seventhings

kgbinmo - I did a radial search on N41-35.850 W090-28.750 in both the Geoaching and NGS databases, and there are no registered marks within 1.8 miles. Found the coordinates using Microsoft Streets (very cheap, surprisingly good & functional software). Good eyes, though. Will

"Tell us why you hunt for marks." Because they are there. W

LSUMonica - I had the same problem. Got the same message last week. It was late so, I quit for the day. Next morning I tried uploading again and everything worked OK. Yesterday, I encountered the problem for a second time. So, I logged off, shut my browser, and went in to the next room to give my cat some fresh food. I came back, logged on and finished uploading my photos without incident. I don't know why the problem happened or what I did or didn't do to solve it. But, I think it has something to do with my cat. Will

Excellent point! I know that Wintertime has a Disney mark website, but I did not know that those marks had their own Waymarking category. I can't see it/find it on my view of the directory, where is it?? Will

In celebration of the 200th anniversary of the Corps of Discovery (Lewis and Clark expedition), the NGS and surveying-related state agencies are sponsoring a series of commemorative disks. When the program is completed in September, 2006, there will be about 30 such stations. Some are established in coordination with the NGS and some are established by state agencies or local surveyors only (that's why it's so hard to know the exact number). There may be more commemorative disks out there that locals have set that neither I nor the NGS nor anyone else in the benchmark hunting community know about. But, in any event, the actual number probably does not/will not exceed 50. The plan is for each disk to have its own PID eventually, at least for the ones set in coordination with the NGS. That is, each disk will eventually become a geodetic control point listed in the NGS database. About one-half have been documented for NGS inclusion so far (10 of 21 that I've found). Documenting the rest depends on the state and local agencies, so they may or may not ever become geodetic control points with PIDs. The first disk was dedicated at Monticello, VA, in January, 2003. The last will be at St. Louis, MO, on Sep, 23, 2006. Since the universe of these disks is limited with respect to number, location (along and related to Lewis and Clark's route), and time, my opinion is that they don't deserve their own sub-category. Since most will be geodetic control points not in the Geocaching database, they fit perfectly into the Recovered US Benchmarks category. That's just my two cents. Will p.s. wordy for the benefit of those unfamiliar with the program.

CallawayMT - I think the BDT is out-of-pocket for a few days. Regarding the ability to see the "Recovered US Benchmarks": This is a mystery. When I go to the site I can always see the Canadian things, the UK Tripoints and the Recovered US Benchmarks. If I don't LOGIN, I can't see the Portugese and Spanish points. When I actually LOGIN, I can see all five subcategories. Try logging in and see if that gives you access to the "Recovered US Benchmarks" category. Will

K.T. As stated above, pictures not mandatory. You fulfilled the primary objective for benchmark hunting when you got out and about to solve a small riddle - "Where's the mark?" Everything beyond that is gravy. The second (of several) reasons for searching for a mark is, whether found or not, to add to the body of knowledge that we (hobbyists, NGS, general public) have about both the marks in the database and the gazillions of marks that are not in the database. A couple of photos adds info to that body. Other good things about photos: They cause a benchmark hunter to impose a greater level of care upon him- or herself. It's mildly embarassing to claim you found ABC when the photo shows disk XYZ. An area photo showing the location of the mark and, maybe, one or two environmental references, makes it very easy for a subseqent hunter to find the mark. One of the perverse pleasures of this activity is to render hard-to-find marks easy-to-find. Many photos of marks and their environments are interesting in and of themselves. See the thread about the "Benchmark Picture Contest" - there are some Ansel Adams wannabe's among the eccentrics. Showing benchmark photos to people who have over-stayed their welcome is an effective way to get them to leave. Believe me, I know. Welcome aboard & good hunting. Will

Had the same problem yesterday, but the error appeared when I tried to upload photos to waymarks that I had created. Problem seems to haver gone away, though. Uploaded photos today, including to error-inducing waymarks of yesterday, without incident. Check again, maybe fixed for you as well. Will

Great idea. Thanks all above for setting up. Will attend.

