{"id":112384,"date":"2026-01-06T05:20:21","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T05:20:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/112384\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T05:20:21","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T05:20:21","slug":"dog-missing-for-5-years-found-in-rockford-reunited-with-family-in-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/112384\/","title":{"rendered":"Dog missing for 5 years found in Rockford, reunited with family in Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) &#8211; It\u2019s a story you have to see to believe. Some may even call it a miracle.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">On New Year\u2019s Eve, 2020, a dog named Bella went missing in a suburb North of Houston, Texas. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Bella lived in a fenced in backyard, wore her ID tag and collar proudly, but was suddenly gone following a rainy and cold night in Houston. When her family discovered she was missing, they put up flyers, signs, went door-to-door, but eventually lost hope as time went on.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">December 2025 marked five years since Bella went missing from her loving home. That was until one single phone call turned her family from hopeless to pure shock.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cBella was brought to <a href=\"https:\/\/winnebagoanimals.org\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/winnebagoanimals.org\/\">Winnebago County Animal Services<\/a> like thousands of pets a year as a stray,\u201d said Amber Pinnon, the adoption and volunteer coordinator at Winnebago County Animal Services (WCAS).<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">But Bella is no stray. Somehow, Bella made her way from the Lone Star State to the Prairie State, a more than 1,000-mile difference between the two. Bella is not a big dog either; she is a small chihuahua.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"figure-img img-fluid mx-auto d-block\" alt=\"Dog missing for 5 years found in Rockford, reunited with family in Texas\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/DMPC4BII5BCEHMTI2AAIFLBE2U.jpg\" width=\"980\" height=\"1306\" \/>Dog missing for 5 years found in Rockford, reunited with family in Texas(WIFR)<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">WCAS, along with <a href=\"https:\/\/wecareforpets.org\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/wecareforpets.org\/\">Care for Pets<\/a>, successfully discovered Bella was from Houston through her microchip. They say without the microchip, Bella may have never found her way home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe do find that there are lots of chips that aren\u2019t unregistered or chips where, unfortunately, the owners haven\u2019t updated that chip. We are tracing microchips quite often; however, the scope of this one is more large than normal,\u201d Pinnon explained.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">It was a very emotional moment for Bella\u2019s family upon receiving the phone call \u2014 a phone call they never expected.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI think he was more like, \u2018Is this a scam? What\u2019s going on? Are you sure this is it?\u2019 and I think he was having a hard time grasping \u2018Is this real?\u2019\u201d said Stephanie Hicks, the executive director at Care for Pets.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Because of many difficulties, Bella\u2019s family was unable to retrieve their fur baby all the way in northern Illinois. WCAS decided to throw out a Hail Mary to Care for Pets to see if their village of volunteers could reunite the family.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">With the power of community, Winnebago County Animal Services and Care for Pets was able to raise enough funds to get Bella back in the arms of her owners. They also found a volunteer to fly Bella back home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe had a volunteer step up, who said I\u2019ll fly same day out to Houston and fly back the same day, so she\u2019s leaving her own dog and family behind and making the trip,\u201d Hicks explained.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">As of January 3, 2026, Bella is home, safe and sound.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"figure-img img-fluid mx-auto d-block\" alt=\"Dog missing for 5 years found in Rockford, reunited with family in Texas\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/OUYYC5FKZBFNJBVAA2TNRN2OMY.jpg\" width=\"980\" height=\"1306\" \/>Dog missing for 5 years found in Rockford, reunited with family in Texas(WIFR)<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt was a very emotional moment for everybody. Even when she first saw me, you can tell she still recognized me a little,\u201d said Sergio Torres, the father of Bella. \u201cShe was really attached to my oldest son, and when she saw my oldest son, she was reaching out her paw and everything. It was a heartwarming moment for us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">You can watch the full interview with Sergio and Bella below:<\/p>\n<p>Missing dog found in Rockford returns to family in Texas<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">While experts say it\u2019s hard to explain how Bella made her way from Houston to Rockford, the family is just happy to have their furry family member back home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">WCAS and Care for Pets say this story is a clear example of why you should get your furry friends microchipped.<\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright |\">Copyright 2026 WIFR. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) &#8211; It\u2019s a story you have to see to believe. Some may even call it&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112385,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[49799,2526,56,10051,49794,49797,49791,49796,49802,49801,49795,49789,32614,49788,4625,49792,49793,27,29,28,49800,49790,49798],"class_list":["post-112384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-care-for-pets","tag-dog","tag-houston","tag-houston-texas","tag-missing-animals","tag-missing-animals-rockford","tag-missing-dog","tag-missing-dog-found-in-rockford","tag-missing-dog-in-texas","tag-missing-dog-reunited-with-family","tag-missing-dog-rockford","tag-news-in-rockford","tag-rockford","tag-rockford-news","tag-stray-animals","tag-stray-dog","tag-stray-dogs","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-wcas","tag-wifr","tag-winnebago-county-animal-services"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}