What have you named your pets?

In My Humble Opinion
21

We got Max when I was 6, he was a schnauzer, and it was the best name we could all agree on. I’ve had goldfish (Spot and Rover), Hermit Crabs (Brutus, Yipiyuk and one who’s name I can’t remember - Brutus ate him early on) Horses named Magic and Zharina (both came named) Guppies named Isabella Bob Fandancer and Ferdinand Fandancer (Fan-tails; could you tell?

I had lots of other critters, from lizards to squirrels, but I can’t remember their names. We have also raised and named upteen litters of kittens (and a few puppies) for the Humane Society.

Really Important Animals:
Wizard, my old dog, the Icelandic Fetchund - she named herself in a dream before I ever found her.

Larque - a Pyrenean Shepherd, a French breed, needed a french name, but I wanted to name her after a bird.

Gavia - Latin for Loon - a black and white border collie.

Corbi - Short for Corbeau Doree - another Pyr Shep. The name means “Golden Raven”

Wren - Short for Mama Marsh Wren - she was a pretty, round small brown kitty when we got her - but she has filled out to be a Godzilla Wren!

Phoebe - Long, thin athletic grey cat.

We can’t get any more animals, we are running out of bird names!

22

I got two goldfish for my 17th birthday. I named them Jack and Diane because John Cougar and I share the birthday, and I had “held onto to 16” as long as I could but changes had come around…I turned 17 early in freshman year in college.

I also had a ferret I named Clyde after the cool dude in Doonesbury.

Then I had two goldfish I named Sprague and Dawley since my co-worker in the animal facility gave them to me.

And if I ever get the pug I want, he’ll be named Pembleton. Backstory (you’ve heard it before but it’s a classic): One of my friends names her pets after TV characters, such as her turtles Xena and Buffy, and her cat Cordelia (after Cordell Walker, Texas Ranger). So my mom says, “I can’t do that! If I ever have a pet, how could I name it ‘Homicide: Life on the Street’?!?”

:smiley: So I said, Well, you could name it Pembleton.

23

Morgana (Black Lab) and Willow (Yellow Lab)

Both Witches.

24

Boots - our first cat when I was a kid. He was black, with white feet.
Tina - She was a siamese, but I don’t know where the name came from. I guess my mother named her.
Maxwell Smart - the stray that showed up after Tina ran away. The kid next door named him after his favorite TV character.
**Gandalf ** - he was grey.
C’Nedra - the first cat I owned as an adult. She was named after the strong-willed red-headed princess in The Belgariad, by David Eddings. She recently passed away at the age of 20.
Miss Meow, aka Missy - She yowled the whole way home from where we got her. It turns out, though, she hardly ever meows, except when in the car.
**Jackson ** - a stray that turned up last year. He just looked like a Jackson to me.

25

Well, although for the past few years I’ve been playing bluegrass almost exclusively (a situation which, incidentally, is about to change dramatically - but that’s a story for another thread) - I spent my college years and my twenties playing reggae, jazz and funk bass.

So my dogs are named Jaco & Marley.

26

Monster is the name of my wife’s cat.

27

**Pepper ** was my first cat as a kid. **Buffy ** was our attack Lhasa.

Now I have an Irish setter/? dog named **Tippy ** (cause the tip of her tail is white.)

In cats we have… **Stella, ** a Persian purebred cat rescued from the pound; she was pre-named. We’re the 3rd family for Lucy, the white kitty, who started life as Duchess but she’s far to scrappy for that name. **Boy ** was the only male cat for so long he just kind of defaulted into his name. **Gatsby ** chose his name - it was the only thing he’d respond to. The dearly departed **Snowball ** and **Baby ** were named for either their color or being the youngest cat in the nuisance.

28

Preface: I have never owned any cats. Sorry, it seems to be a failing around here.

I had a bunch of fish as a kid…don’t remember their names.

A budgie named Charlie.

First dog ever: Jasper.

White-cap pionus parrot: Kyoko

My leopard gecko: Picante

My red-eared slider: Red, or more often, That Little Bastard.

There’ve been others but these are the ones I remember quickly.

29

The first dog we had was named Misty. Why? Because my mom named him. This is me, my mom, and misty. I’m the really short one.

Pets with First Husband:

The next set of pets were cats. Bonzai was named Bonzai because he was a kamikazi kitten - he’d jump and dive into a papasan chair my first husband and I had.

The next cat was Charbonay - he picked her up at a shelter one day when I was at work and said she was the same color as the wine so he named her Charbonay after the wine. I told him it was CHARDONNAY but the damage was done. My first husband was an idiot.

The next cat was Tasha - shelter cat again - I named her and she looked like a “Tasha”.

The cats and me lasted years together.