Harry - Is KU3926 a rotating beacon? Will

Spoo – Good work. This give rise to another question (for the NGS): Can anybody but the NGS reset a CGS/NGS mark? If not, how could M16 get reset without the change being reflected in the NGS database? I suspect that other agencies can and do reset CGS/NGS marks when it suits their purpose. When they do so, can NGS levy a $250 fine if the other agency uses the old disk and does not update the database? And, if that’s the case, does Spoo get a 10% commission for uncovering the misdemeanor? Will

WOW!!!! Long-winded? No - superb story! Them "marker gods" are a mischievous lot - they play jacks with the universe. Wow! Will

Harry's right - sometimes the location of marks with SCALED coordinates can be WAY off. One day, I went in search of KV0202 at St. James' Church at the corner of Amboy Ave and Grove STREET in Woodbridge, NJ. Normally, I would not use my GPS to find a mark with SCALED coordinates. But the church was rebuilt after the last description so, to get another level of confidence that the mark was destroyed, I plugged in the coordinates and hit GOTO. The GOTO indicated that the mark was 0.5 miles north. I wondered, could there be another St. James Church? So I drove north along Amboy Ave until the GOTO said 0.0. And there I was, at the corner of Amboy Ave and Grove AVENUE. And that's how this sort of thing can happen: the "scaler" was working off a topo with street names and fixed the wrong Grove. 0.5 miles is the worst "miss" that I've seen. Typically, the coordinates for marks with SCALED coordinates are 100-150 feet from actual. When searching for marks with SCALED coordinates, the GPS' GOTO is good for telling you when you should start looking for a place to park. The written description is only way to find such marks reliably. Will

BDT - Well done ++++++!!!!. I just uploaded one and encountered only one bug: I selected a "monumentation type" from the drop-down list, but the upload routine demanded that I type in a monumentation type in the field for monumentation types not listed in the drop-down list. Very minor thing; maybe my mistake. Otherwise, very cool! Will

Finding a USGS not found = not common. Good job. W

Spoo - Interesting situation. According to the NGS datasheet, M16/OC0556 was set by the CGS and stamped M16 1933. The disk that you describe suggests that someone couldn't find the disk in 1939 so they established a RESET at that time, but never did the legwork to get it into the database. I also saw no listing for the RESET in the NGS database. Is the RESET disk a CGS/NGS disk as well? You state that the RESET was not there when you searched the area earlier. Art you absolutely, positively sure? Maybe, you've been punk'd by the NGS. Will

Coxy23 – Welcome aboard. Not only that (everything that BDT said, above), but most experienced benchmark hunters also include comments that correct or expand the description and “to-reach” information on the datasheet. For example, if a mark is described as being “14.0 south of the south curb of Smith Street” but, because the street has been widened, the mark now lies 6.5 feet south of the curb, it is general practice to include that observation in the comments. The objective is to make it easier for subsequent users to find the mark. You are correct: “the purpose of the hunt [is] the challenge of actually finding it”. For this reason, many hunters spend their time, energy and focus on marks that either have not been searched for yet or that have been searched for but remain un-found. Other hunters will search for previously-found marks only if they are conveniently located near/enroute to an un-found or unsearched-for mark. Most experienced hunters recommend that newbies search for one or two dozen previously-found marks to familiarize themselves with the process. Of course, there are marks (like the Washington Monument) that have been “found” dozens of times but can’t be passed up. Here’s a link to a recovery I recently did. It’s (quite) a bit more elaborate than the average “FOUND IT”, but you can get the idea. Compare my comments with the original 1992 description. AB2921 Good hunting. Will

