Annie Rosales is living through a surreal, impossible moment after being reunited with a\u00a0beloved cat that had spent 2 1\/2 years living off the land just outside Yellowstone National Park.<\/p>\n
Rosales was undertaking a cross-country move from San Francisco to New York with her husband, daughter, and two cats in July 2023 when they stopped to stay with friends in Cody.<\/p>\n
During their brief stay, their female cat Lily escaped and couldn\u2019t be found.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe stayed an extra day and stayed up all night trying to get her, but she\u2019s a cat,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cWe had hope, but she\u2019s a cat. She\u2019s not going to come when she\u2019s called.\u201d<\/p>\n
After making the heart-wrenching decision to move on, the Rosales family settled into their new lives in New York. Lily was long gone but not forgotten.<\/p>\n
![\"Then](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/cat-text-3-4-26.jpg\")
Then in March,\u00a0the family got a text from an unknown Wyoming number. \u201cIt was a picture of a cat, and they asked if\u00a0we knew this cat because it\u2019s wearing a collar with our number on it,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cI just didn’t believe it when I saw the picture. It was Lily.\u201d (courtesy)<\/p>\n
Then in March,\u00a0the family got a text from an unknown Wyoming number.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a picture of a cat, and they asked if\u00a0we knew this cat because it\u2019s wearing a collar with our number on it,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cI just didn’t believe it when I saw the picture. It was Lily.\u201d<\/p>\n
The next week, Rosales flew to Cody and was reunited with Lily.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nobody knows how a house cat from San Francisco survived more than two years in an area with bears, wolves and other\u00a0predators, but she did it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I got her into the hotel and I opened the door of her pet crate, she sniffed me for a second, then she came right up, rubbed up against me, and was purring and meowing,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cIt was unreal.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Lost-cat-lily-IMG_2486-4.1.26.jpg\")
A couple moving from San Francisco to New York lost their cat 2 1\/2 years ago near Cody, Wyoming. They lost all hope until they received a text from someone who caught the cat and noticed there was a number on its collar. They flew out the next day. (Courtesy Annie Rosales)Into The Wild<\/p>\n
Rosales has owned Lily since 2019. The cat was comfortably living in San Francisco until the family decided to relocate to New Rochelle, New York.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe bought an old RV and fixed it up,\u201d she said. \u201cWe road-tripped across with our 2-year-old daughter and two cats, Lily and Klay. It was a great trip.\u201d<\/p>\n
On their journey east, the Rosales family stopped to visit a family they knew who lived on a ranch along the South Fork of the Shoshone River between Cody and the East Entrance of Yellowstone.<\/p>\n
Nobody knows how it happened, but the night before they were planning to depart, Lily snuck out of the RV.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rosales said they spent an extra day on the ranch doing whatever they could to find Lily.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just couldn\u2019t find her,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was really hard to look for her, because it was a big ranch right next to the river, and there\u2019s a lot of wildlife out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
After a day of searching, they had to make an extremely difficult decision.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe ended up having to drive away,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cWe were really heartbroken driving away and leaving her there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rosales held onto some hope.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She was told there were several stray cats that managed to eke out a living in the area, so maybe Lily had the wherewithal to keep herself alive long enough to be found and reunited with her family.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had hope that someone would get her,\u201d she said. \u201cBut that never happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
Days turned to weeks, which turned to months. The family that the Rosales had stayed with moved away, and there wasn\u2019t any news of Lily for\u00a0more than two years.<\/p>\n
Somehow Lily Returned<\/p>\n
In December 2025, Rebecca and Jack Deal moved to a property along the South Fork River, 3.5 miles from the spot where Lily went missing.\u00a0<\/p>\n
There, they quickly made the acquaintance of two stray cats.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe one cat was super-friendly,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cIt would come into their house and play with them. The other cat was very shy and timid and would hide under the porch when they came to eat.\u201d<\/p>\n
It took a while for the Deals to get a close enough look at the second cat to realize she was wearing a collar. Thinking the collar looked tight, the Deals managed to capture the cat and bring it inside.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s how they got Chris Rosales\u2019s number and sent him the picture of Lily. But before they could confirm with Lily\u2019s owners, Lily wanted out.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe really wanted to go back out, so they let her back out,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cWe told them, as soon as you can bring her back inside, I’ll fly there and come get her. So, the Deals and their neighbor, Mark, made catching Lily their duty.”<\/p>\n
Catch The Cat<\/p>\n
