Changing A Dogs Name - Taboo Or Not

[GoldenGirl85]

Our Cattle dog came from the RSPCA with the name Grease....we soon changed it to Jackson and within a week and without even trying to train it, he was answering to it

[minimax]

Most dogs respond to their name and 100000 nicknames, so it really is the humans that have an attachment to their names, not the dogs.

[ellz]

I've heard it is meant to be bad luck to change a horse's name but know of no superstitions surrounding changing dog names. I've done it in the past anyway although not often.

Mind you, most of my dogs have never generally been called by their "real" name unless they are in trouble anyway so it wouldn't really matter if their names were changed :laugh:. For example, Roger is Woger, Dodger, Dogface, Buddy, Snot, Snodge, Snodger Dodger Dog, Boofy, Boofer, Sh!thead, Stripearse and Numbnuts! ;)

[Luke W]

A little (true) story...

A brother and a sister owned a dog. The dog's name was Harry.

The sister gets married, moves in with her husband (the dog stays with the brother) and has a child.

The sister has always loved the name Harry and decides to name her child Harry.

The brother and sister agree to rename the dog "Fella".

Some months pass, and despite the vain attempts by the sister to enforce the dog's new name, the whole family (mother, father, brother, other brother, other sister, brother-in-law...) can't stop calling the dog "Henry". Only now they called the dog "Henry...(pause)...the dog".

In the end, the dog got it's name back and the child had it's name changed by deed-poll.

The moral of the story. It's easier to change a child's name than a dog's. :p

Edited May 4, 2012 by Luke W

[Aidan3]

The moral of the story. It's easier to change a child's name than a dog's. :p

:laugh:

My current dog's name was 'Sid', which sounds exactly like 'Sit' in 'strayen. Fortunately, he didn't know what either 'Sid' or 'Sit' meant, but I wanted him to learn what 'Sit' meant so I changed his name.

[Everythings Shiny]

Thankyou everyone. I think its more my superstitions that i worry about. (Like new shoes on a bench or table) Im very funny like that. I will see how we go. I would love to call her Serenity if i could so will play with it. :) thanks all so much.

My kelpie is Serenity-Jayne. She was a rescue from our pound and the name stuck. I have shortened it to Rini but thats just me :)

[Bubitty]

Name changing is fine!!! My dogs respond to about half a dozen names each!!!

[raineth]

Don't forget that its only a name to us humans. To a dog it's just a signal to gain their attention :)

Think of all the ways we use to gain a dog's attention and they respond to all of them. So they have little trouble with the change.

We changed our dog's name from Diesel to Digby. Diesel just didn't suit him at all!

If I were you I'd just choose my favourite name rather than narrowing your options by trying to choose a similar sounding name :)

congrats on the new addition by the way

Edited May 4, 2012 by raineth

[raineth]

Thankyou everyone. I think its more my superstitions that i worry about. (Like new shoes on a bench or table) Im very funny like that. I will see how we go. I would love to call her Serenity if i could so will play with it. :) thanks all so much.

oops I missed this when I replied before.

I'm not at all superstitious.

But out dog Digby was treated so badly by his first owners and his life with us is pretty good (even if I do say so myself) so I can't think that it had any negative consequences for him!

He is also the most gorgeous dog that would make any owner proud. So nothing bad for us either :)

[janisw]

Thankyou everyone. I think its more my superstitions that i worry about. (Like new shoes on a bench or table) Im very funny like that. I will see how we go. I would love to call her Serenity if i could so will play with it. :) thanks all so much.

My kelpie is Serenity-Jayne. She was a rescue from our pound and the name stuck. I have shortened it to Rini but thats just me :)

I was going to call mine Rini too or Ren. lol. I will do it then. She isnt home yet but hope in a week or so she will be. Will post pics when she comes home. :) Thanks everyone. :)