, they automatically assume it's an outside cat or an inside outside cat. So it's not lost. And I see that a lot as well. So are there any tips you can give people that if they see a cat, which might indicate that cat is actually a lost cat, that may be an indoor only cat or a displaced cat?

Hopefully the goal would be for them to see, oh look, lost cat flyer. Oh, wait a minute, here's a cat and lost cat flyer. So it really drives that point home. I would say that, if they see a cat take a picture of the cat because if they don't know that cat the flyers might go up tomorrow or the following day, but then they can say, oh, wait a minute. I saw this cat here on, Thursday type of thing. Or if they are, rescue people and what have you, they can obviously go on Facebook and search kind of their local lost pet pages. I realize a lot of people these days are somewhat self-absorbed, so that's asking a lot, which is why I say, maybe just take a picture and see if the flyers pop up in a day or two, type of thing.

Okay, great advice. I,

the flyers are just a critical thing, right? Because without the flyers even, even in like the Northern Virginia area for instance, you'll see an off leash dog who's just, people let them roam type of thing. So it could really be the neighbor's dog, but could it be a lost dog also maybe, and you don't see the flyers or what have you. And so it's, the flyers make everybody in that community aware. And the flyers are likely the most tedious process of all. And it's what I get the most pushback on, is getting the flyers up to the areas they need to be up at. Having the, an effective flyer is also super important sometimes, and some of, these, social media platforms or whatever, will, just design a flyer for you. Okay, great. I don't need to know what Fluffy eats every night for dinner and what time he eats and his favorite color and does he do this and that, and blah, blah, blah. All I need is Lost dog or lost cat. Big picture. Do not chase big phone number. That's it. I don't even want the name on there. If somebody's walking around and they're like out for their afternoon jog, right? And you see all these flyers saying, lost dog, fluffy, what's your gut instinct telling you to do? Oh wait, that's a dog fluffy. And you start calling for the dog, and that then scares the dog and pushes the dog further away. But if they don't know the name, what action item do they have left to do? Okay, great. They'll take a picture and that way they can text it to the number.

That's some good advice. 'cause I do see flyers too, that you actually have to stop and read 'em, or it's it'll be so much wording in a very tiny little photo of an animal, and it's make that bigger.

And at that point, again, who's actually gonna stop to necessarily, other than then pet people or rescue people, your average person who's coming home from work or just picking kids up from school or whatever, they're not stopping to take a picture of that flyer. They don't even know is it, are they advertising a yard sale where they're gonna have, stuffed pets for sale? Who knows? So if it's not super clear. By the time I get there, I redid the flyer for them and then I'm so not popular when I'm like, Hey, let's go replace all of these type of thing. I encourage people to get flyers up to the entrance and exits of churches because that's a different demographic of people, right? They're not on Facebook. They're not on social media, and if they are out driving, they might not be stopping and seeing what's on the stop sign. They're just trying to get from point A to B, but they go to church.

Great advice. When should people call in a professional pet tracker like you?

It probably depends, for instance, when people call me, if they've had a lot of the sightings and they don't know what to do or where to turn or how to get, fluffy home, I'm relatively well networked to whereas I can get them in touch with a qualified trapper for their area. I just got back from Maine. I was in New Hampshire, Vermont, and then New York on my way home to Virginia. So I was gone like, what? Nine days? I'm not. In one location for long enough to actually assist with the trapping. I can, obviously, virtually consult and whatnot like the cats for instance. I can walk people how to trap cats all day long. But for the dogs, again, that's like a five, $600 very large trap that you need to acquire and get out, and it just helps to have somebody who's physically there, boots on the ground because. A dog can say, Nope, I don't wanna do the kennel trap. I, and you have to switch it to a Missy trap. I had one dog out in King George, Virginia for 500 and some odd days. We tracked once we had that dog on camera almost every other night until we started switching up traps. 'cause she wouldn't go into box trap. We tried a Missy Trap. We would build up panel by panel. She had nothing to do with that. So we actually had to have my friend Kevin drive up from North Carolina with a drop net. Meaning we had to clear utilities and get the waterline cleared and all of that good stuff and put that up and then condition her to go under that. And it took a while. So again, it's, having a qualified trapper in your area is a big plus, or sometimes somebody who at least, you know, within an hour who can drive and help you with equipment. Even if I could, I drive a Toyota Highlander. I had a four runner before I can either bring tracking dogs or a trap. And I can pretty much guarantee the majority of the time I'm called in and actually physically go somewhere. They're gonna want the tracking dogs and not the trap.

