By Nick Craven
Last updated at 8:25 AM on 29th June 2010
Holding a pair of Jacks: Michael Neary with his nine-year-old (left) and four-year-old pets
When his beloved Jack Russell terrier went missing during a visit to Ireland five years ago, Michael Neary was devastated.
And after a year, he decided there was a hole in his life that only another dog could fill.
The plant fitter from Morpeth, Northumberland, bought one of his pet's brothers from a subsequent litter by the same parents - giving him the same name of Jack.
Holding a pair of Jacks: Michael Neary with his nine-year-old (left) and four-year-old pets
Last week, however, he was stunned to receive a call saying that Jack Mark One was alive and well at an animal shelter in Cambridgeshire.
Now aged nine, he had been found in Ireland and sent to England in a consignment of dogs for re-homing.
Staff at the Wood Green Animal Shelter near Huntingdon found he was microchipped with Mr Neary's telephone number and address.
'I couldn't believe he'd been found after five years away,' said the divorced father of two.
'My son James went to collect him straight away, and it all seemed a bit unreal until I actually saw Jack again.
'At first, he was a bit wary, but then after a short while he started looking at me with his head cocked, and he certainly looked like he was thinking, "I know this guy".
'Then within a day and a half, he was playing his favourite game of grabbing hold of the end of my trouser leg and letting me drag him around the house.
'For five years I've been telling people that microchips on dogs are a waste of money.
Now I'm eating a big slice of humble pie.
'As for the other Jack, he doesn't know what's going on. When I call "Jack," they both come running with their tails wagging, and I'm not sure how I'm going to sort that one out.
'I think they're beginning to establish a pecking order with the older one at the top. I might start calling the first one Jack and the second one Jackie.'
A spokesman for the animal shelter said: 'Jack's story has amazed us all.
'We've had a few cases where it took several months for an owner to be reunited with their dog, but never anything like five years.
'Without a microchip, Jack would never have found his way back to his family.'
Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1290454/Jacks-Dog-lost-Ireland-years--England.html#
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