Mu Finds Toffel

A sad ending, but a positive story.

Mu Finds Toffel

Mu found the remains of Toffel, a sweet gray and white cat.  I thought about not telling this story because it is yet another instance where the treasured family member did not survive.  However, I think this is ultimately a positive story because Mu did an excellent job, and because Toffel’s owner was glad to know what happened, even if it was the worst outcome.  Actually, the worst outcome would have been for Toffel’s family to always wonder, to never know what happened, to always think maybe they could have found him if they had just done one more thing.  The most amazing part of this story is that Mu found critical evidence in the woods, in deep ivy, 300 feet from Toffel’s home.  This evidence could not have been found any other way.  Even though I know what to look for and where to look, the chances of me finding this evidence without the help of Mu would have been essentially zero.  Mu has found cats, either alive or not, over 350 times in the past ten and a half years.  He is 12 years old and still working hard, enjoying his job.  I think the story of Mu’s search for Toffel should be told because it is ultimately a positive story, and one that people can learn from.   

When we got the request to search for Toffel, I learned more about him and his situation.  He was three years old and about 12 pounds.  He had been an indoor only cat when they lived in an apartment, but when his family moved to this quiet neighborhood 6 months ago, Toffel started going out.  He had a cat door with a camera watching it, so his people could see when he would go in and out.  He usually wasn’t gone long, and it seemed that he didn’t go far.  He was known to be a hunter.  Coyotes had been seen in the area.  Someone with search dogs had come to look for Toffel.  He had walked his dogs just about 120 feet down the side of the road, and said Toffel was picked up by a person in a car there.  Toffel was not the sort of cat to let a stranger pick him up and put him in a car.  I explained to Toffel’s owner that this guy with the search dogs would often follow supposed scent trails short distances and say the cat or dog was picked up, and then the cat or dog would be found later, near the house, in the opposite direction that the man’s search dogs went.  We had received reports of similar behavior from everyone who hired this person and his dogs. While it was theoretically possible Toffel could have been picked up, I told the owner that if I were him, if Toffel was my cat, I would not base my search strategy on the likelihood that Toffel was taken away in a car.  I explained that Mu would work differently, that he would be doing an area search, looking for any cat he could find, and not specifically for Toffel.  I told Toffel’s owner that this strategy had proven to be the most effective.  If Toffel had been an indoor only cat and had just escaped, then I would try to use Tino to follow the scent trail.  Because Toffel had regular outdoor access, and had not been seen for a week, the cat-detection dog seemed more likely to succeed.  I told him there still was about a 75% chance that we would not find Toffel, only a 25% chance we would.  Toffel’s owner said he wanted us to come to Portland to search, on the hope of that 25% chance.

Mu started the search near Toffel’s home, and we found hundreds of places where a displaced or frightened cat might hide.  We found one deck where Mu showed a lot of interest, but it could have been because that house had an indoor cat.  We did not find Toffel there, or any sign he had been there, such as gray fur on the edge of the boards.  We started out searching toward the southeast.  At one yard on the edge of the woods, Mu found coyote scat and pointed it out to me.  I took a picture of it and then broke it apart.  The coyote scat was full of gray fur, which is common for coyote poop because they eat a lot of rabbits and rodents.  This scat, however, was all fur, with none of the little bones and claws and teeth you would typically find in coyote scat.  Because Toffel was a gray cat, I couldn’t rule out that this coyote scat contained his fur.  I bagged the coyote scat and put it in my pocket, to examine later.  I told the owner that it probably wasn’t Toffel’s fur, but I would examine it closely for anything like a cat claw or a tooth, which would be more definitive.

The owner said that Toffel would usually go more northwest, so I told him we would start heading over there to search that area.  As we were heading that way, Mu directed me toward the houses on the east side, next to the forest.  It wasn’t like Mu was following a scent trail, but that he found scents in that direction more interesting for some reason.  We worked our way around until we got into the forest through someone’s yard.  Once we were in the woods, Mu found mussel shells and oyster shells, apparently taken from someone’s compost pile.  He kept searching and he found remains that looked at first glance like it could be from a gray cat.  Also, Mu’s body language seemed to say, “Well, the search is over.”  I couldn’t tell you exactly what I saw in his behavior that seemed to indicate that.  When I told him he was a good boy, and asked him to go over by the owner and sit and wait, he calmly did as I asked, as if he wasn’t expecting that he needed to continue the search.  I told the owner that Mu had found remains, and that he probably shouldn’t look at them. When I looked closer, I saw it was the two front legs of a gray cat with white feet.  It seemed like a likely match for Toffel.  The owner said he wanted to look, even if it was an unpleasant sight, and he agreed it looked a lot like Toffel’s feet.  He was sad, of course, but relieved in a way, to finally know what happened.

We collected the evidence, and I continued to work Mu around the area, to see if we could find any more evidence, which might confirm or negate the identity with more certainty.  We didn’t find anything else identifiable.  We went back to the house and looked more closely at the evidence.  Looking at the pictures of Toffel, we could see that it was a very likely match because his feet were asymmetrical, with more white on the left foot, just like the evidence Mu found.  I didn’t have much doubt it was Toffel.  Theoretically, another cat that looked almost identical to Toffel could have wandered into the neighborhood and died just in that window of time when Toffel went missing.  The most likely, most plausible explanation was that the remains belonged to Toffel, given the location and what we know about typical coyote behavior.  The owner agreed that he had little doubt about it being the remains of Toffel.  He said he would probably do a DNA test to confirm 100%.  He thanked Mu for his work, and said he really appreciated it.  He would rather know the truth, even if it was horrible, than never know.

Mu found this evidence in ivy about a foot deep.  You could be standing right on top of the evidence and still not see it.  If you were more than three feet away, the ivy looked undisturbed, and you definitely couldn’t see any evidence on the ground.  If you were looking for a cat, an entire cat alive and well, of course you would have overlooked this evidence.  This was a missing cat case that could only have been solved by a great search dog being used in the most effective way.  I had told the owner we only had a 25% chance of success because it would depend on what actually happened to Toffel.  If he had been accidentally locked in a garage, which is statistically more common than being taken by a coyote, the search dog probably would not have found him.  If Toffel had wandered outside the 350 foot radius of the zone we planned to search, we would not have found him.  Although being taken by a coyote is one of the least likely things to happen to a lost cat, when it does happen, then Mu’s nose is the only way the cat’s family would ever learn the fate of their family member.

I am very proud to be Mu’s partner.  If Mu was not good at searching for lost cats, if Mu just sat on the couch all day, of course I would still love him more than anything in the world.  He is family, he is my brother, my son, my partner, my friend.  He has a wonderful personality, and he is beautiful.  If Mu’s only job was to have his picture taken, that would be enough.  That he has been the solution for more than 350 families missing their beloved cats, it is just amazing.  Mu is a fantastic dog, a great person, and I never get tired of praising him.  I hope I don’t annoy people by constantly saying how great my dog is.  Actually, I don’t mind if I do annoy people.  I’m still going to say it.  Mu is great.  Mu is the best.

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