Rash of cache thefts

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 9:48 am

I've found out that one of the Girl Scout leaders in town has been taking her troop around Oconto geocaching. A person that lives next to one of my missing caches and who's aware of it told me that all the kids in the neighborhood know about it. I like the suggestion about making them premium caches, but I wish the kids could keep things to themselves and not ruin it for others. It's a great activity for them but I'll definitely have a chat with the scout leader...maybe even the troop. I've put temp caches in place for a school activity...this might be something the scouts could do too.
I'm going to have to relocate them since they've been compromised but I've got a lot of better things to do than replacing missing caches. I hate to archive them though.

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 10:42 am

labrat_wr wrote:

Quote:

We are also thinking it is time for the sport to go back underground a bit and be a little more off the radar.

I would agree with this. While we need to educate people about what the game is, it would be nice if everyone coming in would understand the ethics of the game before jumping in.

I would love to see geocaching be more "underground", but it won't happen. More people = more $ for the frog. GC will keep dumbing things down to the most common denominator to give as many people as possible the ability to find caches.

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 11:03 am

placing only 3/3 Caches and up from now on...
leave the P&Gs for the new folks.

More people = more money for the frog but only when they go premium (or buy the app). I wonder how many of these new folks are shelling out anything but gas money.

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 8:04 pm

While at a sporting goods store I noticed prices for 50 cal ammo cans at 17.99. I talked to a sales man and he said they sell fast. Check the prices on E bay. I truly believe a lot of them are going missing from cachers. I have had 3 stolen this year and will not replace them with cans. One was a custom painted one commemorated to my Mom. I am using what I have left to store ammo in, no hiding them in the woods.

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 8:18 pm

rcflyer2242 wrote:

While at a sporting goods store I noticed prices for 50 cal ammo cans at 17.99. I talked to a sales man and he said they sell fast. Check the prices on E bay. I truly believe a lot of them are going missing from cachers. I have had 3 stolen this year and will not replace them with cans. One was a custom painted one commemorated to my Mom. I am using what I have left to store ammo in, no hiding them in the woods.

Just bought a dozen ammo cans. $9.50 for the 50mm size and 6.50 for the 30mm size. I get em at Willies Army Surplus in chippewa Falls, now that the 60 that I got at auction for much less than that have run out.

Talked to Willie, the owner, and he says they are going higher and higher as people bid against each other. His next shipment will be $13.50, though he gave me the old price for his existing cans.

r

Posted: Wed Aug 01, 2012 9:55 pm

Trekkin and Birdin wrote:

Ralph, Seriously? Though not our favorite kind of cache, they are very popular and in this miserable heat we've had this summer, probably a godsend for many who want to get out, explore a country road and get a mess of smileys.

Now that I think of it, we think a gold ammo can in an area that isn't easy to reach, or visited by many, might have gone missing, too. I think Huffin Puffin tried to find it for lonely points this past year. Kind of makes us sad, since we had a little bit of a vested interest in it. Honestly, you practically needed an oxygen tank up there. Go figure.

The Bobcam hides are 5mm tubes, with a bracket nailed into the sign post, which is a little illegal, but does secure the cache pretty well. 6 of those went missing recently, with the bracket still there. If it was just one or 2, I would not think much about it, but 6 of them, all in the same few days make you think that a vigilante geocacher took them. Hope I am wrong. Here are a couple of samples:

GC3P7EV
GC3P7E8
GC3P7EG

zuma

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 8:40 am

We have started making all of our caches premium, I know this will make them unavailable to the free players, but what about the smart phone market, we do not have one so do not know, do the still have to have a premium membership to access?

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 8:55 am

I would say yes to that. I have been playing with c:geo on a friend's phone. It runs a query of some sort against the web. If you can not see it on the web, then the phones should be the same.

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 8:58 am

sweetlife wrote:

We have started making all of our caches premium, I know this will make them unavailable to the free players, but what about the smart phone market, we do not have one so do not know, do the still have to have a premium membership to access?

I think the query for C:GEO runs off of an existing players own profile....

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 9:03 am

Yes it does, as you have to provide login info.

Joined: 2009-06-05 Posts: 2126 Location: Menominee, MI

Well, I'm leaving my caches for all members right now. I'm not putting them at premium because a lot of the finders are new cachers who choose my caches to make their first finds, particularly at Hene's Park here in Menominee. None of my caches have ammo boxes and they never will be. My largest container is a gallon plastic jar. I've only lost one and that was my fault for not securing it and it got blown away in a wind storm.

The rest of my caches are soup base cans and film cans and one peanut butter jar. Oh yeah, and a mini bison tube.

Maybe those of you who have ammo boxes need to pull them and replace them with something else. Seems like most of the thefts are ammo box caches.

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 7:56 pm

Lostby7 wrote:

sweetlife wrote:

We have started making all of our caches premium, I know this will make them unavailable to the free players, but what about the smart phone market, we do not have one so do not know, do the still have to have a premium membership to access?

I think the query for C:GEO runs off of an existing players own profile....

This is correct. If you buy a premium membership, you can find caches with a smart phone. I sometimes use my phone to cache, and have no problem finding premium caches via phone.

However, many of the new people trying to cache for the first time by phone will be folks who do not cough up the dough for premium membership.

z

Posted: Thu Aug 02, 2012 7:59 pm

Todd300 wrote:

Well, I'm leaving my caches for all members right now. I'm not putting them at premium because a lot of the finders are new cachers who choose my caches to make their first finds, particularly at Hene's Park here in Menominee. None of my caches have ammo boxes and they never will be. My largest container is a gallon plastic jar. I've only lost one and that was my fault for not securing it and it got blown away in a wind storm.

The rest of my caches are soup base cans and film cans and one peanut butter jar. Oh yeah, and a mini bison tube.

Maybe those of you who have ammo boxes need to pull them and replace them with something else. Seems like most of the thefts are ammo box caches.

There is no better cache container than an ammo can. (I have hundreds of ammo cans in the wild, and they will stay there.) There are few containers worse than a film can. (Only one of my caches uses a film can, and I used it on purpose as a joke.)

zuma

Joined: 2009-06-05 Posts: 2126 Location: Menominee, MI

Check Craigslist. I'm seeing a few ammo boxes popping up on there. They could be legit. But it would not hurt to look if it looks familiar.

Here's one for example.

http://greenbay.craigslist.org/for/3133327349.html

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2012 5:12 am

Our caches in the Waupaca area have been pretty much left alone. I think that is because the caching activity around here is pretty light, and we try to put most of ours on private property or at business places that are not generally open to the public. This has been criticized by some, mostly those who do not read the cache listings carefully enough, as we list clearly the permissions and/or restrictions. A couple of these are ammo cans that have been in place for quite awhile, several are plastic coffee cans or containers, and most have somebody on-site that keep their eyes open. We try to make the 'cool' factor the cache itself, the sites are not all scenic or awe inspiring. But we do not have to spend a lot of our caching time on maintenance or replacing.

We did have a lot of trouble with a multi-cache in northern Oconto County a few years ago. The stages were continually vandalized until we finally gave up and archived it. The final, an ammo can, is still there as of the last log, back in November 2011. Maybe we oughta check on it again one of these days... LCG in late summer, anyone?