Your Dogs' Names: How Important?

I was just thinking about my dogs and their names. I have seven dogs, and two rescues right now, and I named NONE of them.

My son named Vanilla and Sequoia, which are both cool names, I think.

Lucky, Pepper, Iggy, Gia, Rocky, Crystal and Jewel came to me with those names already. I can't really say I like any of them, except maybe Gia. I never would have picked them. And a couple of them ... Iggy, Rocky, and Pepper ... totally do not fit the dog and are just dumb, IMO.

But, it seems like once I hear a dog's name, like it or not, that is the dog's name and it sticks forever.

I used to AGONIZE over dog names, before I got into rescue, and named my first three dogs. I would look up names in books, write them down, ask for opinions, etc. Then I got hundreds of pre-named rescue dogs over the next decades, and now it doesn't seem to matter at all what they are named.

What about you? Do you agonize? Would you change a dog's name you didn't like? Or does it really not matter? Just curious ... seems kind of wierd to me that I named none of my dogs. LOL

Names are important to me; I do agonize over naming puppies etc. However, if a dog already came with it's name, unless the name was offensive, or was the same name as one of my other dogs, I don't think I could change it. I've never changed a name in any of the older animals we got, except our husky, Cheeko -- his name was Raja, and my mom hated it (it is a female sounding name) and she loved the name Cheeko. I didn't have a say, and I didn't care, I was 10.

I think about names even when I have nothing to name lol..

I agonize... but it's tolerable. :rolleyes:

Some dogs are more sensitive to certain letters of the alphabet.
I've done this with Puppies mostly.

Just run through the Alphabet, saying the letter, and an additional sound the letter is/can be associated with. Like...

A, Am, Ahh, All
B, Bee, Boo, Baa
P, Pee, Paa, Poo
and so on.

Look for a response. Ears perking, cocking it's head, anything which it reacts to. Speak them slowly, repeat them, and see how it reacts.
Give that a try. Then you may have a starting "letter" (s), then you can expand on that start.

Have a good Day ! :)
S.W.

add me to the list.. agonize..

some I come with a name very soon.. some others take weeks, months and even years.. lol

Names are very important to me as well. Unfortunately i gave in and let others pretty much name my dog's and i am not very fond of their names, well not fond of Elvis' name anyway. Tinny came with her name and i just could not decide on a new name for her lol.

I like all 3 cats names, the older girl Yumi and the youngsters Andy and Montana (Montie, Montie Moo, Moo Goo lol).

We named Sassy after a cat in my favorite movie "Homeward Bound". I loved the name from the start because, well let's be honest, a five year old loves everything about a new puppy. But WOW did it fit her and her personality :eek: It was beyond perfect for her. I didn't agonize over that name.

I guess it depends, because before I got Mikey I thought we were getting a puppy so I picked out names I've always wanted. But when we got Mikey, he knew his name. I don't like people names for dogs, and personally I wouldn't have picked it, but I wouldn't change it now.

I never liked the names the shelter has picked out for dogs. Never, and if I ever adopt a dog I will probably change it. I plan on adopting ex-racers when I actually move out, which will hopefully be in another 2 years or so, so I would probably re-name them something or have a nickname. :p

Names aren't as important to me as they used to be. Well, of course I don't want anything vulgar or just downright mindless, but if they came with a name I just learn to like it after a while. I almost tried to change Sala's name, but now I can't think of her as anything other than just that -- "Sala". I also used to be obsessive over naming every animal in the house, but right now I have three hermit crabs and a handful of fish that don't have names. They don't seem to mind.


Then again, these days I don't have to name animals like I used to. The only "kid" we got this year (aside from the hermits) was Adelaide. My mum and her friend kept insisting we name her Jersey... then Holstein. I kinda didn't want my baby to be named after a cow. :p

If they don't have names, how do you call them?

If you want one certain dog to come to you from another room, or from
across the yard?


Some names just seem to fit certain pups. Like my dog Buddy, he was
a "Buddy" right from the start for me.:)

My Smokey was named after a lot of thought, but the name never seemed
to fit quite right with him, still doesn't really, but I don't know why.:confused:

Maggie, (black Lab mix) has always seemed just right. Sweet, smart and
adorable.:)

I guess I've always thought names are important to me.:)

I don't know really. So I guess it's not that important:)

Simba came to us from his mom so naming him wasn't necessary. He was just Simba.

