My dog can bite off your finger.

Wow, what a title. Just to catch everyone up, I'm talking about Talos here. Talos the pug. Kira could do it too, but people are less surprised by a terrier mix's ability to bite.

Intimidated yet?

Equally, no one would be surprised if I made that comment about a large dog, like a boerboel or a german shepherd dog. But I've watched my pug systematically work her way right through a pork shoulder bone, leaving only a tiny stump of the thickest part. Gruesome, sure, but what I'm hoping to illustrate here is that pork bones and human bones are nearly identical in size and density. Chicken feet are not that different from my fingers, and those don't even need a systematic approach.

She could bite my finger off of my hand.

Now why does this matter?

Am I warning everyone out there about my massively dangerous pug? No. The thought that Talos is an aggressive dog is laughable. The odds that she'd ever bite anyone is pretty much zero. Even Kira, who guards resources, is extremely unlikely to be labelled a dangerous dog by anyone.

But the fact remains that my dog could do this. And if my small pug, with her tiny teeth and tiny jaws can do this, every dog can do this.

That's why I chose such a dramatic title. All dogs are capable of doing serious damage with their jaws. The fact that they don't, given that we barely teach them the skills they need to navigate their lives, barely give them enough time and attention, and probably the worst offence, barely understand their body language is an absolute testament to their patience and endurance. That said, statistically 50% of kids in the US will be bitten by dogs before they're 12. Half of all kids - and guys, this is not a case of Americans being daft. It's not so different in the UK, one in six hospital admissions of kids are due to dog bites. Here, our stats are not so nicely collated in easy to digest articles (google the two mentioned above and you'll see what I mean), but I feel pretty safe in saying they're much the same.

My dogs are good dogs, safe dogs, family dogs. But almost all dog bites come from good dogs, safe dogs, family dogs (luckily these bites are almost always very minor - fatal bites, by contrast, tend to come from dogs kept in the yard or on a chain). I know the power of those jaws, and I know that humans generally suck about being sensible with dogs. Especially little humans, who have even smaller fingers than me, and tend to keep their faces at dog's eye level too. We have to do more to protect people, but especially kids, from dog bites. We owe it to our dogs to not put them in a position where they finally choose to use their teeth, and we owe it to everyone else out there to keep our dogs out of such a situation.

With that in mind, I want to make some commitments.

1. I commit to only letting my dogs around kids if I am fully capable of supervising them.
2. I commit to allowing my dogs a safe, secure space that they can go hide in should they need to, where no one will bother them, not even me.
3. I commit to learning to read, and to respecting my dog's body language. This includes removing them from a situation where they are scared or overwhelmed, even if it ends my fun.

Join me?