Missing cat treks 1,287km over two months to return home from Yellowstone
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Rayne Beau, a two-year-old siamese cat, went missing in Yellowstone National Park in June. He was found two months later in Roseville, California, three hours away from where his owners live.
PHOTO: NYTIMES
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WYOMING – When a cat dashed into the woods of Yellowstone National Park during a camping trip in June, his California owners Benny and Susanne Anguiano thought they would never see him again.
The couple searched for five days through the woods near their camp ground at Fishing Bridge RV Park, but never found their two-year-old male siamese cat, Rayne Beau, pronounced “rainbow”.
Mrs Anguiano said Rayne Beau’s sister, Starr, started to meow through the screen door of the trailer. When the couple eventually decided to drive home to Salinas, California, Starr, who had never been away from her brother, meowed all the way back.
Mrs Anguiano said: “Leaving him was unthinkable. I felt like I was abandoning him.”
But almost two months later, Rayne Beau was found wandering the streets of Roseville, California, three hours north of where the Anguianos live and more than 1,287km away from Yellowstone National Park.
When a worker from a local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals notified the couple that rescuers had identified Rayne Beau from his microchip, Mr Anguiano said they were shocked that the cat had made it back to California.
The couple met Rayne Beau and his sister when they were 11 weeks old, and decided to foster and then adopt them.
During their search at Yellowstone, Mr Anguiano said a campsite worker told him that there had been grizzly bears and coyotes spotted around the area, and their cat was likely to have been eaten by one of the forest’s predators. After hearing this, Mr Anguiano convinced his wife that it was time to leave.
When the couple reunited with Rayne Beau, they said he had lost 40 per cent of his body weight. He was restless in his carrier, but once they released him in the car, he calmed down.
“He just looked at me, and then put his head down and fell fast asleep,” Mrs Anguiano said. “He was so exhausted.”
The couple said Rayne Beau has been back home since early August and is doing well. Mrs Anguiano is hesitant to travel with her cats again, but if she does, it will not be so far away from home. NYTIMES
