Plain answer
Dogs are welcome on Scottsdale's McDowell Sonoran Preserve trails on a handheld leash no longer than 6 feet, with waste picked up and packed out, and only when it is under 90 degrees. The rest is courtesy: yield to horses, stay on the trail, and bring a dog with trained defaults instead of shouted commands.
If you are a Scottsdale or Cave Creek Pet Parent who hikes the Preserve with your dog, this is the plain-English version of the rules. Every rule below comes from the City of Scottsdale or the McDowell Sonoran Conservancy. Every behavior fix comes from how we train trail dogs: installed defaults, proofed under real distraction.
This is how to behave once you are on the trail, including the rattlesnake-alert default our rattlesnake avoidance training guide installs before your dog ever meets a snake at speed.
On this page
The short version: the City of Scottsdale runs the Preserve, and its dog rules fit in one table. Learn them before your next hike.
| Rule | What the rule says |
|---|---|
| Leash | Handheld leash, no longer than 6 feet, at all times. |
| Where dogs go | Access areas and designated trails only. The owner is responsible for the dog's conduct at all times. |
| Waste | Pick up immediately. Droppings go in a closed or sealed container, into a trash receptacle or out of the Preserve with you. You must carry a waste container with you. Loose or bagged waste left on the trail is prohibited. |
| Heat | If it is over 90 degrees at any time in your hike, it is too hot for your dog. |
| Hours and fees | Open daily, sunrise to sunset, free of charge. Gated trailheads follow posted hours that change through the year. |
| Conservancy events | Pets are not permitted on Conservancy-led walks, hikes, bike rides, or group activities. Service animals can be arranged in advance. |
Those rules come from the City of Scottsdale's Preserve rules page and the Conservancy's pet policy. The rest of this article is the etiquette layer on top of them: the habits that keep you out of confrontations and your dog out of trouble across 30,000-plus acres and 200-plus miles of trail.
The short version: six feet, in your hand, the whole hike.
The rule says handheld, and it means it. Clip the leash to your pack or tie it to a post while you take a photo and you are out of compliance. A retractable locked under 6 feet technically fits the letter of the rule, but the second it pays out past 6 feet you have broken it, so leave the retractable at home.
A leash is management, and management is not punishment. It keeps your dog from rehearsing the behaviors that ruin trail outings: bolting after a rabbit, lunging at a passing dog, charging a horse. Every rehearsal makes the next hike worse. The leash prevents the reps you do not want.
If your dog drags you from the parking lot to the trailhead, the problem starts before the trail. Our loose-leash walking protocol fixes the walk itself; the Preserve rule just sets the equipment.
The short version: if the forecast says 90 at any point during your hike, leave your dog home.
Read the rule carefully: over 90 degrees at any time in your hike. Not at the start. A 7 a.m. start at 82 degrees that hits 92 by 9:30 breaks the rule and risks your dog. Check the full window, not the departure temperature.
The City's heat page puts numbers on why: at 90 degrees of air temperature, surface temperature can hit 135 degrees. Dogs do not sweat; they dump heat through panting and a little through their paw pads. Old dogs, obese dogs, dogs on medication, and short-skulled breeds like Boxers, Bulldogs, and Pugs sit in the highest risk group.
Know the warning signs. Heavy panting with bright red gums and thick saliva means stop and cool the dog now. Vomiting or unsteadiness means the core temperature is climbing toward 104. Collapse or seizure is heat stroke: cool the dog and get to a veterinarian immediately. No article replaces your vet.
The Conservancy's trailhead panels add the water rule: bring ample water for you and your dog, and when your water is half gone, turn around. That margin gets you back to the truck with water to spare.
October through April is the hiking season for a reason. Our Phoenix heat walking guide covers the full heat protocol. And note the contrast across city lines: the City of Phoenix bans dogs from its trails at 100 degrees and up, with fines reaching into the thousands. Scottsdale's Preserve rule is stricter at 90. Different city, different number, same message.
The short version: pick it up immediately, seal it, and carry it out or trash it. Nothing stays on the trail.
The ordinance is specific: droppings go in a closed or sealed container, and you must already be carrying a waste container when you start. The bag dispenser lives on the leash, not in the truck.
The line people trip over is the bagged-waste ban. Leaving a tied bag "to grab on the way back" is prohibited, and the forgotten bag is the one every hiker behind you steps around. Pack a second bag for the bag. It weighs nothing and it ends the problem.
The short version: horses first, then hikers, then bikers and runners. When in doubt, you move.
The Preserve's trails are multi-use, and the Conservancy's trailhead panels state the order plainly: yield to horses, because sudden movements or loud noises can startle them. Bicyclists and trail runners travel at safe speeds and yield to everyone else, slowing down and announcing their approach. The panels close with the rule that covers everything else: when in doubt, give others the right of way.
Here is what that looks like with a dog. When a horse approaches, move to the downhill side of the trail with your dog, keep the dog close and quiet, and let the horse pass. No shouting, no arm waving, no letting your dog strain at the leash for a closer look. Quiet handler, quiet dog. A lunging dog at the end of a 6-foot leash is sudden movement, and horses read sudden movement as a threat.
The downhill hiker steps aside for the uphill hiker, and a short thank-you costs nothing when someone yields to you. That is standard trail courtesy. It is how shared trails keep working.
A dog that barks and lunges at horses has a proofing gap: no trained default for that distraction. That gap is fixable, and the trail-default work later in this article is the fix. The fix is handler coaching as much as dog training: our trainers rehearse the horse-pass maneuver with owners until the downhill move is muscle memory for the human too.
