The cat Hermann (3) walks two miles to meet his girlfriend. Now he has run away for the tenth time – NRK Rogaland – Local news, TV and radio

– Come on, kitty. Kitty, come!

It has happened again. The cat Hermann (3) has run away.

Now the owners will soon have to count on three hands how many times he has run away in one year.

It was Solabladet that first wrote about the travel-loving cat (external link).

Nine times foster mother Oda Kristine Soma has had to look for the cat. Now she’s doing it one more time.

And that in a municipality she does not live in.

Don’t like the new home

Hermann grew up on Bogafjell in Sandnes. Last year, his human family moved to Skadberg in Sola.

It is 18 kilometers away as the crow flies.

Naturally, Hermann also had to be there.

And it doesn’t seem like the cat is doing so well in the new place. He just wants to return to Bogafjell.

– We hope he finds out that this is where he belongs now, says Soma.

Together with her children Elin and Alma, she goes for a walk in their old neighborhood to look for Hermann.

Bought a GPS collar

Soma says they have always found the cat because previous neighbors say they have seen him.

More recently, they have invested in a GPS collar that shows where Hermann is at all times.

But the collar is of little use right now.

– He has managed to jump out without the collar as we had to charge it. We were told by our old neighbors that they saw him outside their house on Bogafjell.

The reason why he runs away from home, Soma believes, is because of a close friend of Hermann’s.

She thinks they could be lovers.

– It is one that he has always played with when he has been here. They have always been good friends and he probably wants to play with her, she says.

Cat experts say similar stories do occur

Bjarne Braastad is a cat expert. He says the very good cat friend can be a reason why Hermann keeps traveling to Bogafjell.

But there can also be several reasons:

– Cats are often very attached to their old home. It may also be that Hermann has a difficult time socially in the new place, says Braastad.

He says that most often it is male cats between the ages of two and three that run away from home.

And it is not a completely unknown problem that cats are willing to go far to travel to their old home, he points out.

– It is not surprising that the cat has walked two miles to the old place. The Norwegian record is the cat that walked 60 miles from Stjørdal to Bærum in the late 1970s, says Braastad.

Did his part to make the cat happy

The family kept Hermann in for a while after they moved to Skadberg in Sola. This is to let him get used to his new home.

According to cat expert Braastad, this is a good idea.

– What is important when you move is that the cat gets to know the new home very well before it is let out. It is important to make the cat feel as comfortable as possible in the new place, he says.

But even if the family has done this, Hermann still wants to go to Bogafjell.

Perhaps it is the case that the family must contact the owner of the cat litter to solve the problem.

On Friday evening, they still haven’t been able to find Hermann at Bogafjell.