The country now has nearly ten million cats and at least as many dogs.
You may remember the movie Ace Ventura, the animal detective played by Jim Carrey in the 90s. In Japan, there are now several private detective agencies specializing in the search for stray dogs and cats. And, since the pandemic and the rise in the number of pet owners, these investigators are increasingly called upon.
Many families, and especially single people, have bought a small dog or a small cat to compensate for the restrictions on social life. Studies show that the number of owners increased by at least 15% during the first year of the epidemic. There are now almost ten million cats and ten million dogs in the country. So automatically, there are more lost animals.
Billed to customer size
We see them quite often on TV these days. And they like to say that they do a bit the same job as private detectives for humans. It begins with a long interview with the owner to find out about the habits of the animal, its character, the places where it walks, its possible previous escapes. Then, the detective goes to the neighborhood to question the neighborhood, he puts up posters to alert the neighbors and then he walks for hours to search the alleys, look under cars and show the photo of the animal everywhere.
An investigation lasts roughly three days. It is at least 8 hours of research per day. And it’s charged by the size of the animal. A small dog or a cat costs 87,000 yen (590 euros) per mission. It will be necessary to add 100 euros for the biggest dogs, more complicated to handle. You have to pay in advance and you are not reimbursed if the animal is not found. Private detectives say, however, that they often complete their missions successfully.
Each truffle is unique
While pets in Japan are normally required to carry a tiny electronic chip containing their owner’s identity and address, few services are currently equipped to read these chips if someone finds a stray animal. A start-up, which is called S’more, has just launched another solution: an application which makes it possible to very precisely scan the nose of dogs. Because it is unique, a bit like our fingerprints. You subscribe, you save your animal’s nose in a large online file and if the dog gets lost, you broadcast an alert message to the users of the application so that they can scan the nose of a dog that would seem alone. And if the result matches, the application notifies the owner that his dog has been found. Several thousand dogs are already registered in this file.