ipping your pet is a good way to reunite you with your pets should they become lost. We are very lucky to live in a community in which we have a local bank manager who is a pet lover and recently organized a hot dog barbeque and free microchipping event in her bank’s parking lot. The event was sponsored by the Huntingdon Bank, local animal shelter, local veterinarians, and the WAZY FM radio station. Extra Spe
cial Kudos to them. The dogs attending the event received free plastic doggy bones. The pictures shows our two ratties with their bones.Although microchipping is safe and relatively inexpensive, there have been some issues with microchips produced by different vendors not being able to be decoded by all readers. More specifically, the microchip implanted in your pet contains identifying information that is read by devices that are passed over the microchip. In order to be able to access the identifying information, it needs to be decoded. Different vendors appear to have different codes that may be encrypted and not universally decodable. Much of this lack of universality dates back a few years to 2004 and 2005 and may have been resolved in the interim. However, pet owners should be aware of these potential problems and should address them with their veterinarian.
