Nearly 20-year-old pet cat returns to owner 16 years after going missing

She disappeared from her owner's garden

A 19-year-old cat has been reunited with its owner after being missing for a whopping 16 years.

Sunshine, a pedigree Bengal cat, disappeared from owner Carl Pullen's garden in 2009 when she was just two-and-a-half years old. She was presumed to have been stolen as the sought-after breed can be sold for up to £1.7k - and she was not recovered despite Carl's appeals for help.

Mr Pullen, 51, moved away from Welwyn Garden City in Herts the following year - but was left shocked on Monday, March 24, to hear Sunshine had been found.

He received a phone call from a veterinary surgeon from Welwyn saying that his cat had been handed in. Now 19-years-old, Sunshine has been reunited with her family for the last years of her life.

The technical project manager said: "The vet asked if I had a cat called Sunshine - she'd been handed in as a stray. I'd always figured she'd been stolen. I'd put up posters, appealed to find her, and she was microchipped.

"She went out one day and never came back. It's a good thing I never changed my phone number in all these years. She wasn't in a great way when I picked her up from the vets.

"She was underweight, her claws hadn't been clipped and she had bad kidneys. Since she's been home, Sunshine has had some teeth taken out and medication to perk her up a bit - she's looking a lot better."

Mr Pullen had owned Sunshine since the end of 2006 when she was six months old. Two and a half years later, in the summer of 2009, she went out into the garden of his home and was not seen again by Mr Pullen for 16 years.

Since then, Mr Pullen has lived in Switzerland, Bishop's Stortford in Herts and now resides in the Essex village of Takeley.

Mr Pullen added: "She's nineteen and a half years old which is 92 in cat years. I don't think she's been a stray all this time - maybe just in the last few months.

"We thought we wouldn't see her again but she's back home now."