'I could work every day' Life of a pet detective helping bereft owners amid increase in thefts

Life of a pet detective helping bereft owners amid increase in thefts

- Hannah Al-Othman

On a chilly December morning, Colin Butcher and his dog, Molly, are on the streets of Haywards Heath in West Sussex. But Molly is not out for a walk; instead, she is hard at work trying to track down a missing cat.

Pet theft is on the rise across the UK. Data from the insurer Direct Line suggested dog thefts had increased by 6% between 2022 and 2023, with English and French bulldogs - regularly sold for about £3,000 - among the most frequently targeted breeds.

Separate data from Petlog, one of the UK's largest lost and found pet databases, revealed that almost 5,000 dogs and more than 20,000 cats were reported missing between January 2023 and June 2024. And while pet theft is booming, so too is the pet recovery industry, with bereft owners increasingly turning to specialists to help reunite them with their missing animals. Some recruit the services of volunteers, while others will pay hundreds of pounds for professionals such as Butcher, an ex-Scotland Yard detective, to hunt for their lost or stolen pets.

Some detectives - amateur and professional - use an arsenal of the latest technology, including thermal imaging drones and cellular outdoor cameras.

But Butcher relies on old-fashioned detective work and his 10-year-old working cocker spaniel. Together, the pair have recovered hundreds of pets.

"I could work every single day of the week and every weekend; there's so much demand right across the board," he said. "I probably get about on average 15 emails or calls just on missing cats every single week; a busy week might be as many as 30."

His successful recovery rate for cats is somewhere between 82% and 85%. And his work has taken him across the world, tracking down a Yorkshire terrier who went missing on the Grenadian island of Carriacou, and investigating a corrupt dog rescue centre in Turkey.