How to keep track of the cats in your neighbourhood
Walk the same streets at the same time of day, photograph every cat you see, give each one a name you will remember, and note where and when. Do it with your neighbours and you will know which cats are whose, which are strays, and when one goes missing. Chonk Finder does all of that for you, for free, and shares it with the people on your street.
Free on iPhone and Android. No sign-up.
Most streets have a dozen cats and nobody has the list. There is the black one with the white bib, the tabby that sits on the blue car, the ginger that might be two gingers. When one stops appearing, the people who would notice have no way to compare notes.
Cat rescues and community cat groups keep track the slow way: a notebook, a spreadsheet, a group chat with photos nobody can search. It works until it depends on one person, and then it stops.
Photograph, and the app files it
Each photo becomes a card with the cat’s name, where you were and when. The app decides whether it is a cat you have already met or a new one, so the tabby that might be two tabbies gets settled.
The street shares one map
Your neighbours’ finds and yours go on the same map. A cat four different people have found becomes a Chonk, which is the app’s way of saying the whole street knows this one.
Dates, so absence is visible
Every find is dated. A cat nobody has seen for a month is a cat somebody should look for, and now there is a record of who last saw it and where.
The three questions that stop people
- Can I do this without the app?
- Yes: a shared photo album, a name for each cat and a note of the date and street does most of it. The app removes the part where one person has to keep it up.
- What about the cats that belong to somebody?
- A collared cat can be given its real name by whoever discovers it, and an owner can ask for their cat to come off the map at any time. The map shows an area, never a doorstep.
- Can a rescue group use it?
- Several people already do. It is free, it works with no signal, and every cat has a dated history of who found it and where. Write to hello@chonkfinder.app if you want help setting a street up.
There is probably a cat outside right now.
What the app is for · Why people call it Pokémon GO for cats · Cats by city, the ones people have already found · Every question people ask about the app