Naming the Business or Kennel

Good, apt names to fit your kennels and your dogs are important because they attract people to kennels and dogs. I could give many examples, but through this volume I want to avoid references to the specific kennels. I could quote many shining examples and many that are deplorably dull, but to avoid been charged with boosting my friends and damning my enemies, it is better that I should omit mentioning names.

Your kennel name and dogs’ names should mean something and should not be lightly chosen. The Kennel Club will, on the correct for – “Application for the registration of Prefix/ affix” – and on the payment of a fee, grant applications for approved prefix or affixes which can constitute part of a dog’s name and which ‘cannot be used for registration by any other than the person who, for the time being is entitled under a subsisting grant of Committee’. An annual maintenance fee is payable for a prefix or affix, but lifelong use of it may be granted, if you have held it for number of years, by paying a compounding fee. Such payment, of course, will show a considerable saving in money over a period of years.

Anyone who plans to breed several litters, and expects to do so for a few years, should apply for a prefix at the outset. It can happen that with the beginners’ luck a flyer is bred in the first litter. If your kennel name is not on this one, valuable publicity is lost.

When selecting a prefix, the names of countries, large towns, or titles, a letter or number, or an adjective or noun appropriate to the name of the dog is not permissible. The Kennel Club calendar and Stud Book, which is published annually, list all the words in use for this purpose, and it will save time if, before you select and apply for a word, you buy or borrow this book and check that the word you want or one very like it, is not already in use.

Made up words can be very good, as are those with a family, local or topical connections. If you propose to breed hounds, a prefix such as mandarin would not be very apt, nor would a name with a South American Flavor be appropriate if you are breeding Finnish Spitz or Schnauzers.

If you select a prefix to fix a greed you begin to work with for example, an Eastern name for Salukis, and then you add Mastiff to your kennel, it is best to apply for a separate prefix to use with the next breed. Alternatively, if at the outset you consider the possibility of keeping several breeds later on, choose a word with a wide application.

When registering a dog, you are always asked for a selection of names, for no two dogs can have the same name; also, prefix and name must never add up to more than twenty four letters.

In selecting the names you want after the prefix, the choice is much wider, but again they should apt. For example, a traditional name such as Ranter or Workman is far better for hound than hunts by scent than something like Mama’s Babe or Oriental Star.

With a little ingenuity common English names can be spelled somewhat in the way of the language of the country of origin – thus, for an Afghan, Kim could be spelled Khymm.

If you are breeding a number of litters you can name the alphabetically with “A” for your first litter, “B” for the second litter and so on. Variations of this system are to name each litter from a different set of story book characters, or choose a color for each litter – as Yellow Hammer, Yellow Coat, Yellow Banner. Thought and ingebuity can provide many amusing, suitable and more sealable combinations. A journey to a Dog Show can often be shortened if you are in company with a friend and play at inventing names for a future litter.

(Douglas Appleton, The Dog Business Book)