The strong bond between people and dogs makes it logical that babies and puppies are named in similar fashion.
Royalty and purebred dogs registered with the American Kennel Club fall into one category. They have a lengthy formal name and an informal call name.
Take Felipe VI, the king of Spain. At birth, he was named Felipe Juan Pablo Alfonso de Todo los Santos. But dollars to doughnuts, the queen and his best bud address him with the diminutive Feli.
Same goes for American Kennel Club dogs. The name of the breeder or kennel goes first to establish the prestige of a lineage. The registered name assures those interested in the ancestry of the canine. But dogs have an everyday call name.
Jan Owen, president of the affiliated Durango Kennel Club, breeds golden retrievers.
Owen’s kennel is Wingwatcher, so each of her dogs has an AKC registered name that begins with Wingwatcher, such as Wingwatcher Good Day Sunshine, which differentiates this dog from a litter mate.
But Good Day Sunshine is a mouthful, so Owen has a call name for the dog, which is Soleil – French for sun.
Dogs rescued from a shelter or pound, however, don’t worry about pride of ancestry. They answer to the name given them at the whim of an owner.
There are widely used names in the dog world – the same as the names given babies which, until recent years, hewed to the classics such as John and Mary.
Veterinarians and pet-care services, from databases of nearly 1 million, found the most popular names for dogs last year were Max, Buddy, Charlie and Rocky for males, and Bella, Daisy, Lucy and Molly for females.
It was a little different at Riverview Animal Hospital in Durango. Hospital manager Karyn Ekola said that overall, dogs treated there go by Molly, Buddy, Maggie, Lucy and Daisy, followed closely by Sadie, Bella, Max, Jake and Charlie.
But not every dog owner in the Durango area follows the pack, as evidenced by a visit last week to the Durango Dog Park.
Tuesday Puls arrived at almost a trot, pulled along by her golden retriever, a black lab and yellow lab on leashes.
“The golden retriever is from New Orleans and was named Emily, but I call her Emmy,” Puls said. “She was the only dog I could afford.”
The black lab was Jambo – hello in Swahili – but Puls and her husband, Matt, changed his name to Lambeau, as in Lambeau Field, the home of the Green Bay Packers’ football team.
“After the Broncos, we’re Green Bay fans,” Puls said.
The yellow lab was named Archer because her husband practices archery and goes bow hunting in Wisconsin in the fall.
Bonnie Hood’s rescue dog is named Morgan.
“My husband was captain of a sports charter boat in Newport Beach, California,” Hood said. “One of their frequent rum drinks is Captain Morgan. I don’t drink, but I still have my captain and my Morgan.”
Sharon White was taking her reservation dog, a pit bull/terrier/Rhodesian ridgeback mix for a walk.
“I didn’t change his name, which was Red, but we call him Moose because he’s so solid,” White said.
Erica Gabreski has a Nova Scotia duck tolling retriever-mix, a mutt, she called him, that answers to Palo.
“We wanted a Hawaiian name that means blue because he has blue eyes,” Gabreski said. “It’s something like palu (actually polû). But we ended up calling him Palo (which means stick in Spanish).
Rod Craig, who supports his work in the arts as a journeyman plumber, named his rescue dog Athena after the Greek goddess of arts and crafts along with wisdom, courage and other attributes.
Craig spoke at length about the Sumerians and then the Greek world where Spartan women held status equal to men.
“Athena reminds me that there is no difference in gender,” Craig said. “But I call her Wingnut, too, because she’s one crazy girl.”
Kim Greer has a rescue dog named Roo, short for kangaroo.
“Look at her hind legs when we walk away,” Greer said. “They look just like a kangaroo.”
Hayley Mallett found Luna, a German shepherd-mix, at the shelter in Aztec.
“She’s named after Luna Lovegood, an animal whisperer in Harry Potter,” Mallett said. “I grew up with Harry Potter.”