The net that you were talking about, does that just go up and then just fall directly on top of the dog? Is that how that works?

Yeah, it's like almost a soccer field size net. Like a soccer, like a goal? Type of net. And it goes on top of these poles and it's released by magnets. And it's, you have a live camera from different angles on the dog. 'cause you gotta be there quick. Because you don't want the dog to hurt himself. But yes, that's essentially what it is. Now, some dogs won't enter, won't walk through thresholds no matter how big. It's just a thing. So when the Missy Trap won't work, you're left huh, okay. Now what? And so then we typically go to a drop net.

That's interesting. So can you tell us a little bit about your tracking dogs?

Sure. So I'm gonna say I have 3.5. The dog I started with magic. She's a yellow lab and she's living her best life of retirement with my mom right now. She's probably 12 ish, I would say. And I'll still take around to like local cat stuff or just, like a hide and seek type of thing. She still loves the game, but she has problems getting in and outta the back of the truck. It's harder on her hips and whatnot. Then I have a German Shepherd named Rose who is six. I have a, and this is what kind of gets people every time. I have a rat terrier named Trix, who is five, and she's phenomenal. She's my heart surface girl. She's, so she's 15 pounds. So she's little. She's good for the cats 'cause she can get into places that, my shepherd and my labs cannot. And then my newest addition is Finley and he will be two in July and he's a black lab.

How does that process work with using the tracking dogs? Can you tell us how they go out and actually find the pets?

So it's important to remember that, again, I'm not necessarily walking up on your dog. And while it has happened, I'd say I've had maybe, I don't know, 12 to 15 since I started. We call them walkup finds. And at 12 to 15 I've probably had seven to eight like captures from being out on the track, if you will. We take a scent item, whether that be a bed, a blanket, harness a sweater, I've used the dog's, toothbrush, whatever. And then we literally, track your lost pet. So with that said, we're methodically chasing essentially, right? So once my dogs start to give me a proximity alert, depending on where we're at and what's going on, I generally pull back. We were in Maine, where were we? It was Corinth, Maine, about a week ago. And it was actually with Finley and I was partnering with a thermal drone operator up there, which has a lot of benefits to it as well. Because we were tracking and I was just telling the owner, Christie, I'm like, you'll notice we're moving faster. I was like, the sun's getting stronger and stronger. And then, Rob came over the radio and was like, Hey, I've got Mavis 300 feet in front of you. So again, that's amazing information to have, right? So that way we were able to know what we were walking into before we walked into it. So I had, I put Finley back up in the car. We coached Christie on calming signals. I gave her some rotisserie chicken in a bag, a slip lead, and sent her, literally directed her while having her on FaceTime and on the radio with the drone as to where Mavis was. She sat there probably, I don't know, she probably 45 minutes to an hour in the rain. Trying to use calming signals and what have you. And Mavis moved, bolted right past her. Didn't even take a second to give it a chance to smell. Wait a minute, that's mom. So as disheartening as that is to have her run right past you, we, I mean there was a lot of important things that day, right? Like number one, Mavis mom got eyes on Mavis for the first time. So there's a great big relief there. 'cause essentially that's proof of life. And I can tell you all day long we're getting sightings or whatever. But until you actually put eyes on your dog. It's harder to, it's harder for that relief to sit in. Secondly, now we know where we're trapping and putting cameras up at. And so after that we called it for the tracking because we're methodically chasing, right? And I don't wanna continue to chase and scare her from the area. So let's go to the trapping. Let's get the cameras out in the trap and see where we go with that. And we have, maybe this might be a little bit of a more challenging. Trap, if you will. She seems to have no desire to go in this box trap, no matter what food I put in it, whether it's ham, beef, liver, tripe, barbecue, bacon, she wants nothing to do with it. So we're looking at probably having to get a Missy trap up there for her. So is she still out on the run then? We get her on camera every night. She's still in the same location. She just has no desire to go in this box trap. And it's one of the six foot extra large ones. And so it's not a size thing. I think it's just the being contained thing, right? So now we're gonna start conditioning for a Missy. I'm gonna a trap and start putting the kennel panels up and making sure, we'll probably do it a little slower than typical. We'll probably start with the three panels. And does she come back and eat still? Okay. Yes. Great. Let's do the next three. Okay. She's still there. Awesome. Let's finish it up and go from there.