Trapping Lily a second time wasn\u2019t easy. A trap was put out every night after the Deals reached the Rosales, but Lily was adept at avoiding capture.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe would go into the trap, and one night it closed, but she got out of it somehow,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cShe was evading their attempts to bring her back inside.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the Deals returned from out of town, Rebecca Deal thought she might have a better chance of getting close to Lily, and she seemed more comfortable with her than with Jack or Mark.<\/p>\n
\u201cLily had connected with Rebecca,\u201d she said. \u201cShe came close enough up to allow Rebecca to pet her and would sit on her lap.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since the old trap failed, the Lily Capture Team concocted a new contraption that would make any Looney Tunes character proud: a large box propped up by a taut fishing line.<\/p>\n
A camera was set up to alert them when Lily was under the box. Then it was a mad dash to cut the fishing line and safely contain Lily.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was so sweet,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cI can’t believe the kindness that we got from that family, and all the time they put in to trying to catch her again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Three weeks ago, Rosales got a text from the Deals. Lily was safely captured and inside their home.<\/p>\n
Rosales filmed the moment when they woke up their now 4-year-old daughter Norita to tell her that their \u201cLilycat” had been captured.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid they catch her?\u201d she asked. \u201cI want her. Is it gonna take you long to drive there?\u201d<\/p>\n
Rosales was on a flight to Cody the next day.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Lost-cat-lily-IMG_8077-4.1.26.jpg\")
A couple moving from San Francisco to New York lost their cat 2 1\/2 years ago near Cody, Wyoming. They lost all hope until they received a text from someone who caught the cat and noticed there was a number on its collar. They flew out the next day. (Courtesy Annie Rosales)Lilycat Back<\/p>\n
Rosales\u2019s flight got into Cody around 10 p.m. The Deals were there to greet her, and waiting in the back of their car was the long-lost Lily.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was in a little crate in the back of their car,\u201d she said. \u201cShe meowed, and they did say she was being a little more vocal than she had been.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rosales let Lily out of her crate once they were alone in their hotel room. She didn\u2019t know exactly what to expect.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe had been out on her own for two and a half years,\u201d she said. \u201cJack was nervous because she was really frisky when they caught her, so I didn\u2019t know if it would take her a really long time to warm up to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Within a minute of being out of the crate, Lily was purring, mewing, and eagerly seeking affection from Rosales. It was like no time had passed.<\/p>\n
The Deals took Rosales back to the airport the next day. Lily was going to a new house, but it was still the same loving home.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a lot of tears in the hotel that night,\u201d Rosales said.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Lost-cat-lily-IMG_7852-4.1.26.png\")
A couple moving from San Francisco to New York lost their cat 2 1\/2 years ago near Cody, Wyoming. They lost all hope until they received a text from someone who caught the cat and noticed there was a number on its collar. They flew out the next day. (Courtesy Annie Rosales)Back To Before<\/p>\n
Lily is now settling into her new home in New Rochelle. In addition to being reunited with Chris and Norita, Lily got to meet Rosales\u2019s 2-year-old, Marco.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was pregnant when she ran away, so she never met my son,\u201d she said. \u201cShe wasn\u2019t too excited that we had one kid, let alone two, but she\u2019s definitely warmed up to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Their second cat, Klay, also got a reunion that quickly settled back into a familiar routine.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey were very close,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cKlay was always very affectionate and liked to be right on top of her, and Lilly always played hard to get. As soon as they reunited, they were having their typical interaction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lily has had a visit to the veterinarian since arriving in New York and received a clean bill of health. How she survived the South Fork is anybody\u2019s guess.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just keep looking at her, thinking about what she\u2019s been through,\u201d Rosales said. \u201cWhat were you doing for that long? What have you seen? What did you have to do?\u201d<\/p>\n
Everyone\u2019s best guess is that Lily managed to find enough safe places, like barns or sheds, to seek shelter and find food. Rosales wouldn\u2019t be surprised if several families along the South Fork helped Lily during all that time.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be cool to see if there’s anyone else who interacted with her,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019d love to piece together the whole story of who\u2019s seen her and what she\u2019s been doing for the last two and a half years.\u201d<\/p>\n
The collar that brought Lily back\u00a0is still comfortably around her neck. Best of all, Rosales said her long-lost cat has shown little to no interest in going back outside since arriving in New York.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe’s the same exact cat that she was when we lost her,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n