One of the biggest decisions a new dog owner faces is that of selecting a proper and respectable name for the new pup. After having let my 3 year old choose our last dogs name, this time I intend to take the matter into my own hands. As the past few weeks have rolled by I have pondered on the possibilities of a solid dog name. The first thing I had to decide was if I was getting a male or a female. At this point I am leaning largely towards getting a male this time. My wife doesn’t think having a litter or two of our own sounds like much fun at all so a female is out for now. So how do you narrow it down?

Having four children of our own I know the drill for hunting for baby names. So I got my laptop out and began searching for boy names on the internet. After searching and searching I went back to my dutch heritage. I remembered stories that my mother had told me of my great-grandfather Jacobus Vanderpol. He was famous for his efforts in the late 19th century as a dog trainer in Holland. For nearly 30 years he trained police dogs mostly of the German Shepherd variety.

Well, that settled it. A dog trainer in my heritage. I will name my dog Jacobus in honor of that heritage. They say that the best dog names are short and usually one syllable. Although the name Jacobus doesn’t exactly roll of the tongue, Jake sounds pretty good – short and to the point. Jacobus is the dutch version of the name Jacob which is naturally shortened to just Jake.

With any luck and a lot of hard work and consistency Jake will be a dog my great-grandfather would be proud of. This week I get to meet Jake for the first time. They will be 4 weeks old this Thursday and I will get to spend some time examining the litter and picking Jake out from the bunch. I should have some pictures very soon.