Microchip in a cat – why is it worth it and what does it look like?

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Like many of our guides/articles, this one too began with a question that came to us – „o co chodzi z tym chipowaniem kotów” and then a few additional detailed questions and discussion about it.

Stąd dziś nasz temat – chip u kota (czipowanie kotów). We'll write about: what a chip is, how it works, what a new Parent should know about it, what the costs look like, what microchipping cats involves (and whether it is painful), whether there are legal requirements for microchipping, whether every cat can/should have a chip, a few myths about chips, how catteries approach it, how we approach it, and finally two examples of how to use chips in a cat in an interesting way 🙂

Co to jest czip i jak działa?

A chip is a tiny electronic element (the size of a grain of rice) enclosed in a special protective capsule, which wszczepia się pod skórę zwierzęcia – most often between the shoulder blades. The procedure lasts a few seconds and is comparable to an ordinary injection.

✅ The chip does not emit waves/radiation, does not hurt the cat, does not move about, does not require a battery (or its replacement), is completely maintenance-free for the owner and for the cat it is na całe życie.

🪪 Zawiera unikalny numer identyfikacyjny kota (and only this number, nothing more!). It's a bit like a human PESEL [national ID number]. Practically every vet should have readers for these chip codes, and if a cat is found, the vet can check this „feline PESEL”. Such readers are also held by border services, animal shelters, and sometimes the police or municipal guard. It works from a distance of about 5-8 cm.

Ciekawostka: Posiadamy w naszej hodowli czytnik czipów, so if you feel like it, ask us at collection or during a visit to check the chip number of a chosen cat or several of our cats 🙂

Kod w chipie składa się z 15 cyfr – te sprzedawane w Polsce powinny się zaczynać od „616”. There can be various chip manufacturers, but their production is supervised by the International Committee for Animal Recording (ICAR), which assigns numbers to all producers.

⚠️ BARDZO WAŻNE: Natomiast sam chip to tylko numer! It contains NO data about the cat, breeder or owner! That is why, for it to fulfil its task – super ważna jest jego registration (more on it in a moment). Remember that a chip without registration is practically useless!

PS. We have also come across other suggestions for identifying a cat – a tattoo or a pendant (an address tag). But both these options have big drawbacks – a tattoo has to be done under anaesthesia and may fade over time, and zawieszka może być niebezpieczna (kot może się udusić lub zaczepić obrożą np. na ogrodzeniu).

Czy każdy kot powinien/musi mieć chip?

No to jest ciekawe pytanie – bo tutaj właśnie zaczynają się istotne the differences between chipping as a legal obligation and the requirements of feline organisations (czyli tych, które wydają rodowody).

👮 Czy hodowcy muszą chipować koty?

Prawo polskie NIE narzuca ogólnego obowiązku chipowania kotów, even in the case of their sale. This means that in theory a person breeding cats (not necessarily acting in accordance with breeding rules!) may sell a cat without a chip. Also, of course, many non-pedigree cats („moggies”) do not have a chip.

✅ Ale… większość organizacji felinologicznych WYMAGA chipu

W praktyce, jeśli hodowla działa legalnie, under the auspices of a recognised organisation (such as FIFe/FPL, TICA, WCF, etc.), numer mikrochipa jest obowiązkowy w dokumentacji kota.

Najczęściej:

• Chipowanie jest wymagane przed wydaniem kota do nowego domu.
• Numer mikrochipa musi być wpisany do rodowodu.
• In some organisations chipping is required already at the stage of litter registration.

Dzięki temu nowy opiekun ma pewność identyfikacji kota and can link a specific animal with documents (pedigree, passport, health record).

Chip jest też niezbędny, jeśli w przyszłości chce się wystawiać kota at shows (because „pet” neutered cats can also take part in shows!).

🚗 Podróże z kotem

Dodatkowo jeśli chcemy podróżować z kotem outside Poland, to kot musi mieć passport for pets. And in the passport the cat must be unambiguously identified and that is why the chip number is given there.

Rejestracja chipa – super ważna sprawa!

Wracamy do tego super ważnego tematu – rejestracji chipa. Jeśli kot ma tylko wszczepiony chip (ma on wtedy oczywiście ten unikalny numer), ale nie został zarejestrowany w żadnej bazie, to NIE będzie zapisana w nim (tym chipie) informacja o właścicielu.

That is, if someone finds a cat, the vet can check its number, but will not find information about the owner (or breeder) and will not know who to contact!

Gdzie zarejestrować kota? Gdzie rejestruje się chip?

There is no single central, worldwide animal database, but there are several of the best-known, most popular and largest databases – the Polish ones also pass data/information to these European or global ones. It is in them that vets (or other services) most often check the data.

