Pili and Nick love taking their cat, Coco, on a walk every evening around their neighborhood in Dublin, Ireland. Their nighttime excursions are usually quiet, with Coco happily exploring around bushes and trees while her parents chat close by. But the other
day, the little family’s peaceful routine walk suddenly took a frenzied turn when Coco made an unexpected discovery.
“Coco started making these urgent, frantic meows that we'd never heard before,” Pili told The Dodo.
The couple followed Coco’s cries to a nearby tree, where they discovered a tabby cat perched on a branch. While they looked around to see if the tabby belonged to anyone, Coco began forging a friendship.
“The tabby leaned down, and the two of them started gently sniffing noses while Coco kept up this soft, concerned chirping,” Pili said.
Pili and Nick were shocked as they watched Coco sniff the tabby’s nose. Typically, her back would arch and her fur would puff up whenever a stranger cat approached. But she was completely disarmed when it came to this tabby.
“[S]he was unbelievably gentle, cautious and vocal, almost like she was checking in on him and asking, ‘Are you okay, little buddy?’” Pili said. “That was the moment we knew something wasn't right. Coco seemed genuinely concerned about him.”
The couple had never rescued a cat before, but they knew they couldn’t leave this little guy behind. Thankfully, they’d brought Coco’s carrier along on the walk, so they decided to try coaxing the little guy down from the tree and into the bag. But the tabby cat had other plans.
“[T]he tabby finally leaped down from the trunk … He trotted over to us, sniffed my open cat carrier, and, to our utter disbelief, walked straight inside all by himself,” Pili said. “While we were frantically Googling ‘how to catch a cat without getting scratched,’ he had already packed himself up.”
Coco stayed loyally by the tabby cat’s side throughout the entire rescue, supporting him from the base of the tree as he leaped and sniffing the mesh crate once he was inside. It seemed like the beginning of a beautiful friendship, and the couple discussed adopting him if no one claimed the sweet boy.
But first, they promised to do everything they could to find his family. At around 10:30 p.m., Pili and Nick drove the cat to the emergency vet, where he was scanned for a microchip. Luckily, the sweet boy did have a microchip, but it wasn’t registered, which made the reunification effort even more difficult.
The emergency vet offered to care for the tabby overnight as they continued looking for his parents. Pili and Nick agreed, though they found it harder than expected to leave their new furry friend behind.
“Leaving him there was surprisingly emotional,” Pili said. “We had only known him for a few hours, but he'd completely won us over.”
The couple returned home heavy-hearted but eager to find the cat’s parents. They searched various lost-and-found pet websites for his face but found nothing, until in her last attempt, Pili checked her community’s noticeboard app and found exactly what she was looking for.
“[I] found a missing cat post from April 26th, over two months earlier,” Pili said. “The photo looked exactly like our mystery tabby. We were convinced we'd solved a cold case.”
Pili swiftly emailed the person on the flyer, explaining that the tabby was at their local emergency vet. The following morning, she received a message from the owner saying they’d already picked him up.
The couple was relieved to know that the cat was finally reunited with his family after seemingly being lost for two months. But they were shocked when, one week later, they spotted him again on their walk.
“As soon as he saw us, he trotted straight over, greeted Coco and then jumped into my cat carrier even faster than he had the first time,” Pili said. “I couldn't believe it.”
Pili and Nick rescued the cat, who didn’t seem stressed out at all. He relaxed on the couple’s bath mat while they called his family, who filled them in on what was going on.
“The cat had actually been found just a couple of days after the original missing-cat notice was posted,” Pili said. “The listing had simply never been removed, which explained why we believed he had been missing for over two months.”
According to his family, the tabby cat was a “little escape artist who loved wandering and making friends throughout the neighborhood.” And Pili, Nick and Coco were his new favorites.
You can watch more footage from his rescue here:
The cat returned to his family and soon received a brand-new collar with an identifying tag to avoid any confusion in case he got out again. And although the couple is bummed they couldn’t keep him, they’re ultimately grateful that he’s safe at home thanks to their sweet girl, Coco.
“[W]e're so glad Coco insisted we stop at that tree,” Pili said. “To this day, we still joke that Coco solved the mystery long before any of us did.”