I think there two is a misconception with the tracking dogs, because I see. People sometimes commenting, oh, I'm gonna get a tracking dog. And I think that they think that, oh, they're gonna get a tracking dog.

I'm gonna walk up and hand you your pet.

That's what I was gonna say. There is a process to it. So you get the tracking dog

oh yes.

You get the tracking dog. You don't wanna chase the dog. So then at that point you have to trap it.

Correct. Now the drones are a relatively new thing with lost pets, and it's an amazing, it's amazing, right? People have to understand that. Let's say you have a new dog, new rescue dog, right? And you've had the dog two hours putting a drone up in the air. While yes, you might get eyes on the dog, which is amazing. Even like the calming signals will likely not work at that point. 'cause this dog does not know you. This dog came from, Texas and you're in, you're in Massachusetts, right? There's nothing familiar. So even having, the drone say, yes, here's the coordinates. I'm gonna walk you in, and so forth and so on. Could it work? Okay, sure. Is it likely to work, eh. Maybe, if you've got a little bit of background on the dog, was it an owner surrender or was it out on the streets of Texas by himself for, two years? The dog who's been on the street for two years is gonna be much less likely to trust anybody or anything. I. You're probably gonna wanna do more trapping than like a common signals hand capture approach. And I don't think people realize that, if a drone goes up, yes, it can be immediate gratification, which is remarkable. And that's what everybody wants. If the drone goes up and sees nothing you're still left with nothing, You don't have a direction of travel. You have, nothing to go off of per se. And that doesn't necessarily mean your dog's not in that area of the drone flew, but could your dog be under, something or hidden somehow in a way that, that the thermal is not picking up? Possibly. But again, you're not gonna know that the thermal drones offer that immediate gratification result, whereas a tracking dog odds are you're gonna have to do a little bit of work. It's gonna be the flyers and the feeding stations, and it's gonna be, there's, there needs to be some effort put forth by the owner, It's not necessarily this quick turnaround type, one done, here's Carmen great and I'm showing up with my leash or my carrier and my whatever, and my harness, and let's go get my dog. And I've shown up and had people think that no matter how many times you tell them or no many, how many times you reiterated it in any kind of contract or anything, they still have that stuck in their mind. I still try to break it down yes, could that happen And that would be amazing. Is it likely not really. Again, your dog's gonna sense me and my dog coming into whatever little bubble of safety they've created for themselves way before we get eyes on 'em.

With a thermal drone do you have to worry about picking up other animals that might not be yours?

Of course, yes. But ideally, at least the drone operators I've worked with can tell me, oh, is that a coyote? Yes. Is it a rabbit? Yes, it does. A squirrel also. Yes. We managed to get several porcupines in a tree while we were in Maine. So they can tell us if it's, our target animal or not. And with it. That also helps me and my dogs because I don't really wanna walk into the coyote den, if there's a coyote 300 feet to my right, I'd like to know that before I walk a lot type of thing.

So something else that I see a lot of is people wanting to use the thermal drones in like urban areas. Do people use them or is that gonna be like almost pointless because you're gonna pick up so many other dogs or so many other cats.