Photobuff - I don't think that there is any problem with reporting the existence of the no-PID NYSDOT mark you found on the datasheet for NB0907 as long as you clearly identify the other mark as NOT the mark described in the datasheet. I do that regularly (record no-PIDs on the datasheet of the closest PID station) to keep track of the extraneous odds and ends that I've found. In the future, I think the new Waymarking site will probably have a category for US survey marks that are not in the Geocaching database. That will provide a standardized location and method for logging all the no-PIDs. You are correct NOT to log the disk as DESTROYED. It's easy to determine that a water tank has been razed; it's much much harder to determine reliably that a disk (especially when the location is defined by scaled horizontal coordinates) has been destroyed. I think I have only a single destroyed disk to my credit (because, in part, I think that a NOT FOUND with good comments is just as good). Metal detectors: I use a metal detector when I suspect that the disk I seek is either sub-surface or deep in a bunch of Poison Ivy (maybe, one in every twenty searches or so). I've had mixed results. Sometimes, it works like a charm. Other times (and, especially along road shoulders), there's so much metallic garbage mixed in with the fill that the detector becomes worthless. The detector is generally no help unless either 1. the location of the disk I seek is defined by adjusted horizontal coordinates (and the handheld can get me to within 10 feet of the location), or, 2. the location of the disk is dfined by scaled coordinates and the description provides at least one precise measurement from a surviving environmental reference. I would say that the metal detector has improved my "find rate" by about one or two percent, but it has shortened considerably the time I've spend searching for many marks that I would have found anyway. It is more of a time-saver than a disk-finder.

Odder still, The western boundary of Delaware is made up of three segments: the Tangent Line (about 82 miles long), the Arc Line (about 1.5 miles long), and the North Line (about 3.6 miles long). In 1764 - 1765, Mason and Dixon set 88 Portland Stone monuments to mark the boundary, and supplemented those stones with five or six "natural" stones (amphibolite gneiss) along the Arc Line segment. Two of those original six (?) natural stones have a "monumented" date of 1/1/1765. See JU3851 AND JU3849 I have no idea why. Will

"Monumented" mloser is correct. There are also cases where a mark has been set in place but not described or classified as "monumented" until years later. For example, many of the stones set by Mason and Dixon along the western boundary of Delaware in the 1760's were not "monumented" until the boundary was re-surveyed in the 1960's. In these cases, the word "monumented" is a term of art meaning "surveyed to the standards of the NGS and entered into the NGS' database, the National Spatial Reference System". Regarding "reset" marks. 97 percent of the time (my guess), when there is both an original station and a reset station listed in the database, the original station has been destroyed. Occasionally, both the original and the reset survive. In one case that I know of, a reset mark was established but was subsequently destroyed so that the original survives the reset. See KK1344 and KK0564 Will

casey - Please pass our condolences on to Craig's family and NGS colleagues. His name was well-known to all of us who used the NGS datasheet site. Will

NGS recovery standards vs. GC.com guidelines. We have always regarded the NGS standards as being more strict than GC.com guidlines because of the effect of NGS' standard for logging DESTROYED's. The bar is so high for destroyed disks that it has affected our thinking about all possible search outcomes. [The "emanations" from the "penumbras" of the DESTROYED standard has affected our assumptions about the standards for other possible recovery types.] In fact, the GC.com guideline for FOUND - "If the marker is a survey disk, you must read the disk [and the stamping must match the Designation] ..." has always been more strict than the NGS' standard. For some time, we've understood that NGS would accept a FOUND for the stem of a disk with ADJUSTED coordinates. Recently, as I recall, we had a discussion that seemed to conclude that NGS would accept a FOUND for the stem of a disk defined by SCALED coordinates. This second possibility makes no sense to me, but that's not important at this point. Now, even with the relatively clear and strict guidelines for disks, we know that many GC.com'ers will log FOUND if they stumble across any round thing on the ground in the general vicinity of a station. What's going to happen if the GC.com guidelines are changed to provide for "finding" stems and other indicia? You know what will happen - every scratch and chip and blob of gum will become FOUND geodetic control points. Here's what I think: First, leave the GC.com guidelines as they are, recognizing that the guidelines provide for recording what can be seen or not seen in the real, physical world. Second, improve and refine our understanding of the NGS standards, but confine discussions of such to this forum. It shouldn't be too hard to keep this in mind: the GC.com approach to benchmark hunting applies to what is or isn't there; the NGS approach seeks to provide information that is useful (very good word that m&h used, above) to the many users of the NGS database. Put another way: I think trying to make GC.com congruent with the NGS has a low probability of success. Make 'em more distinctly different instead. Will