The short version: no. Dogs stay on designated trails and access areas. The desert around the trail is the thing being preserved.
The ordinance restricts dogs to access areas and designated trails, and the trailhead panels add the why: stay on the trail, avoid wet or muddy trails, and do not disturb or remove plants, rocks, or animals. Off-trail is where the cholla lives and where rattlesnakes den, and a curious dog meets both at nose level. It is also where coyote and javelina encounters spike, because that is where those animals live.
Here is the training implication. Your dog's legal world on a Preserve trail is a 6-foot radius. A dog that can only behave with twenty feet of slack does not have trail manners yet, the leash is managing the dog, not the training. Which brings us to wildlife, and then to the fix.
The short version: your dog never meets wildlife. You see it, you create distance, you move on.
Rattlesnakes are the encounter that matters most. In the moment: stop, shorten the leash, and calmly back away. Do not try to move the snake or shoo it off the trail. The real work happens before the hike: a trained alert default where the dog stops and checks in with you instead of investigating. Our rattlesnake avoidance training guide installs that default; our rattlesnake bite protocol covers the emergency.
Coyotes live in the Preserve and hunt its edges at dawn and dusk. Keep your dog close, keep moving, and do not let your dog engage. The full encounter protocol is in our coyote guide for Scottsdale and Cave Creek.
Javelinas travel in herds and defend them. Never let your dog chase the herd; a javelina that feels cornered will charge. Our javelina guide covers the encounter in full.
Two rules cover everything else. Never feed wildlife, and observe from a distance. Both protect the animal and keep your dog from learning that wildlife is a toy or a threat.
The short version: on a trail, your voice competes with a thousand smells, a horse, and a javelina herd. A trained default does not need to win that contest.
Definition: trained default. A behavior your dog offers on its own in the real moment, with no cue, no shouting, and no negotiation.
The rattlesnake alert is a default response. The dog smells or hears the snake and checks in with you instead of investigating. Nobody cued it. Nobody shouted. That is the methodology framing for this whole article: trained alert as default response, then proofing.
Defaults are built in order. Teach the behavior somewhere quiet. Reinforce it until the dog offers it freely. Then proof it through the five D's: duration, distraction, distance, direction, difficulty (our methodology). A leave-it that works in your kitchen is Teach. A leave-it at the trailhead with a horse going by is Proof. Most Pet Parents stop at Reinforce and then act surprised on the trail.
The leash manages. The default performs. Management is not punishment, and it is not training either. It buys you time while the training catches up. A dog with no defaults and a short leash is managed. A dog with defaults and a short leash is trained. And the owner runs both: the hand manages the leash while the training runs the dog. That is the human in the loop, and it is why camp ends with handoff coaching, not just a pickup time.
"If the behavior only works when you're shouting, it isn't trained yet. The trail is where your proofing gets graded."
Begin with the assessment
In Foundation Camp, our trainers install the leave-it and rattlesnake-alert defaults through all four phases, proofed against real distraction and tracked in the PD360, then teach you to run them at handoff with written take-home protocols.
The short version: sunrise to sunset and free. Check the posted gate times before you go.
The Preserve is open daily from sunrise to sunset and free to enter, with no permits. Six trailheads run access gates that follow posted hours through the year: Gateway, Tom's Thumb, Brown's Ranch, Lost Dog Wash, Sunrise, and Fraesfield. Gate times shift with the seasons, so confirm the current hours at scottsdaleaz.gov/preserve before you load the dog.
Two planning notes. The 90-degree rule ends most dog hiking from June through September, so plan your Preserve season for October through April. And Conservancy-led group walks and hikes do not allow pets, so a guided outing is humans only. For help matching a trail to your dog's fitness, see our dog-friendly hiking trails guide.
Choose by case, not by tool
Book a PD360 Assessment. A senior trainer reads your dog across nine dimensions, names whether the trail trouble is arousal, prey drive, or a proofing gap, and routes you to the right program.
Key takeaways
Dogs are allowed on the Preserve's designated trails and access areas, on a handheld leash no longer than 6 feet. They cannot roam off-trail or into restricted areas, and the owner is responsible for the dog's conduct at all times. Pets are also barred from Conservancy-led group hikes and events. The full rules are posted at scottsdaleaz.gov/preserve.
No. The leash rule is "at all times," and a leash means a physical leash. If you want off-leash hiking, the Preserve is not the venue. Nearby Camelback Mountain and Piestewa Peak are stricter still, as our off-limits guide to those trails explains.
Stop, shorten the leash, and calmly back away. Do not try to move or kill the snake. The real fix is trained before the hike: an alert default where the dog stops and checks in with you instead of investigating. Our rattlesnake avoidance guide covers the training, and our bite protocol covers the emergency.
No. The Preserve is free to enter and hike, with no permits required. Your only costs are preparation: water for you and your dog, waste bags, and a 6-foot handheld leash. Check scottsdaleaz.gov/preserve for current gate times and temporary closures before you go.
Book a PD360 Assessment. A senior trainer at Scottsdale or Cave Creek reads your dog across nine dimensions, names whether the trail trouble is arousal, prey drive, or a proofing gap, and routes you to the right program. For most trail dogs, that is a board-and-train stay, where the defaults get installed and proofed.
The rules are the easy part: short leash, packed-out waste, sub-90-degree hikes, yielded horses, on-trail dogs, distance from wildlife. The trained dog is the project, and it starts with an assessment: a board-and-train stay installs the defaults over 14 nights of structured sessions, and the owner handoff makes them yours on the next Preserve morning.
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