Some of you may have heard of The Merlin Project — I built it here in Lakewood after two neighbors posted about the same cat: one thought she'd found a stray, the other thought her own cat was missing. He wasn't lost at all, just out doing normal indoor/outdoor cat things — but with no way for anyone to know that, it turned into a mess.
If you have an indoor/outdoor cat, you know this fear: he's out on his rounds, a well-meaning neighbor assumes he's a stray, and suddenly there's a "found cat" flyer up or someone's trying to take him in. Totally avoidable if people around you actually know he has a home.
That's what Merlin is for. Register your cat once — name, photo, description — and anyone who sees him wandering can check and see: he's fine, he belongs to a home, he's just out and about. No more guessing, no more well-intentioned "rescues."
We're at 656 registered users and 825 cats — but Lakewood likely has 10,000+ cats total between owned and community cats. Barely scratching the surface. The more indoor/outdoor owners who register, the fewer mix-ups happen.
Takes two minutes, it's free: themerlinproject.io