A MUCH-loved family dog that went missing three months ago has been reunited with his owner.

Seven-year-old Rags, a Jack Russell, had not been seen since escaping from his back garden in Birlingham, near Pershore, on January 24.

His frantic owner Audrey Richardson, aged 76, put up posters all over Pershore in an attempt to track down her beloved pet, but was close to losing hope of ever seeing him again when he did not return.

But thanks to an eagleeyed resident who spotted Rags walking down the town’s Three Springs Road last Tuesday, he has been reunited with his owner.

The woman took him to a relative’s house nearby who recognised the dog from a poster in the window of Amber Hairdressing and Beauty, Church Street, Pershore, and the reunion was organised.

Mrs Richardson’s daughter, Lynn Thompson, 56, said that where Rags had been over the last three months was a mystery.

She said: “He was only in the garden for a few moments and he didn’t come back. We don’t know what happened. Everybody is saying what a miracle it is. It’s amazing the sequence of events that have got him back. These posters have worked.”

Mrs Thompson said that despite his vanishing act, Rags was in good health.

She said: “He obviously hasn’t been as well fed as he was when he went missing.

He looks older and definitely thinner. He’s not his normal self yet but I don’t think he had been mistreated.

We thought he had disappeared down a rabbit hole or been stolen.”

Lynn Duvall, owner of Amber Hairdressing, said: “We’ve been trying to look out for him but we had honestly given up. Everybody was so overjoyed when we were reunited.”