A thermal drone for a cat for starters is likely not the best bet anyways because your cat's probably hiding underneath a porch or a shed or something along those lines to whereas a thermals likely not going to pick it up anyways. Could it maybe, but that's a hail Mary. As far as the open areas go. A lot of the more populated areas. For instance, a lot of the areas right around DC or Chicago and a hundred percent New York City are no fly zones. So you're not gonna be able to get a thermal drone up there anyways. Any kinda military base and what have you, it's gonna be no fly zones and you can apply for the exemption to get a drone up, but that's gonna also take you three to four days. And there's no guarantee. And so again, it's, the immediate gratification sounds amazing. When you hear it, and I also would like to be like, sure, whatever. Not a problem. Come on. 1:00 AM whatever time you need to be here, let's do it. But people just need to take a second and realize, okay, so if I don't see my dog now, what? Whereas at least if you're pairing the tracking dog in the drone, the tracking dog's still gonna give you that direction of travel. You're still gonna have an action plan on which way the dog went and where the dog will likely go next based on lost pet behavior. Ideally, and at least the way I work things, is that once I get an area, I actually go outside of that area and create a perimeter of what I call negatives or locations with no scent. Just doubling down on the fact I didn't miss a turn, and making sure that the area I have is accurate. Because again, at the end of the day, your dog can miss a turn. But all of my negatives I tell people are also probable positives, meaning likely they passive travel, so your animal's gonna continue to move. Just 'cause he's not here right now does not mean he won't be here in two days. And so it helps them understand the process of where your dog's gonna go next type of thing.

For people who aren't using the tracking dogs and aren't using the thermal drones

FLYER FLYER FLYER

But as far as distance because I will see something where, people are like, oh, my dog was lost. In this general area, but dogs can just keep running to get into another area. The cats can hitch a ride or cats can get picked up and get dumped. As far as travel goes, I guess for a dog, for an animal that's just gonna be running, how far can a dog travel in one day?

So typically a dog will go three to five miles a day. Ideally that's a circle or a triangle. There's some kind of pattern and or shape to where they're going with that said, if they get on power lines, train tracks, creek beds, that kind of thing, that can push them significantly further out, like almost in a straight line, significantly faster. I generally tell people if they have the flyers up for that three to five mile radius, let's, you know it's been 48 hours with no sightings or anything, let's go another three miles out. Then if you wait another, 48 hours still nothing, let's go another three miles out because any of those things, it's like a little doggy highway, right? They can hop on those power lines and no one's gonna see them and they can go straight for quite some time. Maybe popping off here and there, or neighborhoods for like trash night or something exciting like that. But I had, I've had dogs go 44 miles in 13 days. On power lines. I had now, given this wasn't power lines, but I did have an Alaskan sled dog that had just retired, go 27 miles in four days. But again, that's kinda what that dog was bred to do, right? There was no denying that it was gonna be a runner. It just, again, knowing your dog's personality and the breed especially also helps, obviously the Alaskan sled dogs are bred to, to run in significant distances significantly quickly. I find your huskies and your shepherds can also be runners. The whippets and greyhounds also runners. I find that boxers tend to stay closer and or circle back at some point in time, more so than some of the other breeds, oddly enough. The smaller dogs, people like to discount them thinking they're not gonna go super far, but they're the spunky ones that have that, have that energy and they'll up and go in a heartbeat too.

Yeah, and I know people also tend to lose hope like after a week or so and they tend to give up. I always tell people one of the things that you shouldn't do is give up hope. I know by me there was a situation where somebody's cat got out their carrier broke as they were bringing them into a vet clinic. And it happened to be the vet clinic was caddy corner to the back of my business. So I put a trap out just hoping that I might catch the cat. I caught the cat, it took me three months, but I did catch the cat.

And that's not abnormal. I am actually working on a case where that exact same thing happened. And the Pennsylvania, New York border, and it's been, I think we're going on six weeks now. We had one sighting, which was accurate. We are not, for some reason, people just don't take the pictures that we ask them to take, but that's okay. I was up there, I think. The week three to track and we got a good track and I stopped back through there on my way home from Maine and tracked again. And the cat hasn't gone further. The cat just went across the street and essentially is doing the same distance just on the other side of the road. Now we have new cameras in place and that kind of thing. But again, we hit, the one side we have had was back at the vet point of loss. But people get frustrated, like you said, and tend to give up too soon because it's been a week, it's been two weeks and we've got nothing. And especially with cats, I would not discount that for anything. I would leave those cameras out there for 21 to 28 days 'cause they do circle back. It can just take them a little longer.

And like you said, a camera's gonna be the only way that you're gonna get the definitive proof too. Another subject I'd like to touch on a little bit that I've seen lately is scams where people will tell people

yes,

that they've found their pet and they'll say, Hey, text me. And it can involve all kinds of different things actually, but can you explain some of the scams you might be familiar with?

