Stray cat adopted by Edinburgh nursery returns to Leeds

Staff at an Edinburgh nursery were stunned to learn that a stray cat they had befriended did in fact have a home – 200 miles away in Leeds.

It is believed five-year-old tabby Tiger, who spent six weeks with the nursery, ended up in the Capital after jumping in the back of a vehicle.

While his owners were frantically searching back in Yorkshire, the furry hitchhiker was entertaining children at the Cowgate Under 5’s Centre in Old Assembly Close.

Depute manager Lian Higgins, 41, who eventually looked after Tiger at home in South Queensferry, said: “Each morning when the janitor arrived at 6am he was waiting at the door for him. That’s when we began to realise he doesn’t have a home.

“We decided to call him Freddie – he was so friendly with people and he would allow the children to pet him.

“He was always coming in to the nursery and making himself comfortable on something warm, like a printer or a hard drive.”

Centre staff contacted the Scottish SPCA and Cats Protection, who advised he should be taken to a vet to check if he had been  microchipped.

Lian said: “When we found out he had come that far under his own steam we  just couldn’t believe it.”

She added: “I really am going to miss the guy.

“I was all set to adopt him if no-one came forward, but I am so glad he has been reunited with his  owners.”

Tiger went missing from the Hudson household on July 24. He has now been reunited with his family, Sandra and Tom Hudson and their children Tom, 17, and Molly, 13, who live in Morley, Leeds.

Sandra, 46, a teacher, said: “We were beginning to give up hope of ever finding him.

“The strangest thing is, Tiger doesn’t wander or roam about the streets, usually he just sits on the step.

“We could not believe how far he had gone – he must have got into a delivery van in our street. Molly is just over the moon to have him back. We can’t thank Lian Higgins enough for looking after him.”

Scottish SPCA deputy chief superintendent Tom Gatherer said: “It is quite amazing that this cat managed to travel all the way to Edinburgh from Leeds and we are very glad he has now been returned  home.

“This incident highlights how important it is to have your pet microchipped as without one it is extremely unlikely this cat would have been reunited with his owner.”

Pets win prizes for weirdest wanderings

TIGER isn’t the only pet to have gone travelling distances and landed in Lothian.

In March last year, Mickey the ferret was found by Scottish SPCA staff on the platform at Haymarket station and believed to have journied the length of the country after unwittingly catching a train from London King’s Cross.

And deaf moggy Stefan was discovered a very long way from home when passers-by found him wandering around Granton Square despite being registered in Gdansk, Poland.

When he was rescued in September last year, an animal welfare charity said they could not rule out the possibility that he travelled the 1500-mile distance as a stowaway in a van.

And then there are tales of reunion – Salsa the snake reappeared yards from her owner’s Leith home three months after going missing in September 2010 and four-year-old cat Rocco turned up 140 miles away from home.

The moggy had disappeared from his East Lothian home for three weeks before a rescue centre in Cumbria called to say he had been handed in.