Dogs Millcreek
One canyon, three rules, and the one that reverses in winter
Millcreek Canyon dog rules, by the day of the month
Dogs may run off leash in Millcreek Canyon on odd numbered days and must be leashed on even numbered ones. That single calendar rule, plus a leash requirement that never lifts in the parking lots, and a winter reversal on the ski trail above the gate, is the whole system. Here is all of it, plainly, with the orders behind it and the reason this is the one canyon above Salt Lake City where a dog is welcome at all.
By Scott Buehler, Moving Utah
Updated October 2026
The short answer
Yes, dogs can be off leash in Millcreek Canyon, but only on odd numbered days of the month, and only on the trails. On even numbered days they must be leashed everywhere in the canyon. A third rule sits on top of both and never changes: in the parking lots, picnic grounds and along the road, dogs are leashed every single day, odd or even. In winter there is one reversal to know, up on the groomed ski trail above the gate, where dogs are prohibited on odd numbered days instead of freed by them. The system has run since 2001, it is enforceable federal and county regulation rather than guidance, and it exists because this is the canyon above the city that is not protected drinking water.
The three rules
Whether your dog may run depends on the number on the calendar
Millcreek Canyon is the canyon in this valley where dogs are welcome, and the way it manages them is unusual enough that people who have used it for years still get parts of it wrong. The core rule is a calendar rule. On odd numbered days of the month, dogs may be off leash on the trails. On even numbered days they must be leashed everywhere in the canyon. Salt Lake County adopted it in 2001 and the Forest Service publishes it in exactly those terms.
Layered on that is a rule that does not change with the date at all: dogs must be leashed in developed areas every single day, odd or even. The Forest Service defines developed areas as picnic grounds, parking lots, roads and housing developments. That is the rule most often broken, usually within thirty seconds of a car door opening, and it is the one a ranger is most likely to be standing next to.
Then there is the reversal, which is the part almost nobody knows until it costs them a morning. Above the winter gate, on the groomed ski trail, dogs are prohibited on odd numbered days rather than freed by them. That is a separate Forest Service order with a separate purpose, and it is set out further down this page. Three rules, one canyon, and the middle one is the only one that never moves.
Off leash does not mean unsupervised. The odd numbered day comes with conditions attached, and those conditions are the difference between the rule surviving and the rule being withdrawn. They are worth reading rather than assuming.
What the off leash day still requires of you
The reason to take the conditions seriously is that this arrangement is rare and it is not permanent. There is no other drainage on this side of the valley where a dog may legally run, and it exists because a specific canyon without a specific water status was given a specific compromise. Compromises get reviewed. Every loose dog that puts its feet on a stranger, and every bag left tied to a branch, is an argument for reviewing this one.
The practical version for a household is simple. Go on odd days if the point of the trip is the dog running. Go on even days if the point is a quiet walk, because an even day genuinely is quieter and every dog on the trail is on a lead. Both are good days. Choosing the wrong one for what you wanted is the most common small disappointment this canyon produces.
The winter reversal
Above the winter gate, the odd day is the banned day
When the upper gate closes for the season and the road above it is groomed for skiing, a different rule takes over on that stretch, and it runs the opposite way to everything below. Forest Service Order 04-19-84, which took effect on 11 July 1997, prohibits possessing a dog on odd numbered days on the Mill Creek Winter Ski trail when the Maple Grove gate is closed and the area is posted for winter skiing.
The geography in the order is precise: it covers Mill Creek Canyon Road number 012 above the gate at the Maple Grove picnic area to the end of the road at the Upper Big Water trailhead. The stated purpose is public safety during winter recreation and reducing crowding and conflict between users. Loose dogs and a set classic track do not mix, and the order simply removes the overlap by taking the off leash day off the ski trail.
It carries real penalties. The order cites a fine of up to 5,000 dollars, imprisonment of up to six months, or both, which is standard language for a Forest Service closure order rather than a signal about how often anybody is prosecuted. What matters to a household is the practical translation: on an odd numbered day in January, the dog does not come skiing. On an even numbered day, it may, on a lead.
This is genuinely the hardest part of the system to hold in your head, because it inverts the thing you have memorized. The rule of thumb that works is that above the winter gate, the dog rule flips: even days are the dog days up there, and odd days are not. Below the gate, in the same canyon on the same morning, the ordinary odd and even system is still running.
The two rules are live at the same time, in the same canyon, on the same day. On an odd numbered morning in February, a dog may legally be off leash on a trail in the lower canyon and may not legally be present at all on the groomed road above the gate. Both statements are true at once and neither cancels the other. If a winter plan involves both halves of the canyon, plan it for an even numbered day and keep the dog on a lead, and the whole problem disappears.
