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After nearly five months lost in northeastern B.C, a beloved family cat is heading home for the holidays. Since July, Shadow the cat has been surviving in the wilderness of the Northern Rockies.
The black cat was lost when his American owner Jeremy Barton stopped for a break at Liard Hot Springs Provincial Park, a 300-kilometre drive northwest of Fort Nelson on the Alaska Highway.
Barton was travelling back from Alaska to his home state of Oklahoma – when the cat slipped out. Barton searched for hours.
“I started freaking out. I started walking around with his food bowl.”
His efforts to lure Shadow out of hiding failed, and Barton had to break the news of the missing cat to his sons, Auri and Valor.
“It was pretty devastating. They both cried for a couple of days,” he said.
Now, Shadow is coming home.
It came after provincial park operators found the cat, and connected with Fort St. John residents Bruce Kosugi and Christine Sutherland.
The pair happened to be visiting the hot springs, and offered to drive the cat south, after the operators said they were trying to figure out a way to return Shadow to Barton.
Highly allergic to cats, Kosugi suited up in a medical mask, while Sutherland held Shadow in her lap on the eight-hour, nearly 690-kilometre drive to Fort St. John.
Sutherland with Shadow. She’s offered to fly the cat to Winnipeg this month to reunite him with owner Jeremy Barton, who will drive up from Oklahoma City. (Submitted by Bruce Kosugi)
Despite nearly five months in the wild, Shadow is in good health, and will see his family this month when Sutherland flies to Winnipeg to reunite him with Barton.
Barton is deeply grateful, and says the help in returning Shadow is something he won’t forget.
“I’m just really thankful to my Canadian friends up north, my Canadian brothers and sisters up north,” Barton said.
“Especially with all the things going on between our two countries recently, I’m just happy that we were able to do something good with each other and help each other out.”
From Winnipeg, Barton will drive with Shadow more than 16 hours home to Oklahoma City. It’s a long journey with a happy ending.
“You can never do too much, you know, when it comes to helping families at any time of year in any kind of distress,” said Sutherland.
“This cat meant a lot to those two boys. And it’s so neat that they’re going to see him before Christmas.”