We never really named Huney. Her name just came when I said "come here honey" and she came so the name stuck.

Bon had his name before we even thought about getting him. Mark said we had and Angus, next dog will be named Bon (from AC/DC) and Bon it was.

With Roxey it was a little tougher. We were driving home with her and were pulling names out of the air. Then the song "Roxanne" came on, Mark said why not name her Roxey. It was better than anything we could think of so Roxey it was:)

I LOVE names!! The only animal we currently have that we did not change the name of is Taggart. That is his kennel name and we liked it. Usually the shelter has such odd and dumb names, but I really liked Taggart.
Zoee was Bonnee, Paizly was Priscilla (by Cathy here on PT, but I wanted something with a "z" in it :rolleyes:) and Jax was Derek.
When we choose names I give suggestions and Bruce tests them out on the animal. He likes to say them and give nick names, like Zo or Paiz. It's really kind of funny, because no matter what the pets name is we always have a MILLION nicknames for them. Paizly is called Poop more often than Paizly. This came from calling her Paizly Poo. Taggart is Tagg-Tagg-Tiggity-Tagg. Zoee is Zo doggie dog and Jax is Jaxter Maxter Baxter. I thought nicknames were supposed to be a shorter name. LOL :D

Sometimes the animal names itself. My mom tried to name (or I did) her dog Sprite because she has a dog named Pepsi (by previous owners). But it just didn't stick. So her name is Little Bit (or commonly said Itta Bit). That came from calling her Little S#$t. I refused to let them call her that!!!!:mad:

I never had to name one dog, and that was Anna. She came with the name, and I disliked her name at first, but it grew on me. I realized, well, there's no other name to give her and stuck with "Anna".. and it fit her. She was a great dog.

When we brought Rosie home, we had a hard time coming up with the right name, it was either, Shiloh, Daisy, or Phoebe. Well, Dad was the one to bring up "Rose" then I thought, huh, it fits right, so I suggested "ie" at the end.

Hank came to us as "Buster" and it would've been a good name for him. Suits him right for the things he gets himself into. ;)

I gave a lot of thought to the names of my pets... and still I did not come up with a name that easily comes to mind for Lil Girl. She is officially "Rosie" but it just did not come naturally to me. Because she is little and a girl, I just started calling her LilGirl. It's a bit of mouthful but she knows her name. Only the vet people call her Rosie.

Before LilGirl, I had a rat terrier named Honey. Now that came naturally to me because she was so sweet. I started to name LilGirl the same name of Honey but I didnt think that would be "right".

Annie my big sweet dog just appeared here; guess someone had thrown her away and I thought of a name for her very easily. I thought... poor dog... an orphan... and I thought of Little Orphan Annie. I've never called her anything but Annie.

As for my cat, Luke has beautiful blue eyes & I remembered how blue Paul Newman's eyes were & he played Luke in a movie... so Luke became cat's name.

Kay in NC

If I fostered, then the names wouldn't matter that much because their stay would be temporary, and they would probably get a new name anyway, but for my dogs, it is important....It has to be a name I like, and it has to fit the dog....We knew we wanted to name a boy dog Boomer, and then when Sooner came along...it just went together since we are such OU fans...We changed Cassie's (our RB dalmatian) name several times....it started with Oreo, then Ditto, then we were jokingly thinking of Tammy Faye because Cassie had spots around her eyes like Tammy Faye's mascara...I honestly don't know how we decided on Cassie....Our neighbor kept calling her Cathy...and I just wanted to shake him and ask him who names a dog CATHY! LOL

We also liked the name Molly but we wanted to save that for a daughter's name! LOL I know more dogs named Molly than I do people!

I had a list of names I wanted for future dogs but I haven't used a single one! haha

Shadow came with her name and we kept it. Micki came with his name too because he has a large mickey mouse shaped spot. Mini was Angel, but being Micki's sister my dad insisted she be called Mini. Kyra went through a lot of names when she was a baby, including baby, puppy, little one, etc. We eventually decided on Kyra after searching on the internet. Jack's original name was Biff, but at the time I didn't like it. I wanted to name him Bonzai but my mom was like, why don't you just name him Jack or something? So I did.