MetroWest Pack Walk

We are a community of dog owners working together to support and encourage safe dog socialization through structured weekly pack walks. (We are NOT a stand around and play group.) We will hold regular, structured off-leash group walks and nature hikes at various times and locations around the Boston metro west and neighboring areas. We urge participants to use our outings as an opportunity to encourage and reinforce positive socialization skills and the behaviors you want your dog to exhibit everyday in public.

All types of dogs and people are welcome, but for everyone's safety, we have a few rules that we ask every participant follow in order to walk with us:

*Required for membership: owning a dog.

*Dogs should be tagged and up to date on shots

*All dogs must be leashed until we begin our walk (retractable or flexi leashes will not be allowed; please use a standard or flat leash no more than 8 feet)

*No face-to-face greetings for the dogs

*Give every dog space before the walk, over excitement can create a ripple effect or a fight

*Always bring a leash and poop bags to clean up after your dog

*If dog will be off leash reasonable voice control is required

*Out of courtesy to others on the trail, if we ever come upon a single hiker or a leashed dog, I ask that people leash their dogs while we pass.

*Please be on time. To be very specific, when I ask that you be on time I ask that you be ready to walk at the time designated in the event. If you know you will need a few minutes to get yourself ready upon arrival, please show up 5-10 minutes early to give yourself that opportunity.

*Not all dogs are created equal, or even want to be. We have a myriad of different dog personalities on our walks these days. While I think this is awesome, some of our dogs do not. This has presented some issues recently in maintaining a cohesive, balanced group and providing a stress free safe walk for both us and our dogs. Some of dogs are excited players and barkers, a number of us don’t do well with puppies and other dogs can be nervous or reactive and just want to have a quiet walk together without much play. As a way of alleviating this issue and honoring our dogs’ different personalities, we will split our walks into two groups: high energy and low energy. (I am clearly oversimplifying with these names, for the sake of ease) The night before or the morning of a walk (depending on how good you all are about finalizing you RSVP in advance) I will take personality/play style/energy level/age of the dogs attending (sorry people, this walk is about the dogs after all) into consideration and if I feel it is best I will split the group into these two sub groups to walk separately. I ask that people stick to these groups for the sake of safety and time constraints for that walk. If you genuinely feel your dog would be better served hiking with the opposing group to the one you’ve been placed in please let me know after the walk and I will be happy to discuss it with you. <br>

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Attendance Policy: We have lots of new members joining this group who would like to attend meet up events. So, RSVP and Commit. I ask that you please be aware of what hikes you have RSVP'd yes to. When you are slated to attend a hike please commit to walking or dropping out and adjust your RSVP by 9 PM the night before a hike accordingly. When we organizers wake up early, drive up to 45 minutes/1 hour to our destination and either one person or no people show up because everyone has dropped out last minute it stinks. Please be respectful of our sacrifice and our time. We do our best to give notice if we must cancel I ask the same in return of you guys.

I obviously understand we all wake up feeling sick or have car trouble and missing a hike last minute cannot be helped, and for that we will try to be understanding, but I expect those instances will be few and far between. So, to enforce this rule we will re-institute our 3-strike policy. Should you drop out of a hike after 9 PM the night before a hike, or not show up at all you will be given a strike, which the other organizers and I will keep track of. Upon your third strike we will remove you from the group and in order to be reinstated we will ask that you provide us with proof of a $20 donation to a canine-supporting charity/organization/rescue. <br>

Disclaimer: Participation in this group is an at-will activity and has inherent risks for which Organizers are not responsible. Furthermore, Organizers of this group are not responsible for parking tickets or tickets from park officials. Off-leash activity is at owner discretion, and Organizers are not responsible for any injury to you or your pet. Dog safety is solely the owner's responsibility and if your pet is in an altercation it is up to the parties involved to settle for damages. It is also the responsibility of each participant to be familiar with the venue (eg, have a copy of a trail map with you).