Dutch Shepherd Forum

I hate to do it, but I am considering changing my pups name. Would that be terrible? The name he has is "Ace" which is not working out too well for a few reasons.

#1 I say "Hey" a lot in a deep tone as kind of a "leave it/pay attention"
#2 My older dog is named Jake and he cant seem to tell the difference between his name and "Ace" when giving commands.
#3 For some reason the name "Ace" does not seem "distinct" enough when I call it out as in a recall from a distance.
#4 Like Jake, I also am getting them mixed up calling "Jake" when I mean to say "Ace" and vis verse.

I have a list of names to choose from, One I like is "Rudy" which is much more distinct among a few others. What are your thoughts on the above? Do you find two syllable names to be better? Would I be the worst owner in the world if I changed my pups name before it gets too late? Has anyone ever done such a thing?

Any suggestions for a fantastic names for this beautiful 4 month old boy?

He is sooooooo beautiful !!
well, My girls are Named Thalie and Sadie and "HEY' seems to be working just fine for both of them. I think they believe they have multiple names.

I changed my pups names. Emmy started out as Lauren but we know people named Lauren. Roxanne came to us as Brookie, we just didn't like it. Emmy was 5 months and Roxanne was 3 months. Emmy has "a face for radio" lol so she needed a sweet, pretty name. Roxanne was a flashy girl that was found wandering the streets. (Like the song by The Police)

Go ahead and change it, but it may not be that the name is the problem, they don't sound that much alike to me. J and A are different beginning sounds, and should be enough of a clue as to who you are calling.

I've also called mine by another (sometimes long past) dogs name. Your not really in trouble until you start calling the kids by the dogs names.

I posted a reply to this under your "New Member Announcement" post, but addressing Chris' comment about the names beginning differently, I think they are keying in on the long "a." (Similar thing to when you start saying something that they associate with a particular event, kind of like selective hearing. E.g.: the second a "w" begins a sentence..."Want to go outside?" "Where's your evil baby?" etc., they've heard the key sound and react. You'd have their attention if you'd said in a similar tone, "Where'd all my wine go?" It rouses their attention is all I'm saying...at least in my house.)

Raven wrote:(Similar thing to when you start saying something that they associate with a particular event, kind of like selective hearing. E.g.: the second a "w" begins a sentence..."Want to go outside?" "Where's your evil baby?" etc., they've heard the key sound and react. You'd have their attention if you'd said in a similar tone, "Where'd all my wine go?" It rouses their attention is all I'm saying...at least in my house.)

Ha ha, its so true...reading this reminded me of when we are getting ready to go out somewhere. Sugar sees the signs of us getting ready to go out and she always looks at us with this look on her face, as she wonders if we are taking her or if she is staying. If she is coming with us, we usually say, "ok, lets go" or something like that, but if she is staying home, all she has to do is hear the first word "you" and she turns around and goes right into her bed, 'cause she knows we are going to say "you are staying here". Its pretty hilarious actually.

alspyce wrote: Your not really in trouble until you start calling the kids by the dogs names.

Dosnt everyone do that?

they dont really need names. Everyone usually stops when I yell "HEY", The right creatures come when I grab the leashes, and all 4 of them follow me around the house, Only two lay down when I yell 'Couche", the other two still run around the house. One is sneaking in the garbage, and the other three are looking at me with tattle tale big brown eyes.

Yes, I agree. I thought everyone changed names.
I am bad about it. The last dog I did that to was originally named "Ace" but his owner had changed that to Alexander. I am not the owner, mind you, just his teacher, but could not bring myself to call that huge Fila Baziliero anything but "Lurch" and lo and behold...it stuck, and poor thing listens to it now, even his owner is using it as a nickname.
You really do not need to justify a name change. (If you are the owner, that is) so pick what you like, since it will have to serve you for the next 10 to 15 years.

my guys respond to about 3 different nicknames, you'll be fine with one new name

Stella was called Dutchess when she was brought to the shelter in August.... and who knows what before that.... then we named her Stella when we adopted her (she has started responding to it.... well unless she's squirrel stalking but that's a whole other story) I think changing his name would be worth a shot!

My children have called her all sorts of things... Stell, Stelly, Stelly bellie.... the list goes on :/

ha ha Stelly bellie!