Pets with last boyfriend I threw out:

Three ferrets - Angus, Malcom, and Mudjack. When he got tossed out, he took them ferrets with him. Good riddance to all four.

Pets with current husband:

First was a puppy - we got her when she was only four weeks old - we named her Eightball (tiny, black, with a white patch on her chest, and when she went in the kitchen for the first time when we brought her home she rolled around on the tile cause she couldn’t get her footing.)

Second was the beast from Save-A-Pet. We named him Baron cause that’s the name they gave him there and he answers to it. I also call him the Doglet of Love - but that embarasses him.

30

Kitty - a white cat that moved in with us about a year after his previous owners left town. They called him Gringo (there was also a black cat named Zorro), but my family wasn’t having any part of that. After endless debates about what we were going to call the new kitty, we realized he was responding to Kitty and that was that.

Sam - a big, goofy, brown and white mutt. The name seemed to fit.

Billy - an orange cat who has a lot to say. His hissing and spitting reminded my parents of Bill the Cat from Bloom County.

Lucy - the first animal I really got to name. My roommate and I had a lot of trouble thinking up a suitable name for the little grey kitty we’d just acquired from the shelter. We started going through character names from our favorite childhood books and finally agreed when we got to Lucy in the Chronicals of Narnia. (She came with the name Buddy. That just didn’t seem right!)

Camille - a big, fluffy, brownish cat with beautiful green eyes. She came with the name. I adopted her via an ad in the newspaper largely because I loved the name.

Charlie - the current cat. He was adopted as a kitten - choosing him from the litter of six little fuzzballs was truly difficult. My husband and I were tossing around names in the car on the way home and he suggested Chuck. I vetoed that, but countered with Charlie, which stuck.

I’m a firm believer that pets should have “people” names, but it looks like I’m in the minority on this one!

31

I am horrible at naming animals and I rarely call them what I name them.

My two cats are officially (i.e. at the vet’s) Sweetie Pie and **Puddin’ ** (extraneous song lyric: *Caaaaandy, I call my sweetheart caaandy, 'cause he’s sweet as caaaandy…) * but I usually just call them Big Guy and the Kitten. Big Guy is 22 pounds and the Kitten is a more svelte 13.

My betta fish that keeps me company at work is officially named Reiji (Reiji is on the right and poor departed Kyousuke is on the left) but I usually just call him Fishy Fish. (I told y’all I was bad at this.)

32

Parakeets:
Orville- because he’ll never fly with those clipped wings.
Pepper- her coloration was white with black spots.

Cockatiels:
Moose- because he was so huge, and his comb looked like he needed to mousse it.
Turtle- because she originally had feathers that looked like tortoise shell, and she was afraid of coming out of her cage.

Dogs:
Flash- the name he came with, from the pound. It fit because he’s so bright, and was a really fast runner.
Two-Tone- because he’s got a weird, two-tone paintjob… and he barks in two different “voices”.
Boo- our little girl. She’s afraid of just about everything.

33

I’m incredibly unoriginal, so I haven’t had a heavy hand in naming the pets that I’ve owned.
Sienna- (dog) Originally named Brandy, but didn’t respond to it very well. We tried out a few names on her, and she responded pretty well to this one. She’s got ears the same color as her name.
Nuku-Nuku- (guinea pig) Japanese approximation of “cuddly wuddly” in English. It worked, as she was a sweet little pigger.
Peebee- (guinea pig) Named after the noises he makes. Could also be short for Piebald or Peanut Butter.
Jay- (guinea pig) Former cagemate of Peebee. He was named to match. Sort of.

34

Sasha (Dog, now deceased) I got her from Animal Rescue. She was 9 months old and already named. I didn’t change the name. I got Sasha when I first moved to Baltimore and didn’t know anyone. She kept me company and was my best buddy up until the day she died.

Scooby (Dog) Named by the Geek Kids. Ended up being a very appropriate name. He looks and acts a lot like Scooby Doo. I’m waiting for “rut ro” to come out of his mouth one of these days.

Molly (Dog) Name by Geek Child #2. Named after “Molly Volley” which is a Peanuts character (she plays tennis with Snoopy). Geek Child #2 is a big Peanuts fan.

Scooby and Molly are brother and sister from the same litter. I don’t think they would know what to do without each other.

Dana (Cat) Named by the Geek Kids. I don’t know why they chose that name. I’m not much of a cat lover, and out of all of the people in the Geek House I am the only one who thinks Dana is annoying. So, of course, out of all the people in the house, Dana is in love with me the most. I’ll never understand cats.

Maria (Cat) Named by the Geek Kids. I don’t know why they chose that name. I personally call her Psycho Kitty. It seems to fit better.

