💛 XL BULLIES 💛

A 'sniffari' (sniffing safari) is a scent walk where your pup's nose takes the lead! This way of walking mentally stimulates and enriches your dog as your dog “sees” the world through their nose. Using their sense of smell is incredibly enriching as they're using a lot of brainpower to sniff through all the information they find, which makes this activity a great option for mental exercise. These adventures in smelling leave dogs more content (and possibly even more tired) than after a walk when they are moving but don’t have the opportunity to take it all in through their nose.

Our Sniffari is a private fenced and gated forest (about the size of a football pitch) that allows your dog to use their sense of smell to explore and interact with their surroundings. Normally on a scent walk you’d need to keep your pup on a long leash, but as it’s a private session your dog can be off lead to explore.

Rather than walking in a straight line from point to point, a Sniffari is more meandering. Dogs are allowed to explore the environment with their noses, sniffing out scents and following their instincts. Even though a sniffing session is slower than the average dog walk, it's about quality, not quantity. Dogs sniffing is amazing mental stimulation and it increases their respiration rate, so it's a tiring activity. You may stop and start quite a bit, but that’s because your dog is filling their imagination with scents of the world. Scent is incredibly important to dogs – as much, if not more so, as sight and sound – and it tells them far more about their environment than we can ever begin to imagine. When they sniff the grass or a tree, it’s like reading (we)e-mails. They can tell who has been there and when, if they know them, whether they were male or female, entire or neutered, how old, what mood they were in… all from a single sniff.

• For owners who want to take their relationship with their dog to the next level as slow sniffy walks are a great time to connect with your dog as it’s a chance to look at the world from your dog’s point of view. Because we don’t smell our way through the world, we’re often missing an entire way to interact and stimulate our pups.
  

• If your dog is bored and you're looking for new and fun ways to burn off some of their excess energy. Your dog will enjoy the freedom of getting to explore at their own pace and sniff all the wonderful smells they encounter.
  

• The Sniffari is also a great opportunity for training around distractions.

• Allowing your dog to direct this activity gives them a feeling of autonomy. Everyone including dogs, benefits from being free to make choices about what they do. Life becomes less stressful!
  

• When we think about our dog’s daily exercise, we often just think of it as being a physical thing – but when you’ve got a dog’s nose, it is very much more. Experts have said just 20 minutes of sniffing is equivalent to an hour's walk in terms of enrichment for your dog. Understanding how fundamental scent is to your pup will bring a whole new dimension to our dog’s walks.
  

• You get to relax as you explore the world together! Our Sniffari is located in a private and peaceful woodland with towering trees. You’ll get to experience it with your dog rather than just exercising your dog.
  

• Sniffing really engages your dog’s brain, which can help take the edge off their energy levels. By showing your dog that you’re willing to stop and ‘smell the roses’, you may find that your dog is actually more engaged with you than if you were simply rambling around the neighborhood.
  

• It’s also an amazing time to level up your training games - hide and seek in the woods, circling around trees, or recall/stay while yummy distracting scents wharf around.

Pups in their season are allowed in our private areas, however we require you to take full responsibility for your dog during the entirety of your visit.

All the fences are 2 meters high.

When it’s raining, the forest is actually a great option as the trees provide some cover. When there are winds above 40mph we close our forests to create the safest experience possible. If you’ve booked during this time, we will contact you to make alternate arrangements.