Further on we will describe them in detail (including information about costs, etc.), but here let us list te 3 najpopularniejsze w Polsce:

• Safe-Animal (my w niej rejestrujemy w Kotki Kędziorki*PL)
• Identyfikacja.pl
• CBDZOE

Kto rejestruje chip?

W kontekście rejestracji chipów są dwie opcje:

1. Nowy właściciel rejestruje chip w bazie
2. Hodowca rejestruje chip w bazie (to polecamy!)

❌ Zdarzają się niestety hodowcy (i znamy to z opowieści), którzy nie rejestrują kotów, a zostawiają to nowemu właścicielowi. In the flood of information about the new kitten, they often forget about it and then the cat had a chip, but it was completely useless, because it had no data entered.

❌ An even worse example (also from stories) are breeders who did not even implant the chip but only dawali go do ręki w strzykawce! They could give this chip number for the pedigree, but they no longer bore the cost of implanting it, or of registering it in the database. In that case the chance that the chip will be implanted by the new owner and registered – is in our opinion negligible…

✅ W Kotki Kędziorki*PL to my czipujemy i rejestrujemy wszystkie kocięta przy okazji drugiego szczepienia – czyli około 12. tygodnia życia.

✔️ Każdy nasz kotek otrzymuje czip z unikalnym numerem.
✔️ Ten numer jest od razu rejestrowany w bazie Safe-Animal.
✔️ Jako dane sociable podajemy tam naszą hodowlę, ale nowi właściciele mogą to zmienić.
✔️ New owners get a sticker in the health record with the chip number

Dzięki temu nasz kociak od pierwszego dnia w nowym domu jest bezpieczny, a jego dane są gotowe w razie potrzeby.

Wyszukiwanie informacji o chipie/kocie (Safe-Animal)

Zobacz na poniższym przykładzie jak wygląda wyszukiwanie informacji o naszej kotce Amber w bazie Safe-Animal.

Chcesz spróbować? Wejdź na Safe-Animal i wpisz jej numer chipa: 616093902434306.

🪪 Możesz to zrobić też z numerem chipa swojego kota i przekonać się czy jest zarejestrowany oraz jakie dane są przy nim podane!

Dlaczego warto zaczipować kota?

You have probably already guessed why it is worth chipping a cat. But let us put it plainly. Because even a typically “indoor” cat can get out of the house – through an ajar window, a balcony, a door, during a visit to the vet or an escape in a stressful situation.

A found cat without a chip has no identification – it cannot be verified to whom it belongs. However a chip registered in a publicly accessible database allows quick contact with the carer, shortening the time of separation and increasing the chances of a happy return of the animal home.

✅ Bezpieczeństwo i szansa na powrót do domu – if a cat runs away, goes missing or is stolen, a vet, shelter or foundation can read the chip and contact the owner.

✅ Pomoc w sytuacjach kryzysowych – an accident, an evacuation, the carer's hospitalisation – thanks to the chip it is known to whom the animal belongs.

✅ Potwierdzenie własności – in case of a dispute, e.g. if someone takes in our cat, the chip is legal proof that it is our animal.

✅ Obowiązek w podróży za granicę – cats travelling outside Poland must be chipped if we want to obtain a passport for them.

Jak wygląda samo chipowanie?

The procedure is performed by a veterinarian and it is very quick and relatively painless:

1. The cat is identified and examined (for older cats without a known history the vet should first check whether the cat does not already have a chip).
2. In the spot between the shoulder blades / on the left side of the neck the chip is implanted using a single-use needle.
3. The vet reads the chip (to make sure it works and it is possible)
4. Numer z czipa jest wpisywany do książeczki zdrowia i/lub paszportu.
5. Powinno wtedy od razu nastąpić zarejestrowanie chipa w bazie

Zabieg jest szybki, tani i wykonywany raz w życiu – czip działa do końca życia kota.

Najpopularniejsze bazy danych w Polsce

All right, you know what chipping looks like, why it has to be done and how. Remember that a chip without registration is like luggage without an address or a PESEL without address information.

In Poland several databases operate, but these 3 below are probably the most popular and checked by vets.

🐾 Baza	🌍 Strona internetowa	💰 Koszt rejestracji
Safe-Animal (należy do EuroPetNet*)	www.safe-animal.eu	Free of charge (if a vet/breeder does it). The possibility of editing the data by the owner costs 59 zł per year or 399 zł lifetime (per animal)
Identyfikacja.pl (należy do EuroPetNet*)	www.identyfikacja.pl	Registration 49 zł one-off (per animal) + additional services for 19 zł per year (alerts, etc.).
CBDZOE: Centralna Baza Danych Zwierząt Oznakowanych Elektronicznie (należy do WorldPetNet)	www.cbdzoe.pl	Rejestracja 65 zł (bez względu na liczbę zwierząt)

* The European Pet Network (EPN, EuroPetNet for short) is a non-profit organisation that brings together the databases of European countries. This means that this organisation's search engine browses the databases of all these countries, so we can easily find a pet even beyond the borders of our own country.

