Cat owners - collars or not?

[NikkiB]

I have a kitten who's four months old and I'm just introducing him to the garden. My cats in the past have never had collars, just microchips. I know the pros and cons of collars. But how many people on AB would advocate collars and tags?

[fairkatrina]

Collars every time! Hope it never happens, but if someone hit your moggy with a car and killed it they're not going to take it to a vet's to see if it's been microchipped are they? But if they got out of the car to see what damage they'd done and there was a collar with your phone number chances are they'd call and apologise, which is better than kitty just not coming home one day isn't it? Also any animal is obviously 'owned' which has a collar, so is more likely to be returned if it did get lost.

[Kam_voo]

Well with my old cat I used both. So when or if it gets run over
it can be tracked and found the telephone number of the owner
you should put an Adress a contact number and your and your kittens name on for saftey reasons. This should work and Also just a tip To keep flees away make it a flee collar they really work =]

[clairey-s]

Deffinately(?) collars, they wont bother the kitten after afew hours! And microchips as well, there's really no reason not to....

[Callidus]

Always go for a microchip. It just can't hurt.

As for collars, whenever my cats have had collars then they would occasionally come back with bits of bush tucked underneath them. I always imagined they had been innocently trying to get through undergrowth and kept getting snagged by this annoying thing round their neck. It rather messes with the sleek, flexible thing they have going there...

[pussnboots]

Both my cats have collars as it has a magnet on for the cat flap. They never bother about them but seem to know when I buy new ones as they run away even before I open the packets. Funny creatures they come running when the food is being put out but can detect, new collars, worming tablets, flea treatment at 100 yards.

[gelda]

One thing to remember if you buy a collar, get an elasticated one, I remember some years ago I found a cat hanging from someones fence by its collar it had obviously jumped or slipped and the collar had caught on the fence, luckily I was there just after it happened and managed to free it but the poor little thing was terrified. So please think about this any of you thinking about getting collars for your cats. BTW the Cats Protection sell collars that will break if caught on anything.

[RATTER15]

I once found a dead cat hanging in a tree by an elasticated collar, I wouldn't put any collar on my cat!!

I don't have a cat and wouldn't have one but if I did I wouldn't put a collar on it!!

[orange-gnome]

If you look around you can get collars which are designed so that the clasp releases if it gets caught on a tree branch. It takes a certain amount of pressure so won't just undo if your cat is walking through bushes but it will stop him being hanged.
I'd go for one of these everytime, it might mean that your cat comes home occasionally with no collar on but thats better than no cat coming home.
With the elasticated ones the cat still has to manage to get his head out but these ones just come undone.