Missing cat found after over three months through Petco Love technology

When Grayson slipped out of his Plano home in mid-July, his family feared the worst. The 10-year-old indoor cat had never spent a night outside, and their neighborhood — bordered by a busy highway and teeming with coyotes and other wildlife — felt like the last place a senior pet could survive for long.

Yet, 103 days later, Grayson’s owner Pam was reunited with her cat thanks to a helpful neighbor and Petco Love’s Love Lost photo-matching technology.

Pam and her husband realized Grayson was missing on July 16, likely darting out as they brought in groceries. They turned to Love Lost, a free national database that uses AI to match photos of missing pets with found animals reported by shelters and community members.

They uploaded Grayson’s photo, filed a lost report and checked their daily match alerts religiously. Pam also drove their neighborhood and checked with local shelters for months — but no Grayson. Three months later, on October 27, Plano resident Missy spotted a thin gray cat wandering in an alley near her home, about a mile from Pam’s house and across a high-traffic highway.

Concerned for the cat’s safety, she brought him inside, snapped a photo, and uploaded it to Love Lost to file a found-pet report.

Within moments, Love Lost’s AI photo-matching tool flagged a potential match: Grayson.

“I used Love Lost to reunite them,” Missy said. “I uploaded a photo of the cat we found, and it was matched through AI with the photo the owner uploaded. It was amazing.”

Missy messaged Pam directly through the platform. A cross street Pam had mentioned in July turned out to be just a mile from Missy’s home.

Both women were stunned that Grayson had made it so far. The stretch between their homes includes a major Plano roadway and an area where coyotes and even mountain lions have been spotted.

Love Lost, powered by national nonprofit Petco Love, is available free to pet owners and shelters. Its AI technology scans facial features, markings, and shape to match images of missing and found pets, helping reunite thousands of families each year.