Just collected our border collie puppy and hope to think of a suitable name for him...hopefully easier as we assess his personality.

That said, a French acquaintance has just told us that the French have an alphabetic / year requirement for dog names; and for 2012 it must start with "H". Neither the vet (who wants us to let him know the name we choose) or the vendor told us of this, so can we assume this requirement is purely for the formal names of "LOF", which we assume is French Kennel Club/pedigree, dogs?

Slightly worried as we do know the vendor's daughter called this puppy "Honda". He is clearly border collie, & we've seen the parents, both clearly border collie so possibly he is "pure race", but neither parent is "LOF".

So; do we need to think hard about a name beginning with "H" or are we OK to pick any name?

http://wamiz.com/chiens/nom-chien

This explains it. Obviously you can call it anything you like en famille as it were.

Hi

We have 3 border collies, all got here in France (great dogs!) and we named them as we wanted to.  The doing it with a letter for each year is not a rule.

You can call the dog whatever name you choose, but the LOF registered name does have to start with the letter of the year.

(Ex: the dog could be called honda on the paperwork, but you could call it bob!)

For non lof dogs, any name goes!

Thanks all for the helpful replies. Mind you I'm not sure that having to start the name with a fixed letter wouldn't actually be a good idea...might have helped to concentrate the mind.

Carole.H; yes they're great dogs, wouldn't have any other. True you need to devote a lot of time to them, but it's repaid in spades. Training is such a delight...in less than one day he has learnt "come" and "be clean".

I have not heard of this requirement, but if true, it is the equivalent of the kennel name on a UK dog pedigree.