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Carbon Hunter

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Posts posted by Carbon Hunter

  1. I guess the Lockdown months are now going to be some of the hardest (after 2001/2002) to find caches that were hidden - especially in SA?

     

     

    Is there any way to do a correlation of when our experienced cachers (say >100 finds) found their first find and were converted to experienced cachers - and also how many cachers have been regular finders over at least a 2 -3 year period.

     

    I really believe that to keep our game sustainable we need more cachers - then the hides / finds / events / etc. follow organically.

  2. Wow - only 200 finds a year - I'm sure this is also lower - even on a cache like Table Mtn - can you plot maximum (or perhaps "mode or average" for the top 10 caches over the past few years? I'm sure this is also significantly down?

  3. On ‎6‎/‎28‎/‎2018 at 10:48 AM, STNolan said:

    Whelp, nearly 4 years later and I just killed an hour looking at old stats. This was an awesome compilation of data... I wonder if the trends noted in 2014 have continued into 2018?

    Agreed-  they are fascinating - Danie Viljoen is brilliant

    • Upvote 1
  4. On ‎7‎/‎17‎/‎2018 at 9:21 AM, Bouts777 said:

    The number of active EarthCaches in South Africa crept to over 400! Well done.

    Awesome South Africa - I can remember when there were less than 10!!!!!!

    • Upvote 1
  5. 3 hours ago, Danie Viljoen said:

    2017 Statistics, part 8: Finds distribution

    This should be read with part 6.

    • 1902 cachers have found 1 South African cache during 2017
    • 1112 cachers have found 2
    • 761 cachers have found 3
    • 585 cachers have found 4
    • 418 cachers have found 5

     

    That's about 4500 newbies - or fringe players - take 1/2 away for tourists and we still end with well over 2000 local cachers with potential to grow into the next geelvink or PieterM - there are some awesome "new" cachers of just over a year or so who now have 1000+ cache finds - we need to grow more of these - even if they only convert to a 100+ finders per year.

    • Upvote 1
  6. My comments on our 2017 stats:

     

     

    • The total number of caches placed - lowest for 5 years! Hopefully we can turn that around
    • Cache finds - downward - but we'll need to see if that is a trend or just a normal anomaly
    • with over 180 Will Attend logs still needed (as of early Feb) for the possible MEGA in Gauteng - it seems like we need to do some major recruiting in the caching community in 2018
    • I do  not believe that SA is anywhere near saturation level - if we look at a metro area like Durban - less than 50 odd regular cachers - this could easily hit the 500 mark to be comparable with Germany / US etc. - so with more cachers comes more caches. Similarly - areas like Newcastle ' Pietermaritzburg / East London / Rustenburg / Nelspruit / Witbank / Bloemfontein / Upington / Kimberley / Ladysmith / Bethlehem etc. - all large towns - with very few cachers. I still say cacher numbers are the issue - not number of caches
    • I personally don't have an issue with certain "big number" finders having few hides. It would be nice to have them hiding - but each and every one of us plays the game in the way it works for us.
    • Western Cape will remain the primary destination (tourists both international and local) - plus there are AWESOME cachers in the area - and some brilliant caches. I love caching there - and I'm a true blue Natalian. We all just need to co0ntiunue encouraging new cachers and placing new quality caches. The western Cape also lends itself to a more outdoorsy lifestyle.
    • Canary Islands got 60000 odd more finds for 2017! That is huge. I really hope we reverse this trend - it's good to be the biggest in Africa.
    • Interesting that Free State got almost twice the number of finds that KZN did (based on pie chart)
    • Alarming that 1902 cachers only logged a single cache (even if you half that for tourists) - it means new cachers don't see the point - QUALITY caches are the key to keep us old folks interested and attract newbies.
    • While an average finds of 18 caches sounds good - the median of 4 is bad - it means the large numbers of guys like geelvink and the others  - are overshadowed by the huge numbers who do not change into regular cachers. We need to see new faces!
    • Just over 2 finds a month (28)  places you in the top 10% of cache finders in SA!!!!!! Very alarming on cacher "stickiness"
    • We are having many many caches archived each year - agreed some may be archived too soon - but maintenance needs to be kept up on caches placed - or good quality caches that last need to be placed.

     

    Letss get out there and break records in 2018 - let's grow our hobby

    • Upvote 1
  7. From this table I see SA is at position 23 in the global enabled hides list.

     

    I seem to recall that in years gone by we were a little higher up the list (around 18 if I remember correctly). I have been scouring the old stats list (and apart from having a good giggle at some of the early stats - like being amazed at someone finding 24 Events in total - cowandchicken) - I could not find the list of countries - does anyone have access to the top countries by time?

  8. 2 hours ago, GlobalRat said:

    Good point... had my years mixed up.  I guess the PS phase gave boosts in certain years. 

    On the upside, for the majority of us there are still 1000's of caches to be found.  Thinking back to the mid "noughties" where there were literally zero unfound caches and we had to urge fellow cachers to hide a cache just so that there would be something to find.  Currently, supply is outstripping demand, so very far from a crisis yet.

    PS??? What is that?

    Agreed - yes we all still have 1000s to find.

     

    I guess the concern is that sustainability is showing a rverse direction - and for the past few years we've seena  downward trend - while countries like New Zealand and France are still seeing growth.

     

    E Cape is pleasing to see - so we need to learn in the likes of WC; GP and KZN

  9. 5 hours ago, GlobalRat said:

    I think the pending Mega will boost numbers a bit again in the coming year

    But 2012 and 2014 did not show much of a spike? So unless it is a targeted strategy for 2018 MEGA not sure how it will change?

  10. 5 hours ago, Danie Viljoen said:

    Worrying trends, part 2:

     

    The number of first-time cachers in the year ending 31 August 2017 is 30% fewer than the previous year, and 31% fewer than in 2015. That is a loss of almost a third!

    So what can be done to reverse this?

    Newbie events (bring a friend) - are organisations like the boy Scouts now saturated - do we need to get support from HQ to promote caching in Africa - what about neighbouring countries - surely Zim & Namibia in particular could do with some growth.

     

    Do we need cache hiders of the ilk or Crystal Fairy and TechnoNut again to saturate areas?

     

    What about a province like E Cape - with the large growth in cache numbers - have we seen an associated growth in cachers?

     

    • Upvote 1
  11. Very sad

     

    Could we perhaps keep track of some of the SA stalwarts who have passed on.

     

    I think of Madsons a few years ago in a car accident - and a fine lady from Welkom (I forget her name) - I'm sure there are many more I am forgetting.

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