Microchips for Dogs
Microchipping your dog is an essential step in keeping your pet safe. Microchips give dog owners peace of mind if their dog goes missing. When a dog is found with no ID, scanning for a microchip is routine practice. Microchips for dogs significantly impact the ability and speed of reuniting owners with their lost pets.
What is Microchipping for Dogs?
A dog microchip is a transponder, approximately the size of a grain of rice, implanted into a dog’s skin. A veterinarian performs the injection. The purpose of microchipping dogs is to identify a lost dog that has been found with no identification.
Benefits of Microchipping
Microchipping has several benefits. Microchips are permanent – after they are implanted, your dog will never need to have it removed or replaced. Microchips do not use any power source or connectivity, so they will always be scanable. Unlike tags and collars, microchips cannot fall out, break, get lost, etc. No matter what your dog does or where it goes, the microchip will stay safely implanted under its skin. Microchips are inexpensive and easy to place in dogs. The procedure is also swift and generally painless.
How Dog Microchips Work
Microchips work by storing a radio frequency that relays a unique identification number when scanned with a specific scanning tool. When scanned, the registered microchip number displays on the scanner. The microchip number is then used to search databases, such as PetLink, to find the dog’s information as well as the owner’s information. However, this requires that the dog owner previously registered their pet’s microchip in a microchip database.