Toby the Puppy tips the beam at around 12, maybe 13 pounds.

He thinks, though, that he is much larger. Much meaner. Much tougher than he is. So, when he encounters another pooch of more impressive proportions, Toby might be inclined to ruff and woof his way toward them.

That is, unless he and the other pooch somehow communicate with each other that says “Hey, it’s all good. Let’s be friends.”

He did so today. Toby’s mother and I took him for his morning stroll through the neighborhood. We encountered a friend of ours who was walking his, um, great Dane. Duke is the Dane’s name. He is nine months of age. He weighs in at around 100 pounds. Our friend says he’s still growing, likely to around 150 pounds.

Toby and Duke hit it off right away. They sniffed each other’s … you know. There was no huffing and puffing. No growling. No snapping. Just good old-fashioned canine fellowship.

Which leads me to believe that dogs must be far more intuitive than we give them credit for being. Toby and Duke both knew the other one is friendly. They surely must have communicated that mutual knowledge to each other.

To be sure, our Toby has other large puppy friends. Our grandpuppy, Madden — aka Mad Dog — and Toby and great pals. They carry on whenever they see each other. We venture to our son and daughter-in-law’s home in Allen and the first order of business is to turn the pooches loose in the back yard where they spend a good bit of time running full tilt around the yard.

We have a niece and nephew who live in Austin. Their puppy, Lucy, also gets along well with Toby the Puppy.

Today, Toby the Puppy expanded his roster of friends by one. It just amazes me to the max how our little guy — who tends to think of himself as a big guy — knows when to display his good manners.