Nation's Leading Pet Insurer Reveals Most Popular Dog and Cat Names for 2005

PR Newswire ^ | December, 2005

[A knight without armor]

I petted my first pit bull last Sunday morning on the way back from the store. This man came along with a gray pit bull on this big chain leash and this inward pointy choke collar but it was just bopping along. I chatted with him and asked if I could pet it. It was solid as a rock but soft and warm as moleskin. I could feel it was all power. All went well. I came home with my arm still attached. His name is Yatzee. I'd never seen a pit bull in person before, just on TV and photographs.

[rdb3]

Out of all the breeds I've owned, my Presa is by far the best behaved. His temperment is outstanding.

[teenyelliott]

Mine is huge. Her dad weighed 120. Tons of pics of her on my profile page.

I had a lab about twenty years ago that only weighed about 55 lbs. I think it is pretty rare to get a female as big as mine. I'm happy about it, though.

[PRND21]

What happened to Fluffy and Boots?

They got zotted.

[Dog Gone]

Well, okay, if she's 11 1/2 it's probably a little late to be giving her a new name, especially if the current one fits. But Napoleon Mouseapart is really a good name for a cat, if you're ever in the market.

[HIDEK6]

L. O. L.

You owe me a new keyboard.

[Springman]

IMHO, pit bulls get a very bad rap.

My father worked w/a guy in the 80's, his house caught fire, his pit bull woke them up and saved the family.

My brother's buddy got one of her pups, ever good dog, never hurt anyone, loved kids.

Then my brother got the granddaughter, dumbest and sweetest dog on the plant; took Sheba eight years to know she could jump a 4' fence. Also she would knock you down to lick your face.

People matter more than a dogs breed on how they behave, that's my two cents!!!

[technochick99]

I once knew a guy whose cat's name was "Kitler," not that I am recommending it. I had a turtle named Fluffy once.

Fluffy! Too funny!!

I've often thought of naming my next cat Chairman Meow Zedong, but it would offend me too much politcally.

[Colonel Kangaroo]

I know a cat named "Vomit". With what she does to the carpet, she's earned the name.

[AnAmericanMother]

Oh, I'm not going to get another show dog! In fact, I'm writing Ms. Howley about my next one, because I like what I see in my girl. I understand that Rascal isn't throwing as good pups as expected, so I'm going to go back directly to her - and see if she has another small one. (You can see how tiny my girl is in post 118. She was looking for more weave poles because usually there are 12, but a lot of AKC judges only use 6!)

At least my dog's sire's line had some performance titles (including a JH), so you know they weren't brain dead (and at least I was careful to meet her parents and grandparents). But I've seen plenty of conformation Labs that were so dumb, you wonder how they remember to breathe. Fortunately mine is smart as a whip (TOO smart - she can open doors, cabinets, and tupperware), she loves to swim and even to swim in the surf (we have a picture of her surfing down the front of a good sized breaker with a bumper in her mouth) and she's very birdy and gun staunch, so her show blood did her no harm. She's probably not as keen as a pure field dog would be, but she's good enough for an amateur like me. I went to an Evan Graham seminar this past fall, and he used her as a guinea pig for a couple of training exercises, and opined that she was a very sensitive and intelligent dog. (He also advised me just to keep the collar no higher than a medium 1 on her after we got her conditioned -- that's all she needs and I use it sparingly.)

I'm not serious enough to get into the field trial biz, UKC hunt tests are more laid back than the AKC and just about right for a dog and handler who are coming to the game late and wet behind the ears (friend of mine in our hunt club says that AKC judges take positive pleasure in busting people at the JH level - of course his dog is SH and winding up her Finished title in UKC, so what does HE have to worry about? She runs agility too (with his wife) and is a splendid dog, the same height as my Shelley but longer in the back and about 55 pounds.)

I've got a lot of respect for folks who work the swamp collies. We've got a couple of Golden fans in our club, one very serious trainer is taking her third Golden to the Grand . . . and you're right, that's doing things the hard way. A couple of Chessies (great dogs) and Flat Coats (great once they settle down) in our club, too.

One of the funniest bits I ever read in Golden Retriever News (I subscribe because of the great performance training and veterinary articles) was written by a couple of conformation gals who showed up at a hunt club training session with their perfectly coiffed Goldens . . . " . . . everybody was driving pickup trucks and wearing camouflage, and their dogs . . . their dogs had whiskers!."

[AnAmericanMother]

The one place it isn't safe to check is the freezer of a serious retriever fanatic.

By golly, you speak the truth!

My kids were totally grossed out when I shoved four mallard drakes into the freezer next to the ice cream (they weren't so grossed out as not to eat the ice cream though!) I DO wrap them in newspaper first, so unless one foot or a bill was sticking out my guests probably wouldn't notice anything when they went for the ice cubes.

. . . and I was so surprised this morning! I got my very own Rem 870 AND a shotshell reloader - I had no idea! I racked it, and my Lab dashed to heel and sat, scanning the living room ceiling for stray birds . . . she was very disappointed when I told her, "No Bird."

[AnAmericanMother]

Oh, my dog has embarassed the bejasus out of me a couple of times . . . three perfect retrieves, and on the last one she stopped about 40 yards from the line and began tossing the bird up in the air and catching it. She didn't damage it any, but she wanted to keep it to play with. I wanted to sink through the ground . . .

. . . but I don't get mad at my dog, 99 times out of 100 it's something I did or failed to do in training (I did carry away THAT much from agility to apply in retrieving!) When I was younger, I was a very cutthroat competitor (hunter-jumper horse shows and fencing) but I have mellowed a good deal with age. I started too late and am too inexperienced to take this dog to Grand or anything like that . . . we are just going to hunt with our friends and go as far up the food chain in UKC as we can reasonably go, probably Seasoned, maybe put a JH on her but I don't think we'll get much further than that.

It really is astonishing how many "hunting" dogs there are out there with no training to speak of. My girl is barely ready for JH and not ready for Seasoned yet, but she is so much better trained and better behaved than your average dog. Kind of scary thought.

[AnAmericanMother]

Talk about laughing so hard you can't see to type!

I can just SEE a Pit doing test dog . . . OMG! What a screamer! (and you're right, the beginners would have to be REALLY embarassed.)

[bannie]

My favorites:

"Hey, You!"

and

"You, Too"

[bannie]

Don't pet too many of 'em; or you'll be a Knight without Arms.

;-)