Where did you get your dog’s name?

I am not sure where to put this post - it seems like a general area topic

I was sitting here thinking about how I came up with the names for my dogs over my lifetime. Gizmo is named after the little Gremlin. He is a Japanese Chin and he looks and sounds like him.  Paki, also a Japanese Chin, is named after a beautiful place I visited in Hawaii. My pug BennyHaHa just looked like a Benny and after awhile we realized he must be part clown so the HaHa is an added exrtra  

How did you come up with the name for your fury friends?

Hmm, maybe we need a topic for general dog chat? Let me look into that.

As for naming my dogs, their call names are always regular people names. I began keeping dogs before I was married and had children, so I always choose names I would have given my kids. I’ve had Brian, Jack, Amanda, Lainie, Nealie and the list goes on. On a related note, I did recycle one of these names for my youngest daughter who was born after the dog with her name had already passed on. My older children tease Lainie that she was named after a dog, but I really did it because it was my favorite name of all and it was available again, lol. My daughter was going to be “Nealie”, but my husband wasn’t sure he liked it, so I used it for our JRT instead.

Since I’ve been involved in showing dogs, I’ve also had to come up with kennel names. For these, I usually tried to play on one of the parent’s kennel names. If that wasn’t possible, I’d choose a theme for the litter. I used to work closely with a Lhasa breeder that I handled for, and since these dogs are such great movers, we wanted names that reflected that. We chose Cruise for our theme. Cruise the Limit became the name for the male we showed, call name “Cruiser”, and Cruise the Fast Lane became the name for his litter sister that also finished her championship. What was her call name? You guessed it - Lainie!

Our dog Murray was named after the dog on the television show Mad About You. Max is the name of a German Shepherd I had when I was a kid and then I named my English Shepherd Max when I got her.  Kaia is named for the wild wind, because he was wild.  We named our Labrador/Chow cross Pagan because we already had a black cat named Heathen and then Ashes is named Ashes because she looked like she’d rolled in the ash pile.

We got our dog’s name, Khayman, from an Anne Rice novel. He was the old vampire and a very respectable character. Plus, we thought the name sounded cool! We have also heard (not sure if it is true…) that dogs respond well to the long “a” sound, so we wanted a name with that sound in it.

I loved Khayman, Debbie. He was one of my favorite characters along with Pandora. Lestat was just too overdone!

We left it up to the kids to name our Pug - and at the time they were watching Charlie Brown on television. When they learned that the new Pug would be female, they instantly suggested “Lucy”... lol.

We’ve always given our dogs people names too. Right now, we have a Scarlette, Gretchen and Maya. Scarlette is a golden retriever who is very red, especially in the summer. She’s more of a strawberry blonde, really. I love the movie GONE WITH THE WIND and the name just suited her. We named her Scarlette Sadie.

Gretchen is our miniature dachshund. My husband said she needed a good German name. I dubbed her Lady Gretchen of Whitcomb. Lady, because she thinks she’s royalty and Whitcomb after the neighborhood where we lived when we first brought her home.

Maya’s full name is Oh-Mee-a-Maya. My daughter had planned to show her at one point in dog shows and thought that was cute. But we’ve always just called her Maya.

It’s funny how their names just suit them so perfectly. Not sure what I’ll name my next dog. I usually base it on factors like personality and appearance.

Hi Lori, I love Maya’s show name. What kind of dog is she? I used to show a Yorkshire Terrier whose show name was Shakespeare’s Oh Me Oh My, and we called her Mia for short. Your dog’s name made me remember her, and she was a little doll who was so much fun to show.

My dogs came with their names—which saved me the trouble of trying to think of one.

My Rottie is Tango. I don’t know why they named him that and I don’t care. It’s what he answers to (when he feels like it).

Lila is our Dogue de Bordeaux. That is the name she was given my her former owners (I use that term loosely) but the shelter called her Louise. That just sounds like a terrible dog name to me. I also worked with a lady named Louise and I wasn’t too fond of her. So I went back to Lila. She was probably totally confused but she does look at me now when I say her name, so I guess that’s progress.

The cat, Jada, came with her name, too. Just another benefit of getting your pet from a shelter.

Hi Terry,
We named our current dog, Gracie, after Princess Grace of Monaco(Actress Grace Kelly). She has such a lady-like air about her so we gave her a princess’ name. LOL!

My first dog was named Sparkles Pepper because he had such bright sparkling eyes and he had the salt and pepper Schnauzer coat. Yes, this was what a six-year-old thought! He was a fun and playful dog.

We named one of our Poodles, Bantu, after the African tribe. He was a very regal dog who needed a noble name.

So many of our dog names didn’t follow a particular theme. The dog’s personality had a lot to do with the type of name we chose.

Adrienne

Kathleen, I love the fact that you kept the names your pets came with. I truly believe this makes the transition to a new home just a bit easier. There are so many changes they have to get used to, and changing their names would only add to the confusion.

Great question. My pets have people names too. Our Golden Retriever is Scarlette. I love the movie Gone with the Wind and she has a reddish tinge to her fur. The name just seemed to fit. We picked her up from a private breeder, I took one look at her and named her.

Our oldest mini dachshund is Gretchen. My husband named her. He said she was German and needed a good German name. Gretchen just kind of stuck.

The youngest dachshund is Maya. My daughter had planned to show her initially and named her Oh Mee-a Oh Maya with Maya being her nickname. After a few classes aimed at showing her, my daughter quickly decided she didn’t want to do it, because Maya is so stubborn. She’s a sweet dog though.

In the past, we had dogs named Victor and J.R. (Yes, after J.R. Ewing, my husband again).

Hi Lori, I once new a Shih Tzu named Scarlett. She was mahogany red and white, a rare but desirable color back in the day. Her show name was Scarlett O’Hair in honor of the character from Gone with the Wind. I just love a name that plays on words. 

I love the idea of playing on the parent’s lineage when naming the dogs- they do that in horse racing and it always sounds great. For example, Tabasco Cat was a play on the sire’s name, Storm Cat, and the list goes on and on in racing.

I also like people names, but Pharrah was named that because she’s so alert when you speak to her (and she looked reagal like a little Pharroh)- her ears prick up and everything and she gives you her full attention.

Misha was named by my dad, and we kept it because Misha it suited her perfectly; soft and cuddly!

Nikita was named cause she looks like one of those Russian hats like Yuri wore in that movie, can’t remember the name but the theme song is “Somewhere my Love”

Hey Dolly, I remember that movie. It’s Doctor Zhivago, although I’m sure I spelled it wrong. I think using movies and books as a source for naming inspiration is a great way to go. I have three JRTs and one of them was named Olivia for a couple of days. However, the name just wouldn’t stick, and my daughter decided she should be Delilah. This was inspired by the song Hey There Delilah. It actually turned out to be a great fit, but we probably wouldn’t have thought of it if not for the song.