What Does a Kennel Name Tell You?

If a person is of Scandinavian descent, one can tell who his father is by his son's last name. The son of John is Johnson. If a person is from Polish descent one can usually tell by the ending of his name being 'sky'. In the case of a Small Munsterlanders name, one can see who the dog's breeder is and which litter the puppy came from.

There are three basic ways that a Small Munsterlander breeder can select their kennel name. The first way is for the breeder to select a kennel name that describes the area in which the kennel is located or an area that has a strong meaning to them. The Jaegerbakkens kennel name that belongs to Paul and Vibeke Jensen is located on Hunters Ridge Road. Jaeger means hunter and bakkens means hill or ridge. Therefore Jaegerbakkens translates as hunters ridge. Another example is the Wolfsburg Kennel that belongs to Tom and Sharon McDonald. Tom's family owned a Volkswagen dealership in Lincoln and the town of Wolfsburg in Germany is where the Volkswagen was originated.

Imported dogs such as Jeiko vom Jakobsbrunnen are named with their individual name followed by von or vom which translates as from and then the kennel name. The second way to select a kennel name in North America is to follow the same tradition. Bev and Randy Turner have chosen this method with their kennel name. They use the puppy's name and von Turner.

A third way to select a kennel name is to have the breeder's name followed by the puppy's name. An example of this is Marc Gosch uses his last name Gosch with 's (Gosch's) and then the puppy's name.

Many breeders give every puppy in each litter first names beginning with the same letter of the alphabet. The letters are used in sequence by each kennel, from A to Z. This is the way to tell the littermates if the kennel name is the same. Some examples are as follows:

• Jaegerbakkens Fantasia was an SM pup in Jensen's sixth litter.
• Bailey vom Turner is an SM pup in Turner's second litter.
• Gosch's Aspenne is an SM pup in Gosch's first litter

Some breeders give a pup its official name and some allow you to choose if you order your puppy early enough. You may of course "call" your dog whatever you like, irrelevant of its official registered name. When writing to SMCNA about your Small Munsterlander it is advised that you include both its registered and "call" name whenever you write about your dog or enter it in tests, etc. The call name should appear in parenthesis after the registered name.

Breeders can choose the method they like best to name their kennel. Many kennel names have been applied for and registered with North America Versatile Hunting Dog Association (NAVHDA) to make sure it is an original name and that no other person will be able to use another person's kennel name.

Click here for a list of past and current breeders with their kennel names.