Bella by name and by nature
Our dogs are diversifying as rapidly as we are, and greyhounds, schnauzers and shih tzus are all on the rise. But clinging on stubbornly at the top is a labrador called Bella.
‘‘It’s incredible, yeah – yell ‘Bella’ [at a dog park or beach] and you’ll honestly get three or four other dogs perk up,’’ Chris Barstead says. His own Bella pricks her ears up at the name. ‘‘Or other people will be calling their dog [Bella] and she’ll be confused.’’
Lindsey Bradfield and her Bella regularly cross paths with another Bella at Narrow Neck beach on Auckland’s North Shore. ‘‘That’s quite funny, calling for your own dog and they both come.’’
Chloe Leuschke had no idea the name was so common when she and husband Edward bestowed it on their Bella as a puppy. ‘‘Even one of the girls at work, her dog, I didn’t realise, was called Bella,’’ Chloe says. ‘‘We realise we’re not that original.’’
They liked the name Isabel when their daughter Charlotte was born last year, ‘‘but we couldn’t call her Isabel, because we had Bella’’. (Now 15 months old, Charlotte shares her name with 232 other New Zealand babies born last year – the most popular name for girls for the second year running.)
Of the 111,000 dogs registered in Auckland, 1659 of them are called Bella – well ahead of second-placed Charlie.
The name seems to cross cultures – there’s a Bella Ngatai, a Bella Zhao and a Bella Kumar all registered in Auckland. It’s the most popular name for dogs in Christchurch, Dunedin, Nelson and Tauranga, too.
But there’s another choice New Zealand dog owners are making that’s even less original than the names they’re giving their pets. Chris, Lindsey, and Chloe’s Bellas (along with the mystery Bella at Narrow Neck) share something else in common: they’re all labradors.
The breed counts for one in eight pure-bred dogs in New Zealand, and it’s likely many of the 212,000 cross-breed dogs around the country have a hefty dose of lab in their genetic makeup too. More unusual breeds – greyhounds, miniature schnauzers, and shih tzus – are climbing up the ranks, but the labrador is still canine king-pin.
There are 41,385 labradors registered in New Zealand – 10,000 more than its nearest rival, the border collie.
Since 2013, they’ve gone from being the most popular dog in 31 of New Zealand’s 67 council districts, to the most popular in 38 districts: all the cities, and an increasing number of smaller towns.
In certain rural areas where border collies, in particular, used to reign – Selwyn, Waimakiriri, South Taranaki – the labradors have leap-frogged to the top. – RNZ