Z czego my korzystamy?

Jak wspomnieliśmy – w Kotki Kędziorki*PL korzystamy z bazy Safe-Animal. In our opinion it is the largest database, with a well-prepared website, information about the cat.

My chipujemy kota w hodowli, oraz rejestrujemy go w Safe-Animal. After collecting the kitten you do NOT have to do anything, you do not have to buy a paid Safe-Animal subscription!

In the Safe-Animal database, the information about your cat contains the data of our clinic (Redline) and our contact details (telephone number).

Jeśli you would like change te dane to opcje są dwie:

1. You buy a Safe-Animal subscription (annual or lifetime) and then you can make all changes and edits to the cat's data in the database yourself. You can also decide what is visible there.
2. Możecie nam zgłosić ten fakt i wtedy bezpłatnie dokonamy tej zmiany przez naszą klinikę.

Z naszego doświadczenia – większość nowych właścicieli zostawia te dane bez edycji – in case the kitten gets lost and is found, someone should get in touch with us, and we have your contact details and can help. But you can change this – it is entirely up to you.

⚠️ UWAGA: Jeśli kiedyś kupiliście the Safe-Animal subscription (for a year) and you will not want to renew it (because you do not want to pay any more) – then the data about the cat NIE są kasowane z bazy. They stay there forever, and only you lose the possibility of editing them. We add this, because it is also one of the questions we have discussed more than once.

Mity o chipowaniu kotów

And almost at the end, a few more myths that we have heard and had the chance to discuss:

❌ Kota NIE można zlokalizować za pomocą chipa. It is not a GPS device that will show us the cat's location. There is also no data stored in the chip itself, and it is we who decide during the registration of the chip in the database what will be shown to the person who finds it (e.g. only a telephone number).

❌ Chipowanie i rejestracja NIE jest kosztowna, and in the case of responsible breeders it can even be free of charge for the new owner. The cost of implantation is from a few dozen to 100-150 zł (depending on the chip manufacturer, the vet and registration). Some municipalities occasionally organise free cat microchipping campaigns – it's worth taking advantage of them if your cat doesn't have one yet.

❌ Zabieg chipowania NIE jest skomplikowany i trudny. It lasts literally a minute, the cat does not have to be anaesthetised, does not have to undergo any recovery, most vets will perform chipping without any problem.

❌ Chip NIE przeszkadza zupełnie kotu w funkcjonowaniu. The chip does not irritate the tissues around the place where it is located, and the animal also does not feel any itching. It happens that it is even hard to feel it through the skin.

❌ NIE ma żadnych ograniczeń wiekowych when a chip can be installed. It can be done on a tiny kitten, but it can also be done on a fully adult cat.

❌ Samemu NIE da się (w prosty sposób) odczytać czipa. You have to have an RFID chip reader. That is why if you find a cat it is best to take it to the nearest vet.

❌ Chip NIE może zostać zgubiony przez kota, nor can it be pulled out by a stranger. A chip is also never replaced.

❌ Każdego kota można zaczipować. Nie ma żadnego znaczenia czy kot jest rasowy czy też nie.

Do czego innego można wykorzystać chip?

As we mentioned, a chip is only 15 digits, but there are two quite interesting solutions that use this simple possibility of identifying a specific cat.

Miski na chip

There are food bowls for cats that can recognise a specific cat and tylko dla niego otworzyć się i dać dostęp do jedzenia.

This works above all in a situation where at home we have more than one cat and there are two situations then:

1. If we have to give a specific cat (and only it) a specific food. For example when only it can/must eat a specific type of food.
2. If we want to have cats that eat a shared food, but to one of them we have to add extra just for it.

There are quite a few bowls of this type, we do not have any so we will not recommend a specific one, but look under the phrase „chip bowl”.

Wejścia na chip

It may happen that we want to let our cat out of the house or, within the house, restrict a specific cat's access to a specific room.

Such entrances (mounted in doors) have a sensor which of course recognises the chip and it is we who can decide for which cats these doors will remain closed and for which they will open.

Here too we have no experience, so it remains for you to search online for the phrase „chip cat flap”.

Podsumowanie

Chipping is a simple, cheap and very effective way to increase a cat's safety. It works throughout its whole life, does not bother the animal, and in case of problems – it can save a life or help it return home.

In our cattery we take care of this from the very beginning – because responsibility for the cats does not end on the day of their release 💚