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What’s Next?… I don’t appreciate that comment and think it is inappropriate for here. The President has nothing to do this this nor does Ashcroft. It is a land manager’s decision that we as an organization exist to educate and urge to favor our hobby.
My response to the topic is that I have seen a post on Geocaching.com where a GPS was confiscated by park employees where geocaching was banned. I think this is a national issue, and needs to be addressed nationally. It might eventually lead to a lawsuit in which case some money from geocaching.com and GPS manufacturers would be needed.
Many hobby organization end up with legal defense funds to protect their rights. Some that I have been involved with are the American Motorcycle Association, Amateur Radio Relay League, Experimetal Aircraft Association and the NRA. Geocaching.com is going to have to consider that course of action.
Why not? It isn’t going to be held to any rules but what the participants agree on. For years I did hidden transmitter hunting that was pretty much a road race of several teams from a starting point and then often a foot race to the transmitter. Nobody got hurt. Two of the teams were Milwaukee Policemen.
Perhaps do it like a road rally where departing is staggerd and time to finish was used to determine the winner. For example, using Mapsource, times from waypoint to waypoint would be determined and points(minutes) taken from a team calling in early. This would minimize the racing aspect.
Maybe too, ten participants are given a different order to find the waypoints which would prevent bunching up except at the final.
Sounds like fun. I’ll ante up depending if I physically have a chance at winning.
Steve Bukosky
Caching and working in Omaha NebraskaWith a little luck, I’ll be adding Nebraska and maybe Iowa this next week. I’ve got a business trip to Omaha.
Just to give credit where it is due, Ken Braband originally posted that link in response to a related question I had a year or two ago. So, Thanks Again Ken!
While returning from a cache on the Ice Age Trail today, I heard of charges filed against a deer hunter in Sheboygan county that shot at something moving in the twilight. He killed his friend. The time was 4:55PM and after hunting hours.
That could have been one of us killed while on a cache hunt. Blaze orange makes no difference when it is dark out. (rant about what I hope happens to this guy deleted)
Congrats on COTM. It is well deserved and one that I revisited with my team members BS&T.
A passing thought on voting for your own cache. There would be nothing preventing everyone who has ever placed an active cache from nominating it, there by flooding the list of nominees. This is because COTM is not limited to a having been placed that month. COTM could be one that has been around for a few years and recently discovered by a batch of new cachers who think highly of it and cast enough votes to make an oldie the COTM.
I suppose a cache owner could vote for thiers AFTER it has been nominated. That change would have to be kicked around by the high priced help and the general population. I’m sure we will be discussing it shortly.
Looks like it should have a cross on the roof at the entrance. I can envision two outhouses and some grave stones in the background.
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Originally posted by jthorson:
SBukosky still does this I think …
Haven’t done it for a few years but my numerous hobbies come and go and return again. The way our local group did it was to transmit for 10 seconds every minute. Usually in order to get a bearing, the vehicle would have to stop. This was murder on brakes! Most of us would have antennas mounted on the side of the car that would stick up a bit and often sucumb to tree branches. Once as near as we could get with a car, we’d have some on foot gear to use to find ”the fox”. KA9EVK and I once foiled the hunters by hiding in a huge thistle patch in the Havenwoods park in Milwaukee. It was a hot August night and we used winter coats and blankest to safely get into the patch. The hunters were not so prepared! One of the toughest finds I made was where the transmitter was buried and the antenna was covered with a hollow weed stem.
Oddly enough, I didn’t care for the out of car footrace that much. Yet, here I am geocaching and 99% of it is off road and that is what I love about it so much.
I want to point out that speed and the ”foot race” is a key need of this activity. Our group offered rogue transmitter track downs to find jammers and such. Part of the group are radio technicians for the Milwaukee police department and they would often have to use their Fox Hunting skills to track down a stuck transmitter or someone that stole a police walkie talkie and would cause havoc on the police frequencies.
Because getting a Ham Radio license is so much easier now, I’m sure that many geocachers would like to get into fox hunting. If you are around Milwaukee, visit Amateur Electronic Supply on 58th and Good Hope. They should have information on getting a license. Actually, to do the hunting, you don’t need a license. Just the person using the transmitter needs it.
Also do a google search on fox hunting or transmitter hunting. Lots of good sites about it. And don’t be scared by the technology. It can be done as simple or elaborate as you want. In fact, you could do a simple version of it with FRS radios. Just don’t use Rhino’s!
Having read the post before it became a link, I agree with the message it holds. Covertness is part of the geocaching experience. We are hiding things intended for only certain people to find. A park ranger could patrol his area for ages and not be aware there are caches out of view, just waiting to pop up and bite him in the nose. It seems to me that most objections to caches are based on paranoia rather than facts. I just witnessed this in Indiana where the rules are to stay on trail so as not to impact the growth. I saw zero impact at the cache site. However, it was not hidden with the intention of baffling as many as possible without giving a useful clue to help prevent such impact from happening. Laughingly, near by was a fenced off area to keep deer out so their impact on the plants could be determined. Again, I didn’t see any difference inside the fenced area from the outside of it. When exiting the nature center, I talking with a park ranger about the area. I mentioned how nature quickly reclaims most of man’s impact on an area. He agreed. It would have been a good time to mention geocaching but I’ll let that for the locals to deal with.
The point that I got from the message is that a don’t ask and don’t tell policy is the writer’s preference. It seems to me that has been the policy on nearly all of the existing caches in our state. What fun are permits and tracking down someone for permission to hide something they otherwise would never know was there?
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Originally posted by fishcachers:
I wonder how my kitty would do, lol!
If its a kitty like Sigfried and Roy’s kitty, I would be afraid of nothing! Cept maybe the kitty!
You haven’t cached until you’ve shredded at least one jacket on thorns and brambles!
Yeah, when I mentioned a dog, I had visions of something like that. Maybe someone makes dentures for doggies??
I agree with Ken. Please post your no finds unless you made a half hearted search. If the cache owner verifies that the cache is there and the coordinates are within reason, then the difficulty level might need to be adjusted. I believe ”newbies” should go on the easier caches to begin with rather than possibly get frustrated with too many no finds and give up on the hobby.
Also, I personally believe that a useful hint should be given to enable a hunter to find the cache. With few exceptions, my philosophy is the cache is just a reason to make the journey.
This could be fun. You haven’t cached until you took your first spill and have to search for your GPS that went flying!
I think Otter just about covers it! I have to admire a solo female cacher. I don’t think I’d feel as confident. However, being a fairly big guy, I hunt solo 99% of the time and never felt threatend. The past year I’ve also had my dog with me much of time and he looks like a spooky wolf to many so that helps. If I were a female going solo, I’d feel better if I had a dog with me.
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