Why this canyon
It comes down to where the drinking water is
The most useful thing to understand about dogs in the Wasatch canyons above Salt Lake City is that the rules are not about dogs. They are about water, and the map of where dogs may go is the map of where the valley does not drink from.
Big Cottonwood and Little Cottonwood, the next two canyons south along the bench, are protected culinary watershed. The creeks that run down them supply a large share of the valley's drinking water, and the ordinance that protects that supply keeps dogs and other domestic animals out of both canyons completely. The prohibition reaches a dog that never leaves the vehicle, a first offense is a Class B misdemeanor carrying a 650 dollar fine, and a state bill to let dogs simply ride through in a car died in committee, so the driving exception people ask about does not exist.
Millcreek Canyon does not carry that status. Its creek is not part of the culinary supply in the same way, so the Forest Service has been able to manage dogs here with an access compromise instead of a prohibition. That single difference in water status is the entire reason this canyon has a dog reputation and its neighbors have a dog ban. If you want the wider picture of what those two canyons are, the county page on the Cottonwood canyons covers them properly.
People get this backwards with enough regularity that it is worth stating flatly: the canyon that allows dogs is the one at the end of 3800 South, and the canyons that do not are the two south of it. Arriving at the wrong one with a dog in the back means turning round, and on a Saturday morning that is forty minutes and a fine you did not budget for.
The map of where dogs may go is the map of where the valley does not drink from.
Dog Lake
There is one Dog Lake and two completely different ways to it
Dog Lake sits high on the divide between Millcreek Canyon and Big Cottonwood Canyon, which means it can be walked to from either side. From the Millcreek side, up the Big Water trail, dogs are welcome under the canyon's ordinary odd and even system. From the Big Cottonwood side, up the Mill D North Fork trail, dogs are prohibited, because that approach is inside the protected watershed.
Same lake, same day, same dog, two opposite legal answers depending on which parking lot you started from. It is the single most concentrated example of how these canyon rules work, and it catches people who read a trail description without noticing which trailhead it started at. If a walk to Dog Lake is the plan, the question to answer first is not the distance, it is the side.
For 2026 there is a further complication and it removes the Millcreek answer altogether. The Big Water trailheads are inside the upper canyon construction closure, which runs to 14 December 2026 and covers walking as well as driving. That leaves the Big Cottonwood approach as the available one this season, and dogs cannot use it. The honest advice for this year is to pick a different objective and come back to Dog Lake once the road reopens.
| The approach | Dogs | Open in 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Big Water trail, from Millcreek Canyon | Allowed, under the canyon's odd and even system | No, inside the upper canyon closure order |
| Mill D North Fork, from Big Cottonwood Canyon | Prohibited, protected watershed | Yes |
The dog position is permanent and has nothing to do with the road works. The upper canyon closure order runs to 14 December 2026, so read what is posted at the trailhead on the day you go.
The whole system
Dogs and bikes run on the same calendar, pointing opposite ways
The canyon manages bicycles with a calendar rule too, and it is deliberately the mirror image of the dog one. Set the two side by side and the design is obvious: the days the dogs are loose are the days the bikes are absent from the upper trails.
On even numbered days, bikes are allowed on the Big Water, Little Water and Great Western trails in the upper canyon. On odd numbered days, they are not. The Pipeline Trail is the standing exception, open to bikes every day of the year, which is one of the reasons it is the busiest riding trail in the canyon and why its trailhead at Rattlesnake Gulch fills so early. It is also the trail kept open through the road reconstruction, so this season it carries traffic that would normally spread across the upper canyon.
For a household that owns both a dog and a mountain bike, the arithmetic is annoying and worth doing once. Odd days are dog days and not upper trail riding days. Even days are riding days and leash days. The Pipeline works on either. Anyone trying to do both in one morning in the upper canyon is trying to break one of two rules.
| Odd numbered day | Even numbered day | |
|---|---|---|
| Dogs on canyon trails | May be off leash | Must be leashed |
| Dogs in developed areas | Must be leashed | Must be leashed |
| Dogs on the winter ski trail above the gate | Prohibited outright | Allowed, on a leash |
| Bikes on Big Water, Little Water and Great Western | Not allowed | Allowed |
| Bikes on the Pipeline Trail | Allowed | Allowed |
Published by the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest and Salt Lake County. The upper canyon rows are academic for the 2026 season, because the trails they describe sit inside the road closure that runs to 14 December 2026.
Using it well
The habits that keep this arrangement in place
Check the date on the phone before the dog gets in the car, every time. It sounds trivial and it is the entire system. Everything else on this page follows from one number, and a household that builds the check into leaving the house never has a bad interaction in this canyon.
