Pet tracking collars

After hearing Smudge's story, and its wonderful conclusion, I was
wondering if people had any opinions about pet tracking collars. I've
noted at least two:

The LoCATer sounds like the better system, having a longer battery
life, less bulky collar, and a litle less expensive, but a little less
range. About $50 for a collar and $200 for a receiver, and $20 for a
pack of 12 (a year's worth) collar batteries.

I wonder if they could make a product like this using transponders
(similar to pet ID chips). I remember hearing years ago about how
they tagged butterflies with transponders to track them. Light,
rugged, and doesn't need batteries for the tag, but limited in range,
I think.

Jo Firey...

It is really a tough call to decide how much range you need. I'd guess most
cats never go more the a quarter mile from where they start out.

Distance dogs however, like my brother's Husky are likely to be many miles
away within an hour.

Takayuki...

I think the first one is more for dogs, being larger and more
powerful. I can just imagine how far a husky can run off, considering
how long they can pull a sled.

Karen...

I almost think for a cat you would have to have something implanted.
Seems like that should be possible. I think it would not even have to
be a big range. MOST cats are within 3 blocks when missing (my vet told
me anyway). Look at Smudge, she wasn't far at all.

Takayuki...

I'd guess that the range that you could get with a transponder would
be a block or half a block. Maybe good enough to find a cat. The
radio collars apparently have a maximum range of over half a mile,
although that extreme range I assume would need almost a clean line of
sight.

I don't know if it would be practical today to have implantable
transponders with that range, because they need antennas to get their
increased range. Even with the butterflies, they needed an antenna on
the transponder that was an inch or so long, but it didn't bother the
butterflies because the wire was light and thin. I use one of those
transponder ID badges at work, and I once had one stop working, except
at extremely short range. It turned out the wire inside the badge (a
loop of thin copper laid flat inside the card) came loose from the
chip.

Marina...

I used to translate the webpages of a project that tracked Ospreys via
satellite. They had solar-powered transmitters to strap on the ospreys'
backs. That would only work outside, but most cats that get lost get
lost outside, I would think. Maybe the battery would retain enough power
even if the cat was inside, like Smudge was.

(If you want to read more about them, it starts here:

Takayuki...

Thanks, that's interesting, and those are about the most beautiful
birds I've seen. They don't seem to talk all that much about it, but
it must be some interesting technology they're using, if they can make
a lightweight transmitter that's both energy efficient and allows
satellite tracking.