All About Animals discussion

I love the blog "The Kitchn". Had to pass on this great blog on looking at your wine cellar when naming your dog (or cat, I suppose): http://www.thekitchn.com/guiness-pino...

Thanks for the link. This would make a good thread on how you named your pet.

I don't know if we're that creative in this family. We've had a Cinder, Taz (short for Tasmanian Devil Dog), Sierra, Misty, Trouble, Yukon, Berkeley for dogs in this family.

When we did have cats, my dad named them. One was named Zyra for the planet that crashes into earth in When Worlds Collide one of my dad's favorite movies.

I guess we're lucky we never had any Godzillas or Ghidorahs.

I think we are on and off when it comes to creative pet names. So far I have had the following:

Molly Fish (the ones with the Mickey mouse marking on their tails): Several generations of these all of which were called either Mickey or Minnie.

Platty? or Platy? Fish (the ones that look like Dalmatians with their spots.): Mine was a playful and fearless one called Perdita after Perdita from the cartoon version of 101 Dalmatians. My sister had one called Jewel which was a big bully to my fish. I will admit that I was happy when her fish died before mine.

We had shiny yellow and orange fish. The yellow was called Lightning and the orange was called Thunder.

My current Goldfish was won at a Halloween carnival 12 years ago and is called Pumpkin. She swims upside down now but otherwise eats and acts normally so I would say she is doing well for being 12 years old.

I won a really small orange goldfish and a larger silver one at the same carnival a few years ago and named the orange one Sunny and the Silver one...Silver.

I bought a speckled gray and brown colored goldfish that I liked a while later and called it Speckle.

Later I got another fish of the same type and coloring which I named Sea Star after Sea Star in the book: Sea Star: Orphan of Chincoteague which I had just finished reading not long before. Sea Star turned out to be a bit of a problem fish with a habit of jumping out of water. I had to always make sure I had something on top of my open fishbowl to keep this fish in it.

Then I had an African Cichlid that I called Trouble. Trouble really lived up to her name. First off the fish was a bit of a bully to the other two fish I had at the time which resulted in my having to buy a second fish tank for my room. Then the fish wouldn't eat the food that was made for African Cichlids. This fish wanted the flakes so I had to go looking for a flaked form of her food. Finally, this tank that she was in now was only a one gallon tank with one decoration yet one day I look in the tank and see no fish and no sign of a fish. The tank had a lid so the fish couldn't have jumped out. Most people say watching fish is relaxing...I have yet to experience this. I always seem to end up with the opposite experience. Anyway a few minutes later Trouble came tunneling out from under her tank decoration and it became a regular thing to see her go under and come back out again. Oftentimes she came out with a stone in her mouth and would drop in outside the decoration before going back under. Surprisingly the fish died naturally not of being squished by anything.

My first dog was a Toy Poodle by the name of CeJaye. The C in his name stood for Catherine (my sister) and the J in the name stood for Jennifer (me).

My current dog is a Chihuahua by the name of Taco. I didn't name him but I know his previous owner named him Taco because he was a Chihuahua like the Taco Bell dog. This name became a small problem when he first became my dog as I ate Taco's almost every week. If anyone asked what I wanted to eat I would say Taco. Taco knew both the words eat and Taco and he would look so confused when he would hear these words in that order.

My first rabbit, a Dutch, was named Friendly because I just wanted my bunny to be a friend.

My second rabbit and first rescue pet, a Dutch mix by the name or Oreo was almost called Skunk but she ended up getting to keep her shelter given name.

My more recent rabbit adoption consisted of the bunnies Chibi and Kojikaki. Chibi got his name based on two characters; the little dragon hero from the Dragon Drive book series and the wolf pup from the Okamiden video game. Both were named Chibi which means small. Kojikaki's naming took a bit more work but her name in English can be both Fawnheart and Fawnspirit. She got her name based off the way the warrior cats are named in Erin Hunter's Warriors book series.

Lastly, I had a self named bird called Peekablue. The short story here is that my grandma told the bird to chirp when she heard a name she liked and she didn't respond to anything until, as a joke, my mom said Peekablue and the bird chirped.

We had a dog named Glue one time, because he showed up at our house and just stuck. We couldn't get rid of him! LOL He turned out to be a great dog so we ended up being glad he was so determined to stay.

I have two horses named after songs…

I also have a cat who I was so totally blank on naming. He spotted black and white so I just put Spots in to google translate until I came up with a translation I liked! His name in Paikka which was the Finnish translation.

I wrote this column a while back:


What's in a name anyway?

A rose is a rose is a rose, right? What ever happened to all the Rovers and Rustys and Chiefs and Fidos and Spots and Patches and Kings of yesteryear? Now our dogs are named Hannah and Sam and, . . . ahem! - Cuddles. (Well, better to be a Cuddles than a Puddles.)

According to BARk magazine (http://www.thebark.com/) which writes that according to petfinder.com, the top ten canine names of 2011 were mostly human (why am I not surprised?) and included Max, Daisy, Bella, Lucy, Molly, Charlie, Jack, and Sadie, rounded out by two monikers that can belong to either humans or canines - Buddy and Rocky.

Of course you know that there are only three possible names for a dog: Beethoven, so you can say, "Roll over, Beethoven!"; Achilles so you can say "Achilles! Heel!"; and - Johann Sebastian Barque.

In my training classes, I tend to call all the dogs, Sweetie Pie (and call them all 'hims'). Imagine my surprise when one little one WAS actually named Sweetie Pie! Fortunately that class also had a Helix whose human was a geneticist like me. At last someone who could speak my language!

And I hear Christian Slater doesn’t have a fish called Wanda but does have a dog called Fish! (8/6/12)

One of the families I dogsit for in Columbia even has a pooch named Poochie (how original is that?), probably named by the former child who is now a teen. . . . a real Poochie ‘Moochie.’

In the world of show dogs (think Westminster Dog Show in Madison Square Garden, every February), one names a dog several times, the first of which being the kennel name (e.g., Lazyriver) followed by the dog name (Star in the Skye) for Lazyriver Star in the Skye, or Skylar/Skye for short, the call name, which should not rhyme with 'no' or 'sit' or 'stay' or 'come' or 'heel' or 'go potty' . . . . for obvious reasons.

As a matter of fact, the American Kennel Club (AKC) actually has a list of rules for naming dogs (didn't Nazi Germany, too?), one of which is that a name cannot be more than 30 characters long. The AKC must also approve each name and no more than 37 dogs of the same breed can share the same name. But you can give your dog a number instead of a name!

Having said all that, I want three more labs and a golden retriever since I already have the names picked out. My black labrador retriever will be called Goldie, my yellow lab will be named Spot, my chocolate lab will be Whitey and I will call my golden retriever, Blackie (or maybe Labbie). That way they will never answer to anyone else! (I can always pretend they aren't mine, too!).

I might also get a male dog (a dog) and name him Lassie, and get a female dog (a bitch) and name her Laddie. But my favorite name for a dog will forever be Deogie (D-O-G) or just, "Hey You! You in the Fur Coat!"

On the other hand, I also want a Rottweiler (a Rottie) whom I shall call Sweetums (I once had a teddy bear that I called CocoaButterHoneyBrownSugarTeddyBear) and a pit bull named Princess who shall always wear a pink collar. Except when she's wearing flowers or ribbons-and-bows.

My best buddy had a Cutie and a Chewy – easier to identify who is the canine in that family.

Or maybe I'll get a Yorkie and name her Bear! After all, aren't we programmed to live up to our names? (Which is why I changed mine! Unfortunately, people often think Skye is the dog partner of this human-canine team.)

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