Missing cat found 5 years later thanks to microchip

March 8 (UPI) -- Animal rescuers in British Columbia said a 13 1/2-year-old cat is on his way to being reunited with his owner five years after the feline was reported missing.

The Victoria-based group Find Lost and Escaped Cats, or FLEC, said the cat was recently reported missing near the Royal Bay bluff by a Colwood family, and the pet was soon found by a member of the public and taken to a veterinarian.

The vet found the cat had a microchip that the Colwood family didn't know about. The chip identified the feline as a cat reported missing five years earlier by a woman who now lives in St. Catherines, Ontario.

"I think you could have knocked the owner over with a feather when they were contacted," FLEC President Jill Oakley told the Saanich News of the cat's original owner.

Oakley said the cat will soon make the trip to Ontario to be reunited with his original owner. She said the reunion highlights the importance of having pets microchipped.

"This is why we always tell people with missing pets to never give up," FLEC said in a Facebook post.