Sure. It's a whole bunch of them because people just get super creative. I think it started off with text me a Google Code. That was like three years ago, four years I guess, when the scams really started kicking in. I haven't seen so many of those recently. Now it's more first of all you have people impersonating legitimate organizations, whether it be pet trackers or drone operators or what have you. It's sad. Everyone tags these fake pages on Facebook and you get these desperate pet owners who don't. Do the homework they're saying they're a hundred percent guarantee and blah, blah, blah, blah. And first of all, that should be the first big red flag. If I say I'm a hundred percent guaranteeing that I'm gonna find your pet and hand 'em to you at the end of the day, there, there's no way. We're dealing with a living thing that has its own personality, right? That's like me trying to say, a hundred percent I'm gonna be able to do this with this person. No questions asked, whatever. There's just no way to predict that. I've had people. recently get spoof called, so when somebody calls their phone, because again, you've got flyers up, you're on social media. People already know the area your pet's lost in and they have your phone number so they can just Google, let's say, I don't know, like Palm Beach, Florida, right? What's the emergency vet closest to Palm Beach, Florida? They'll call you and your caller ID is going to show up with, Palm Beach Emergency Vet. So really you have no reason to think it's not Palm Beach Emergency Vet, right? 'cause that's what's coming up on your caller id. And they're gonna call you at like midnight 1:00 AM or whenever and say, Hey, you know your dog was hit by a car. I need your credit card number for $3,000. We're going into surgery right now, or your dog's gonna die. So number one, they're taking advantage of you at when you're most vulnerable. What's missing? Two, they're getting you when your guards down likely late at night or early in the morning. So you maybe you were sleeping, that kind of thing. So you're not necessarily thinking straight 3. They're calling from an organization or business or vet or whatever that you are familiar with. That is close to you, and it's very probable. Your dog could have been hit by a car and taken that you don't know. And so they're playing on all those different emotions and they're taking all those things and factored into the scam, and people will give them $5,000 that way, and they get to the vet and, oh, wait a minute. Nope, you don't have fluffy here huh. I find that no vet, no animal control, nobody like that is necessarily gonna ask you for money like that over the phone. They're gonna say, Hey, fluffy was hit by a car. We need you here. Like right now. No. And if you are unsure, the best thing you can do is hang up. Google the organization and call them back because if they were spoof calling you, you're actually gonna get the correct organization when you call that number back. People actually somewhat recently, and it was a group in Florida that got scammed on there and they had literally cloned my website. So when you clicked on it had all the same colors, all the same pictures, except they've added on like a drone service. And they added on a bunch of like cash app this or Venmo this and all these different like payment, methods. They changed the phone number, but they weren't super duper thorough with it. If you click on the link to the National Geographic thing, you still get the real me. And at the bottom of some of the pages, they didn't take out the correct number. So ideally someone catches that, but again, it looks just like my normal website. Like they did a remarkably good job and they just, copy and paste it. some different pictures in there. I've had people say that they work for professional pet checkers on Facebook and try to scan people that way. I had somebody call me from Norman, Oklahoma asking me why Dave hadn't arrived yet. And I'm like okay, who's Dave for starters? And apparently someone had said they were calling for my organization, their name was Dave. They were coming out until they found their dog to Oklahoma. And I think it was a total of $300. And I was gonna show up with my 31 tracking dogs.

Oh wow.

Several things there. Number one, I'm based outta Virginia and so if I'm coming to Norman, Oklahoma for $300, then wow. That's. Remarkably kind of me and two, what am I tracking? 'cause I apparently, I have a tractor trailer of dogs. So if I'm not putting up dog poop or trainee or, like feeding, like that's a lot of dogs. It's unfortunate that they've gotten so good at this, but just you gotta do your homework. Whether that be asking for a variety of different references or, FaceTiming with the person if you Google me, you're gonna come up with Carmen Brothers and you're gonna see a picture of me. You're gonna be able to see, again, the National Geographic Show is a big one. I can send you links to that and I promised you I don't have a scammer in nat geo. So that way you can again verify you're talking to the real person, right? It's just people are so quick to click, pay whatever these days Just, again, I can just say, do your homework and if you think it's a scam or you think it's too good to be true, it likely is.

