Mia has been found — a year after disappearing
Dog that went missing in March 2017 turns up in good health
MINKA COTE NEVER GAVE UP HOPE she would see her beloved dog Mia again, even after the 13-year-old pet had been missing for more than a year.
Mia had no collar, no identification tags and no microchip when she left her backyard in March 2017 through an opening in the fence, caused by a fallen tree in a windstorm.
Cote’s hope paid off earlier this month when she got a call late in the day from a woman involved in finding lost pets that Mia, an Australian and German Shepard mix, might be at the city’s animal services shelter on Dartnall Road.
“She texted me a picture and I just burst out in tears,” says Cote. She was so overcome at the news, her husband Tyson had to take the phone and get the details.
The next day, Cote took a cab with her brother Kevin from her home on Sherman Avenue North to the shelter to see if the dog was indeed Mia.
When workers brought Mia out, Cote was overjoyed.
“It was crazy. It’s like a big load came off my chest,” she says. Cote knew instantly it was her dog. “I know every detail about her.”
Within seconds, Mia recognized her too, and started licking her face. The happy reunion was in play. When Mia got home, home was a different place because the family had since moved. But the house was soon full of family who came to see her and Mia recognized every one of them, says Cote. “Her tail was just a-wagging.”
“She remembered all of her tricks. She sits pretty. She’ll do a dance on her hind legs when you give her a baby carrot.”
And she’s back to playing floor hockey with candy Skittles, adds Cote.
The big difference now is that Mia has a collar on at all times, with identification tags — now that Cote bought a city dog licence for her. And soon, Mia will be microchipped so if the tags happen to fall off, there is a backup plan.
“Oh, I’m never going to lose her again,” swears Cote.
Mia is not allowed out unless accompanied by Cote, her husband or her brother. “She’s never going out alone,” adds Cote.
Mia went missing on March 24, 2017, when Cote and her husband had called an ambulance for her father-in-law, who lived with them and was having a medical issue.
When the paramedics asked them to put the dog outside, the couple obliged. When the Cotes followed the ambulance to the hospital and spent time there, Cote says her teenage son forgot about Mia out in the backyard. Mia had never left the yard before, but she sensed something was up when the ambulance arrived, says Cote. In the health crisis, it wasn’t until the next day that the family noticed Mia was missing.
What followed was a most distressing time that stretched from days into months. Cote kept putting up posters all over her Sherman hub neighbourhood. She posted Mia’s pictures “all over Facebook” and on lost pets websites — even posting again two weeks before Mia was found that she was still looking for her.
Every time there had been a reported sighting, the Cotes would jump in their van and go looking.
“It was heartbreaking to lose her,” says Cote. “My marriage almost ended because of the heartbreak.”
Her four sons — the youngest is 18 — and her granddaughter were also lost
without Mia, she says. Cote was a single mom raising her boys when she bought Mia as a puppy 13 years ago from an ad in The Hamilton Spectator.
“I had a feeling she was still alive. I never, ever stopped looking for her,” says Cote.
“It feels amazing to have her back. She doesn’t leave my side when I’m home. She follows me everywhere.”
Mia is now even a celebrity at the Walmart at Ottawa and Barton Streets where Cote works part-time. Cote thinks Mia was cared for by someone while she was missing and guesses they released her for some reason.
Jen Stutt, care attendant at the animal shelter, says Mia was picked up as a stray on April 7 in the area of Martha Street, just off Parkdale Avenue North.
“The call came in that someone had found a dog. Apparently, there’s a bit of sketchiness to the story that the dog was found in a yard where a family had moved out and left the dog behind.”
Animal Services picked up Mia, took her picture and posted it the next day on the Helping Lost Pets website at helpinglostpets.com, Stutt said. The Facebook social media site called Lost and Found Pets in Hamilton picked it up and its administrator recognized the dog as possibly being Mia, so she contacted Cote, Stutt said. The rest, as they say, is history.
“We were all very happy to see them reunited,” says Stutt.
The moral of the story, of course, is to get a city dog licence — the tags identify the owner, says Stutt. A microchip is also a good backup if the tag or collar comes off, she adds. “We try to emphasize the importance of that ... once we put a licence on her collar, if she goes missing again, she can be returned immediately.”
Stutt says the dog looked well cared for, in good shape, clean and well fed. “Our presumption is that someone had it and either lost her themselves or decided they didn’t want her.”
Stutt says it’s unusual to see such a dog reunion after so long, but Cote is just ecstatic that it came to be, saying “She’s like my daughter, my child.”
To see a Facebook video of the reunion, go to http://bit.ly/miareunion.