Quote:

---

Scrub, a seven-year-old Russian blue and tabby cat with grey and white fur, has been reunited with his family five years after he was lost in the post-Hurricane Katrina chaos, the Biloxi Sun Herald reports.

Jennifer Noble of Biloxi told the paper she thought the Humane Society of South Mississippi had made a mistake when they got in touch. A quick scan of the microchip implanted in Scrub revealed, however, he was indeed the Noble's long-lost cat.

The Humane Society of South Mississippi says Scrub was identified by an implanted microchip. The 7-year-old cat was brought to the shelter by a Gulfport woman who'd fed him as a stray the past couple of months but worried about his safety during a cold snap. The woman who'd been feeding him lives about 15 miles away.

“This is the power of microchipping,” humane society Director Tara High told the Sun Herald. “There is no other way that cat would have found its family. This is a very dramatic story with a wonderful ending.”

Scrub was about two years old when he disappeared, Noble said, and he got away because the post-Katrina heat and lack of electricity forced the family to leave all of their doors and windows open.

“The scenery was changing every day,” Noble told the paper. “I honestly think he got disoriented; that he just couldn’t find this way back."

Now, the cat has returned with good health, only a few scars and a slightly feral side.

“Today, he still has his moments where he gets a little jumpy,” Noble said. “He is not as docile as he used to be. He’s got a little bit of wild in him."

After Scrub settled in with the family a bit, Noble said she knew for sure it was the same cat.

“By the time the (Noble) boys went to sleep that first night, he had crawled into their bed," Noble said. "It was such an odd thing. All the other cats I’ve known have been afraid to get under a cover. Scrub always slept underneath a blanket on somebody’s bed."

---