Ever been curious how we have decided the names for the dogs in our program? Have you caught on to a pattern yet? It is all by design, and I’m going to share all the secrets here in this blog post. But first Introductions.
Introduction
For those of you who don’t know me, hi, I’m Lily and I’m one of the owners of Sage House Pups, an Australian Shepherd breeder focused on bringing happier, healthier dogs to your future. We prioritize health, structure, and temperament of all our dogs. We follow the AKC standards for Australian Shepherds and strive to keep this beautiful breed alive and well.
I’ve been breeding since 2024, and got our first dog, Adeline, in 2021. We have successfully whelped 2 litters, 11 puppies, and none have crossed the rainbow bridge in our care, something I’ve learned that is not common with something as unpredictable as Mother Nature. The fact that we have not lost a pup during birth, and the following weeks after is something I take pride in, but also know it will inevitably happen, and it will be an absolutely horrible day when it does. I try not to think about it too much though.
Anyway, I’m two paragraphs in and I’m already off topic. Back on track. I currently have only 1 breeding female in our program, but I have acquired 2 more in 2025 that I am hoping to start breeding in 2027/2028. With those two new additions, a new theme had begun in our household and now it has just stuck.
What’s in the Name?
As you all know, our first dog is named Adeline, or lovingly called – Adi, Adi-tude, and Fatty Adi when she is a week away from giving birth. Some of these sound mean I know, but she loves the nicknames I promise. We also call her Pumpkin, or Pumpkin Spice. From the time she was a puppy, she would snort her opinion at us, or try to get us to play. Which is where Adi-tude came from. She is our sassy, fun, playful Aussie.
Originally we weren’t supposed to get a black tri, I had my heart set on a different litter from the breeder we had selected, and I was set on a red merle. And we planned to name her Juliet, or Jules for short. (We are absolutely huge on nicknames in this house. Every single puppy will have gone home with at least 5 nicknames based off of their litter name, or the new name you had chosen if we found out before the pup went home.)
Clearly Jules was not in the cards for us because we ended up with Adi. When her she was born, the breeder gave us the option to pick on from that litter, and at first I had said no. Adi caught my eye, but I was set in stone. But one thing about me, I am stubborn, very stubborn, just ask my husband, but I am also open minded. I am open to changing my mind, accepting new information, I just sometimes I have to sit with it. And this was one of those cases. We hadn’t set a clear path yet for our program and technically, all the doors were open to us. So when Adi’s 1 day old photo kept popping up every single time I opened Facebook, my mind and heart began to change. She called to me from that photo, and we jumped. Of course Jules did not fit her personality or the way she looked, so then began the hunt for the perfect name.
We settled on an old English vibe. That included all of her extra words. Release word, kennel name, and her release to eat (this is an okay to eat something that has dropped on the floor, that way in case a pill gets dropped by accident, she won’t immediately go for it.), etc. Some of her tricks have had to do with an almost Victorian, old England theme. And we moved on from there.
And Then There Were Three
We didn’t have intentions of naming our next dog a B name. It just happened. We went over every name under the sun trying to name Belle, but we could not agree on anything. Finally we settled on Bluebell, but I wanted to change the name just slightly and I wanted to be able to just call her Belle, after the Disney Princess Belle (remember, we are big on nicknames and this dog has a lot.) so I tweaked the spelling and it was settled. Our Blue Belle came home with us the summer of 2025, and that was the most wild summer of our life. I don’t know if it was just the fact that we hadn’t had a puppy in so long, or that Belle just has more energy than what we are used to. She definitely has had quite of bit of energy as a puppy. As she has gotten older she has mellowed, but still requires regular exercise.
This dog has been one of the silliest, strangest dogs I have ever known. She has a very unique personality, and walks to beat of her own drum. She is by far the dog with the most nicknames in our household. Those names include, but are not limited to, and will probably be added to: Belle-ony, Belle-gadi, doe-Belle, jelly-Belly, baby Belle, Belle-boney, and many more. Unrelated to her name, she is also known as Bamboni.
When we introduced our new puppy to our friends, one of them commented “So are you naming them in alphabetical order?”. Alex and I looked at each other and the idea sparked. We were going to name every dog in our household in Alphabetical order.
When Plans Change
Our next dog was planned to be a male. No not the one where the deal fell through. I may or may not share a full post on that drama. But we had planned to get a male puppy sometime the beginning of 2026, and the name was going to be Caspian. If you haven’t noticed, we already have a C name now among our program, and we still do not have a male. I’ll explain more of what happened, and what changed, and why a little later. Back to our C named puppy.
When we bred Adi and Summit, we had no intentions of holding a puppy back. We kind of assumed we just wouldn’t hold a puppy back from Adi, or perhaps maybe it would be our male. We had our eye on Jack for a few weeks going back and forth on whether to hold him back for the program or not. In the end we decided not to.
But one pup wiggled their way into our hearts. Calida, at the time named Sally, was beautiful. We loved her coat, and her personality. She so far has been one of the easiest puppies to raise. So then became our problem. We couldn’t have a Caspian if we had a C girl name. That wouldn’t make any sense.
That was when Zephyr presented himself.
Boy Oh Boy
While the first Zephyr fell through due to various reasons, we fell in love with the name and got the idea to name our male dogs in Reverse Alphabetical Order. So while we still at this very moment are not sure if our next dog will be named Zephyr (although we currently are waiting on a genetic test for a male puppy), we do know it will be a Z name.
We have played with a couple of Z names, and we have settled on a few, and we will see what happens. I may actually know our plan by the time I post this, but that just means you’ll have to read the new post to find out what happened. Sorry for the cliff hanger.
What About The Partner Homes?
I know this might take away some of the fun for those who are looking at joining the Partner Program, but we adored this idea so much, that we are hoping those who join the program will think so too. We are currently looking for a Partner Home for Calida, and her name is staying. All the dogs in our Program, whether they reside with us or in Partner Homes, will be prenamed. We have decided that to make sure we are picking the best of our pups, we are hanging on to them until they are 16 weeks old. We will be doing all of their puppy shots, microchipping, everything. As well as building the foundation for training, confidence, and making sure they are potty trained, and crate trained. This takes away a lot of the work a Partner Home needs to do, and allows them to enjoy the fun parts of owning a dog/puppy. When the dog is spayed/neutered when they retire, the family is welcome to rename them.
Each Program has their own quirks, and we have decided this is one of them. I know a lot of people will have their opinions about this, and not all of those opinions are positive. That is okay. We are excited, and the dogs are all cared for, happy, and healthy, and that is what matters.
What’s Next?
While we do have our next couple girl names picked out, and are playing around with a couple of the boy names, we are going to keep them a secret for now. Mainly because those names could change at a moments notice and a new puppy comes into our lives and the name we had previously picked out doesn’t fit. Life is unpredictable, so we have to be flexible. I will update you all soon when we have the results of the genetic test.
In the meantime, I’d love to know your stories of how your pet came to have their name. Comment below and let me know!
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