In the 19th century the French produced the Velo-Dog revolver, a pocket pistol for bicyclists and others who might be attacked by dogs. You can still get ammo for it.
What a dinky little gun, I’d love one of those to turn on the small yappy type dogs that are the bane of any urban walker.
In martial arts, especially when you are talking bladed weapons, it is very common to encounter folks who recommend that you strategically “give up” a limb. Personally, I never found such arguments convincing.
Erm…how about being told to not strike it anywhere when training? I have a 100# German Shepherd and she has never been hit in her life and she is a well-trained, sweet and gentle dog.
Blades are nasty, nasty business, and you do go into it with the idea that yes, you are going to get cut. How badly and where depends on how well you’ve trained or sometimes how well the other guy is trained. The current trend in knife fighting training is to surrender your weak side forearm to damage to protect your vitals. That’s why bladed weapons and leather jackets go so well together.
Come to think of it, a nice thick motorcycle jacket might be appropriate apparel when out strolling around in suspect dog territory.
“The Jam your hand in it’s mouth thing” does actually work pretty well, But I have only tried it with aggressive family dogs, not a big trained killer dog. It’s kind of a wierd instinct as soon as you realize the dog is in mid bite on your hand. You just naturally shove your hand to the back of it’s mouth/throat, and make a fist as hard as you can. It plugs the mouth and the throat, and the dog panics a bit, but cant really do anything, can’t bite, and can’t get away.
However. It still does hurt, and your hand and arm end up scratched pretty good,
I wouldn’t try it on a pit bull or any dog with that kind of jaw strength, cause I’m pretty sure it could smash your hand out of the fist.
I don’t desire to hijack this thread, and I agree that getting cut is a near inevitability in a knife fight. However, in my mind there is a difference between being aware of the possibility of using your off side to deflect strikes to more vital areas IF NEEDED, as opposed to adopting a strategy in which you INTEND to get cut somewhere. Somewhat of a difference, no?
I’ve got a lot of doubts about much of the value of much of what I encountered as “knife fighting” training, but that would be fodder for another thread.
Unless you’re dealing with moles, right? 
I’ve heard that the safest way to hold an attacking dog is to grab its head with both hands right below the ears. You’ll have control of its head so it won’t be able to turn and bite either arm and you can hold it at arms length so it won’t be able to claw you. The trick is to be able to grab it like this in the first place and then to figure out what you’re going to do with it.
My Daddy always said that if it was not worth killin over, it was not worth fightin over. If it was worth killin over, then do it from behind with a pair of .45’s.
This whole thread is a good argument for concealed carry.
The average person who walks around lose dogs without thinking about the dangers is not going to be able to follow any of this advice. They will not be able to do anything but scream and flail about as they will be too terrified and hopped up on adrenaline… If the dog is big or trained to kill at all, they are toast unless maybe trying to protect their child.
Do not try to teach the defense of, but the prevention of getting into the danger in the first place. Soccer Mom is not going to be able to do any of this.
Easiest and least needing any training what so ever is a big walking stick for those that will not learn to avoid the problem or carry a better weapon.
Those in this thread are at least thinking about the problem and so stand a better chance.
Joe & Jane never will…
YMMV
In my personal experience with dogs, the best way to get a dog to stop attacking you would be to order it to attack you.
I’m just glad the OP’s thread title didn’t finish with “…(need answer fast!)”.
Ayuh. My wife, who has been vehemently against handguns all her life, is now considering getting a CHL because of recent dog attacks in our city. About two weeks ago, a loose pit bull attacked a three-year-old boy, seriously wounding him. The report said that, after the child’s grandfather beat the dog into running away, it attacked a doberman and tore its leg off. And earlier this year, two pit bulls attacked some miniature horses belonging to a charity called “Hearts & Hooves” (they take the miniature horses indoors to people who need therapeutic healing, a sort of “lift spirits” thing). Two horses died, and three others were seriously injured. Not to mention the 10 or so goats (show animals, mostly) that dogs have killed in the past two months.
So, now my wife’s afraid to go out walking, especially with our 10-month-old in a stroller. I’m going to get her some professional handgun instruction, to overcome her misgivings, and then we’ll see about the CHL.
Steps:
If an attack dog rushes at you and you are completely unarmed and know its an attack and it is in kill mode:
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Stand tall, firm. Plant feet firmly on the ground and bend knees a little so you DO NOT LOSE BALANCE. Keep your eyes on its eyes - the dog is having a stare down, but you should be locating your target. Take a real deep breath, this is going to be ugly.
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Yell NO! with authority while quickly snatching its collar and kicking out its back legs and smashing it on the head with your fist. If no collar, go for its neck but DO NOT LOSE BALANCE. If necessary, give it an arm to chew on, but move to step 3 very fast.
Note: if it goes for a leg, skip step two.
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Twist the collar and pull up while shoving your index finger as deep into the eye socket as possible, choking it out and gouging eye(s). No collar? Quickly and brutally shove your index finger into an eye socket as deep as possible as fast as you can. DO NOT HESITATE. Do not remove the finger, keep it all the way in.
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When your other hand is free, take the index finger of that hand and shove it into the dogs other eye as deep and as brutal as possible.
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Curl fingers up and back, lodging them deep into its skull, hopefully puncturing its brain.
Bottom line: when fight or flight kicks in, use it to your advantage to get your fingers in the eyes with aggression and speed. Go straight for the eyes without hesitation.
Maybe this should morph into How to kill/disable an attacking zombie?
#1 = Guns, big guns.
So where were you seven years ago when the OP was being attacked by a dog?
These are all good points. Thanks. I’ll be printing this out and keeping it on my person at all times as I’m sure it will come in handy some day.
I just hope when I do have to use it the attacking dog will not only have the good manners to attack me in the prescribed manner but will also give me time to reference my notes in between steps.
A food in a mission is very difficult to stop. Our neighbors pit bull attacked one of our dogs and my wife attempted to break it up. The dog bit her arm. She grabbed a metal pole and stabbed the dog in it’s eye, the pole entering is socket and going in about 3 inches. The damn dog barely even blinked.
About that time I became aware of the situation and grabbed my shotgun. I fired into the air and it took two shots before he broke off the attack and ran. Had I had a clear shot he would have been drt (dead right there). It was really scary to think that this dog continued his attack despite having a pole stuck in it’s eye socket.
So what’s a “food in a mission?” Or is that some sort of bizarre autocorrect typo?