Hiking with your dog in Utah
Utah has some amazing landscapes and seemingly endless outdoor opportunities. It’s a great place to adventure with your dog. Nothing is better than enjoying a beautiful hike with your furry best friend. There are many sought after hiking trails conveniently close to Salt Lake and these trails have become more and more popular over the years. The increase in foot traffic has also brought with it an increase of dog traffic.
If you have a dog who can not handle off leash dogs appearing out of nowhere, getting into their personal space, rude behavior, ignoring cut off signals, or following them on the trail, then unfortunately many of these more convenient trails are not for your dog. The amount of work it would take to ready them for the type of environment these trails have become is staggering, impractical, and due to the unpredictable and uncontrollable nature of others and their dogs, it’s not guaranteed to work out in the end. You and your dog could do everything just right and still have a poor outcome based on who you run into.
Even if the location has on leash days, you must always assume that you will encounter off leash dogs. You can not count on other dog owners to be following the rules or paying attention. You can not count on other dog owners to leash up their dog if you ask, or to be able to control their dog at all.
Only dogs who are truly sociable and dog-tolerant are fit for these high trafficked hiking trails. It is a frustrating and unfortunate reality. I too would love to use those trails. I even have a well trained dog- tolerant dog but I will not put my dog in an unpredictable and uncontrollable environment, and many of my colleagues feel the same about their personal dogs. Repeatedly exposing your dog to these chaotic environments could potentially lead your dog-tolerant dog down the path to becoming dog-selective or dog-aggressive. These places are not worth that kind of risk.
Fortunately like I said above, Utah has seemingly endless outdoor opportunities, just not always convenient ones. There are trails and locations out there that are available to dogs who need a less overwhelming experience if you’re willing to travel to them.
If you have a dog who struggles with off leash dogs, you need to look for trails that are wide and that have good sightlines and exits so that you can prepare for and avoid trouble as you see it coming.
There are many things you can train and practice that can help prepare your dog for off leash encounters, but not the kind that happen over and over and over like you would experience in places like Memory Grove, Millcreek Canyon, Neffs, and Red Butte to name a few of the more perilous locations.
Because of the unpredictable nature, there are no perfect one-size-fits-all or guaranteed to work ways to deal with off leash dog encounters, but If you’d like to learn what you can do to prepare your dog for the occasional off leash encounter, and give them their best chance, then email me at Jamie@shakeonitdogtraining.com or fill out an intake form below.