They're very creative.

Just my website alone I don't even know how to report that or shut that down. Because anybody can buy a domain name and put anything they want on it. What do I do with that at that point? So at this point, I just literally switched up my entire website. So at least it looks different. Again, there's only so much prevention and, trying to. Make things separate yourself per se, that you can do.

Yeah. And I know like on the pages that I admin for, we will see constantly comments, oh, contact such and such pet trackers, we're gonna get your pet home.

Yeah. All the things and these different ones, and it's just. It's disgusting. But it makes it harder for people to get legitimate help.

It does, right? Absolutely.

cause I'll get sent something I saw this, blah, blah, blah, whatever. And so I'll, I've got like a jpeg with, lost Cat tips, lost dog tips, and then, my number at the bottom of it, or I send 'em directly to my Facebook page or whatever. But. If you're seeing scam, scammer legitimate, scammer, scammer, it's, who knows, right? It's almost impossible to know who you can trust and who you can't.

Yeah it's scary because, it is when people are the most vulnerable, and they just wanna get their pets home

right?

What are some preventative measures pet owners can take to reduce the risk of their pet getting lost in the first place?

I can't emphasize the microchipping enough, especially for cats. The Tabby cats tend to look the same. And if your cat's out for four to six weeks, again the coat could be different 'cause their diet's been different. It's just, a microchip is something that a lot of people like, oh, I've got an indoor cat, he's never gonna go out anywhere. I don't need to do that. Yeah maybe, yeah, please do. Just in case. 'cause you never know and just be smart about it, right? If your dog doesn't have great recall, or even if your dog does have great recall, a leash is a very cheap buy. You can get 'em on Amazon super cheap, use them, put identification on the collars just, hey, it's out there all the time. If you don't have a fence, keep your dog on a line. If you know your dog is gonna chase the deer, then maybe don't have an invisible fence, but have a rear fence and that kind of thing. Just prevent, if it's a holiday you're planning on having people over, so maybe, put your dogs in the bedroom or something. That way they're not stressed and there's no risk of people leaving doors open and that kind of stuff. I would say for the pet sitters in particular. There's a couple different platforms out there, some better than the others. However, it's great to have a personal relationship with your pet sitter, right? Don't just let you know Joe Schmo from that you booked online and I've never met come walk Fluffy because we don't know. Fluffy doesn't know that person. And you don't want the pet sitter who's gonna go, chase your pet for five blocks if the leaf does drop type of thing. And if nothing else, attempt to have a good scent item for all the pets in your house to make people like my lives much easier. If you have nine cats and three of 'em are indoor outdoor, and the others are indoor only, and they all share the same everything. If I come out there and one's gone missing, or two gone missing, one came back, and so forth and so on, there is no way for me to say, okay, I'm a hundred percent sure I'm tracking the correct cat if the scent items contaminated.

Before we end this call, is there anything else that you would like to add?

Just it can happen to anybody, and again, a lot of it has to do with not the fact that it happened. I find people think they're getting judged for losing their dog or losing their cat, and no one's judging. It's more or less what you do to get your cat or dog home.

Absolutely. And it can happen to anyone. I know there are some people that are careless and they do definitely have those situations, but it could be, you think your door is shut and your door accidentally pops open,

right? Or the, the landscaper didn't lock the gate or whatever. It's my biggest pet peeve is seeing on like the Facebook pages. My escape artist is at it again. Okay, there's that. Get a GPS collar, right? The GPS collar is likely way cheaper than I am or a thermal drone is. Take that precaution if you know the Fluffy likes to run, do what you can do, not make him run or keep track of where he is at.

You said you had some resources for some tips. Where can people find those?

So you can go to my website, which is professional pet trackers.com. And there are resources, the page resources.

Great. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today.

Of course. Thank you.

All right. Bye And that's all the time we have for today's episode. If you are in animal rescue, or if you know someone that has a story that should be told, please contact us. We would love to have you or them on the show Thanks for listening, and please join us next week as we continue to explore the world of animal rescue.