Sheila (Guinea Pig, now deceased) Named by the Geek Kids. I don’t know why they chose that name. I would have preferred something more cutesy, like nashiitashii’s “PeeBee”, or “PigPig” which is another Guinea Pig name I’ve heard in one of these pet threads.

Bogart and Bacall (Parakeets) We inherited these from a friend. They were already named. Our friend must like old movies.

Furball (Rabbit, now deceased) We inherited this from our neighbor, already named. It’s not hard to figure out where the name came from.

All of the Geek Fish had names. Don’t ask me what they were.

Whoopsie (Guinea Pig, now deceased) Named by my sister when we were little. There was a doll out at the same time with the same name. Originally it was supposed to be my sister’s pet, but it didn’t like her and she didn’t like it. Eventually it somehow became my pet.

Oreo (Cat, now deceased) Named by my sister when we were little. The cat was black and white so the name seemed to fit. Originally it was supposed to be my sister’s pet, but she lost interest in it. My mother fed it, and it came to me for attention. I taught it to play fetch. I’ve never known another cat that would fetch.

Snoopy (Dog, now deceased) When I was little we had a beagle. When you have a beagle and you are a Peanuts fan, what else are you going to name it? Snoopy was true to his namesake. He slept on top of his dog house.

35

Whiskers - male cat - named by my stepdaughter due his having enormous whiskers for a kitten.

Ranger - female cat - named by my BIL when he was a teen; he was an ardent Islanders (hockey team) fan and hated the New York Rangers because “they were a bunch of pussies”. Ranger is a “pussy” cat.

Tegan - female dog - named by me because she is a Welsh Corgi, we wanted a Welsh female name, and it happens to be the same name as one of my favorite Dr. Who characters.

PAST PETS:

Sherry - female cat - named by my brother who thought the name sounded French (he was juststrating to learn French).

Hassan - male cat - name by me after watching a Loony Tunes cartoon where some guy kept yelling “Hassan, chop!”

36

Let me see, you’ve seen pictures of them…
Our Eskimo is Kiara, Our Black Lab Mix is Sierra, tortishell cat is Snickers (other name is Snicklefritz), 2 whistle pigs, Choco and Marshmallow, a bearded dragon named “beardy” and a hedgehog named Sonic. :smiley:

37

Childhood cats:

We had a series of cats, all of them black, and most of them didn’t last long because they were all outdoor cats (my mom didn’t like having them in the house). I thought they had cool names when I was little, but looking back I’m kind of mortified by the theme my mom seemed to have going: we had Spade, Spook, Spook II, and Stokely. This was in the late 60s through the mid 70s.

Later on when I got to name the cats we had another black sibling pair named Pharaoh and Nefertiti. I had a tabby named Finnegan, the only cat my mom ever allowed to live in the house–but he only lasted a few days. I think she couldn’t handle the cat indoors so she took him back to where she got him. I love my mom, but I didn’t respect her much with regard to cat ownership.

We also had a Siamese named Mai-Tai.

Adult cats:

Had a long break between childhood and more cats (college, rental places with no-cat clauses, allergic spouse who didn’t get treatment until we bought a house). Our first cat was a black one named Phantom. He didn’t work out–he had severe issues, and the spouse’s allergies flared up bad so we had to find him a new home.

After that, we had Tenshi the Singapura (he came with his name, and we still have him)
Meep (RIP, Meeplet :frowning: ), Russian Blue–we chose her name because she was cute and so was it.
Ozzy, Singapura (named after Ozzy Osbourne or Ozymandias–sometimes we’re not sure which one)
Grace, Russian Blue (named after a character in a book called “The Autobiography of Foudini M. Cat”). Her original name was Aria Bella, and we still call her that sometimes too (“Graciela Aria Bella”).
Sonata (aka Frankie, aka Fred) is Grace’s sister. Her original name fit with the music theme of her litter. Frankie came from “Frankie Sonata,” and Fred came…just because it’s cute and so is Fred.
and finally, Clarice, our tabby girl, aka “Agent Starling,” so named because when we got her she was small and scrappy. Now she’s large and mellow, but the name stuck with her. :slight_smile:

38

Bailey - Dog, named for the beverage and her coat’s similarity in color to it.
Kirin - Dog, Japanese breed (Shiba Inu) named for the Japanese beer (mrsgnu’s favorite) and to continue the naming convention.
Raven - Dog, Kirin’s sister, named by the breeder for her coat color. There conviniently is a brewery with this name so we can ret-con the naming convention here, too.

39

I also had a cockroach named Gregor Samsa and a Betta named Pinochet.

40

We name our birds after Russian Political figures.

Sheep are named by clever puns or dirivites of show-biz folk.

Wallabys same as sheep, with the exception they all play off “Joey” or “Joe”.

Okay. This is all my wife. Secondly, I don’t drink enough.