This is not a catastrophe, either, even though it is about choking.

Amy Welborn wants to know,

…why do you think the mouth is a baby’s primary sensory organ?

… it seems so unsafe, on the face of it. The only thing I can figure is that it ensures the baby will get some kind of food even if it’s neglected, as it shoves everything into its mouth. But that still doesn’t seem to compensate for the danger factor.

In a "natural" environment the hazards of, say, choking would be reduced. There are no such things as coins or marbles—slippery little trachea-plugging spheres and discs that they are—in the wild. Nor are there sliced-up apple chunks. Few foods (grapes are the only example I can think of, and wild ones, of course, are tiny) are actually choking hazards when presented whole, unprocessed, uncut.

Most rocks of the right size, that is, are rough and textured and unlikely to be choked on if a baby decides to roll it around in his mouth.

Healthy babies that are allowed to stick the normal sorts of things (not marbles) in their mouths develop a pretty good gag reflex. Remember, gagging isn’t choking. A baby who gags on a rock, stick, or leaf isn’t in any danger, even if it *looks* scary. That’s just part of the oral exploratory process.

And poison isn’t likely to be a problem either, as in the wild most poisonous substances are terribly bitter.

The point is only that the serious hazards we associate with babies sticking stuff in their mouths are mainly created by our modern life, to which evolution has not had a chance to catch up.

It helps to know the difference between what gagging looks like and what choking looks like.  After H., who used to work in a day care, explained that to me (and demonstrated, which was mildly amusing—she lay down on the grass and waved her arms and legs to show me ‘choking baby’)—I got a lot more relaxed about babies mouthing things.

My babies have gagged on lots of stuff.  I only ever saw one choking once (on a slice of apple)—he was sitting on the floor flailing his arms in a panic—and he had brought it up by the time I got to him. 

If I know that what he’ s just stuck in his mouth is a marble or a coin, though, I tend to do the Face-Down Finger Sweep.  Pick him up, hold him face down (gravity should be your friend, not your enemy—contrary to what you might think, you do not need to see what you are doing), pry the jaws open and do one sweep across the tongue with the index finger.