BDT - Like I said, I've never seen an empty chamber. But m&h asks an interesting and very relevant question: "How far down is it reasonable ... to dig ...? I say one foot (+/- Brown Recluse spiders), but accurate recovery comments provide the useful information that renders the actual depth less than critically important. Will p.s. - I think Deb is still out-of-pocket via her work e-mail. w p.p.s. - Ignore p.s.

m&h - Interesting, multi-part question. Part One - the real, physical world: I note that the mark you sought at FJ0761 is a metal rod covered by a logo cap. You found the cap, opened it, and removed six to eight inches of soil. So, you ask, "Where's the rod?". I have recovered over 100 such rods (mostly in rural Maryland). I have found many chambers filled with sand or soil (and spiders, leaves, etc etc). In no case, however, have I ever failed to encounter the top of the rod more than about four or five inches below the lip of the chamber. FJ0761 would have would have piqued my curiosity, and (assuming I had my normal inventory of benchmark hunting tools with me) I would have gone down to a depth of about a foot - which is the practical limit for digging in the typical steel rod chamber without specialized tools. If I did not encounter the rod at that depth, I would begin to suspect that the rod, itself, was gone (unlikely, but possible). That would have been a surprise: I have seen a few rods bent out of plumb, but I have never encountered an empty chamber. How far should you have gone? I don't know. If I was in my full-throttle benchmark hunting mode, I would go down to about a foot. If I was on my way home from a wedding, I might not dig at all. Part Two - logging FJ0761 at Geocaching.com: Some time ago, there was a discussion about logging such rods. The consensus at the time was, as I recall, you could log a "FOUND" if the stamping on the collar of the chamber matched the designation. But, having lifted the cap and found no rod there, could you validly log it FOUND? I don't know what I would do. Could be FOUND if the stamping matched the designation; could be NOT FOUND as I saw no rod where a rod was supposed to be; could be NOTE, "Found the logo cap, confirmed the stamping, found no rod at eight inches down". I think I would log it as NOT FOUND if I failed to encounter the rod at the maximum depth possible with my tools and attention span. Part Three - reporting the recovery to NGS (and to the point of being useful): This is easy - either FOUND-POOR or NOT FOUND with, in either case, comments describing what you found. Something like "FOUND THE LOGO CAP, AS DESCRIBED IN 19XX, AND CONFIRMED THE STAMPING ON THE RIM. REMOVED SOIL TO A DEPTH OF EIGHT INCHES BUT DID NOT FIND THE STEEL ROD. HANDHELD COORDINATES ARE NXX-XX-XX.XX W0XX-XX-XX.XX" The comments are the useful part - Whoever had an interest in that station would know what they needed to know about it. Either the rod is not there or they need to bring a battery-powered shopvac with them if they intend to use the rod. Also, the fact that USPSQD reported the rod as GOOD should mean nothing, but it would, in fact, motivate me to dig an extra inch or two. That's my opinion. Will

Patty - Looking at your photos (assuming I'm correct that the view is along the south side of the bridge looking westerly), I think your mark would be in one of three possible places: Most likely, on the closer orange-outlined wing-wall and out of the photo at lower left and south of where the wing-wall transitions from a down-slope to level. Next most likely, at the top of the closer yellow-outlined wing-wall (where I would expect the wing-wall to have a small flat section), but now covered by the green-outlined concrete screen wall/retaining wall/abutment. By your photos, the concrete of the green-outlined section looks newer than the orange and yellow outlined sections. But also, anywhere else on the bridge. Maybe it's just my atypical experience, but I have noticed a lot of direction-confusion regarding the location of marks on bridges - more so than for marks on buildings, etc. Also, I would not be even slightly surprised were you unable to find the mark. In high-growth areas like Santa Clara County, CA (and Fairfax County, VA) the DOT seems to devote a great deal of time and effort rebuilding or replacing bridges, to the detriment of the marks mounted thereon. I would be surprised if your bridge was not widened, etc. in the past 45 years. Will