HA, very cute. Ours are Thalie Wally and Sadie pie, Sadie soup when she is bad, and thats alot.

going back to part of original question re ideal type of name, i find a name that begins with a hard sound is best for long distance or urgent calling. ace is difficult there. test your names by yelling them just as you would for a long recall. you feel ridiculous, but it is worth it to get one that will easily give you the impact you need.
for extra emphasis - when that is needed or simply desired for fun - i find having a second name [ think appending a child's middle name when emphasizing extra annoyance or extra good ] or an expanded full name works very well [ randy expanding to randolph / jon to jonathan, for example]. in these 2 examples, if you are going to speak the long form for emphasis, the very first sounds of the first syllable come out of your mouth differently even if you are not raising your voice. the dog automatically knows extra attention is being requested. with this approach, be careful to use for emphasis across a variety of situations, so the long version has neither good nor bad association. mine actually associated it more with a positive surprise about to happen, but that definitely served to get extra attn.

Well, that was about the easiest thing in the world. I changed my pups name from "Ace" to "Vader". Other variations for fun have been "Ace Vader", "Dog Vader" and "Ace-Dog-Vader". Once the decision was made, I started calling him "Ace Vader" then a few minutes later with markers and treats for looking at me when I say "Vader" he understood. He honestly seemed happy about it as if to say "this Vader game is cool. I get a treat and I much prefer this new name". "IT FITS ME" The entire process took about 10 minutes really and he had it down.

Vader was thought of by my son and was my original favorite name when Vader was 8 weeks, but my wife talked me out of it due to the fact that she thought he looked like a "mean dog" and we may not want to perpetuate that image with a "mean name" which kind of made sense at the time. I previously mentioned that "Ace" was not working out for various reasons, so after careful consideration we are all very happy now with the name "Vader" and feel like its perfect for him for several reasons:

#1 Vader is a dutch word meaning Father. This DS pup is sooo vocal. Always telling everyone he meets "what for" with a lot of playful winning, high pitched barking, and "talking" like an over bearing father. Each morning when we get up and let him out of the crate, he spends 2 minutes "talking" in his whinny growly voice about how we should have gotten up earlier or that he was still sleeping or that he is soo happy to finally be let out and what took us so long and on and on.

#2 You have to admit, he does look a bit like Dog/Darth Vader from the original Star Wars with his black mask and probably even more so as he gets bigger. Did I see that a new Star Wars is coming out?

Vader is a great name for a beautiful dog.
Deb

Oh my goodness is he a good looking dog!!! Glad the name change was successful!

I love that puppy stare!!! he is definitely a handsome boy

Cool name for a cool pup...

glad the change was so easy!

Vader is a great name for him, especially when in that "sphinx-pose!"

I had to laugh about Judith's "Lurch" story, reminded me of a pup I fostered back about 12 years ago! (Come to think of it, now, I wonder if he had any DS in him... Will have to dig around and find old photos, post one and see what y'all think... I'd pegged him as a pitbull/greyhound something mix... But that was before I knew about DS.)

We called him Jester, and I'd have kept him, but I won't take on more animals than I can responsibly care for, and I was maxed out with 3 dogs, 2 cats, 2 rats. He ended up being adopted by a roommate of my boyfriend at that time, and she named him "Wilder"

What was really funny, was that since he lived with me for several months, and my boyfriend was over a lot, Wilder got to know him really well. So when he moved into his new home with my boyfriend's roomate and their other roomies... He would always run right up to my bf for lovins 'cuz he knew him well already. My bf would scritchy him and all, but kept saying "what are you doing? You think you're my dog? You're not my dog! You're not my dog! Go to her!" *pointing to roomate* So Wilder began responding to the nickname "Notmydog". Soon the whole house was calling him that! (He did respond to his given name as well, )

All of my critters, large and small, have always had their given names, and then each had about a page's worth of diminutives and nicknames as well.

Thanks to Judith's enlightenment on the slang for Amsterdam, I can see "Mokum" is gonna be a new nickname for Mokume, too!

Mokume is pronounced with 3 syllables, Moh-koo-meh. We decided a good call-name would be "Moko" as we didn't want to use Moku, which is too similar to our other dog, Maiyou. (Pronounced like, My-you). Even though both begin with "M" hopefully (and seemingly working out, thus far,) the hard k in Moko's name, plus ending in an "oh" instead of "oo" sound makes them distinct enough that they aren't getting themselves confused with one another. I've totally started adding "Mokum" the the list though after Judith's revelation on the Dutch connection.