Clip up in the parking lot regardless of the date, and stay clipped until the trail proper. The developed area rule is the one with the highest chance of being witnessed and the lowest chance of being defended, and it is also the rule that exists because parking areas are where dogs and strangers and moving vehicles all meet.
Carry water for the dog, take the waste out with you, and be honest about recall. A dog that comes back when it feels like it is not under voice control, and an off leash day is not the place to find out. If you want a straightforward first outing, the lower canyon trails from the Rattlesnake Gulch lot are the easiest introduction, and the ranked list has the rest of what the canyon and the city offer. There is a fee collected at the booth on the way out of the canyon, with an annual pass available, so a card in the door pocket saves a fumble at the exit.
The five second check before you leave the house
Scott Buehler
Moving Utah About Scott
Quick answers
The dog rules, answered
On odd numbered calendar days, yes, on the trails. On even numbered days dogs must be leashed everywhere in the canyon. The Forest Service states it as dogs being leashed in the entire canyon on even numbered days and permitted off leash on odd days only. Off leash still carries conditions: you must be carrying a leash, the dog must stay within visible range, it must be under reliable voice control, and you are liable for what it does.
Yes, on every day of the year regardless of whether the date is odd or even. The Forest Service requires dogs to be leashed on all days in developed areas, which it defines as picnic grounds, parking lots, roads and housing developments. This is the rule broken most often and usually within a few seconds of a car door opening. Clip up before the dog gets out and unclip at the trail proper, not at the vehicle.
Below the winter gate, yes, under the ordinary odd and even system. Above the gate it inverts. Forest Service Order 04-19-84, effective 11 July 1997, prohibits possessing a dog on odd numbered days on the Mill Creek Winter Ski trail when the Maple Grove gate is closed, covering the road from that gate to the Upper Big Water trailhead. Its stated purpose is winter recreation safety and reducing user conflict, and the penalties run to 5,000 dollars or six months.
Water. Big Cottonwood and Little Cottonwood are protected culinary watershed supplying a large share of the valley's drinking water, and the ordinance protecting it excludes dogs and other domestic animals from both canyons entirely, including a dog that stays in the vehicle, with a 650 dollar penalty for a first offense. Millcreek Canyon does not carry that status, so the Forest Service manages dogs here with the odd and even day compromise instead of a prohibition.
It depends entirely on which side you walk in from. Approached up the Big Water trail from Millcreek Canyon, dogs are allowed under the canyon's ordinary system. Approached up Mill D North Fork from Big Cottonwood Canyon, dogs are prohibited because that side is inside the protected watershed. Same lake, two opposite answers. For the 2026 season the Millcreek approach is inside the upper canyon closure order, which leaves only the approach dogs cannot use.
They mirror the dog rules. On even numbered days bikes are allowed on the Big Water, Little Water and Great Western trails in the upper canyon; on odd numbered days they are not. The Pipeline Trail takes bikes every day of the year, which is why it is the busiest riding trail here. The design is deliberate: the days dogs may run loose are the days bikes are kept off those upper trails.
The canyon is patrolled and the rules are enforceable federal and county regulations rather than guidance, with citations available to officers. The winter ski trail order cites a fine of up to 5,000 dollars, up to six months of imprisonment, or both, which is standard closure order language. The more realistic consequence is the slow one: this off leash arrangement is unusual, it is reviewable, and every incident is an argument for reviewing it.
Not in the canyons immediately south of Millcreek, which is the point. Big Cottonwood and Little Cottonwood exclude dogs entirely as protected watershed, so on this stretch of the range Millcreek Canyon is the answer, which is why it draws dog owners from across the valley. Salt Lake County and the individual cities maintain designated off leash areas down on the valley floor, and those are managed separately from anything the Forest Service does.
The rules themselves do not, but the ground they apply to has shrunk. Everything above the Terraces, including the Big Water trailheads and the upper canyon trails, is closed to all public access under an order running to 14 December 2026, and that closure covers walking. The odd and even system continues to apply on the lower canyon trails and at the Rattlesnake Gulch and Church Fork trailheads, which is where dog walking in this canyon is happening this season.
The dog canyon is a real reason people buy here
A legal off leash trail ten minutes from the front door is a perfectly good reason to want an address on this bench. What is worth understanding first is the traffic it brings to the streets at the canyon mouth, the annual pass a household ends up buying, and the year the upper canyon is shut. Tell me what you are weighing, and a Salt Lake County partner agent I trust takes the ground work from there.
Or call Scott: (435) 357-4345or send Scott a message
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