We put a great deal of thought into naming our pets. We want something that will suit them – be that their breed, colour or personality – but it can be difficult to come up with something suitable, especially if they’re young kittens or puppies and you aren’t sure what they’ll look like in adulthood.
Every time we had a new addition to the household, it would initiate a family debate or delegation of a name choice to different people if more that one pet was acquired at once – unless it was a horse, in which case if a horse already has a name, it’s bad luck to change it. Although we would discuss options for “show names” at great length, too.
With so many options, how do you choose?
A dog by any other name…
You can pretty much name a pet anything without sounding too ridiculous. For example, you wouldn’t call your child Twix or Frodo (maybe you would if you were particularly cruel), but both are normal pet names.
You do have the consideration of having to shout a potentially ludicrous name across the park when Dumbledore legs it and forgets all his recall training.
I did want to call one of my cats Schrödinger, before considering that’s quite a mouthful to be shouting out the back door.
For crying out loud
As a vet, you spend a good portion of your day calling pets’ names out loud in the waiting room, if you choose to do that rather than call the owner or surname. I tend to call the animal’s name, unless I’m unsure of the pronunciation or it is something ridiculous or rude.
Luckily, my only experience so far of rude or offensive pet names has been two dogs booked in for neutering that never actually turned up for their admit appointment. While booking surgery time that might have otherwise been allocated to other pets was somewhat annoying, I was quite relieved to be saved the awkward name-calling, and assume the whole thing was just a very odd idea of a prank.
On occasion, calling the animal’s name can cause confusion – particularly if there’s more than one in the waiting room at the same time. Whenever this happens, I inevitably haven’t remembered the surname and have to scuttle back to the computer to confirm which Fluffy is due in next. Once, I even had two pets with the same first name and surname – but, luckily, they were different species.
Naming (un)conventions
Seeing a lot of animals every day exposes you to certain trends – this could be the latest film characters, celebrities or, bizarrely, breed-related names. I’m not sure how it starts, but it seems nearly every boxer is called Lexi, every Jack Russell is Jack or Poppy and every collie is Meg or Skye.
Do all breeders get together and decide to name every dog of that breed the same name? Do people just copy other people in the vicinity with the same breed?
Cats are not immune either – lots of male cats are called Tom (though there’s nothing wrong with that, my favourite childhood cat was a fabulous Thomas), cats with white feet are Socks, black cats are Sooty and, perhaps the name that tempts fate, Lucky for the cat that was rescued or adopted.
Variations on a theme
My favourite names are those that follow a theme within families. For example, my mum’s cats have all had TV character names, although we stopped naming them in matching pairs because one of the pair inevitably outlives the other by a long time – the aforementioned Thomas outlived Jerry by 12 years.
I have, seemingly, started a trend of food and drink with Oreo and Guinness who, if you hadn’t already guessed, are black and white moggies. One of my colleagues names all of her dogs “old lady” names, which is quite unusual, while my favourite client trend is rabbits all named after different types of tea (although I do love tea, so that’s probably why). One of the most unique themes I came across was Egyptian pharaohs or pharaohs wives – definitely no confusion in the waiting room with those.
Sometimes it starts with one name then owners try to stick along the same theme (as with my mum), and sometimes there are backstories as to why people select certain names, which are always interesting to hear.
Ultimately
Do our pets even care? Do they recognise their names or do they just recognise the syllables and our tone of voice?
I certainly think my cats think they both have both names as we always call them together when they’re outside adventuring.
However, I’m sure some pets would be mortified at the names we give them if they really understood, or perhaps they’d like being named after a stupid cartoon cat or a powerful wizard.
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