Cushie Butterfield

Who gave you permission to place it there? Nobody gave me specific permission. I went by the precedent that none of the 25 or so other caches in the (fairly big) area had been placed with express permission. The area is NOT used for live firing after all, and the geocaching guidelines themselves stated only that permission MAY be required. I could understand why the MOD wouldn't want physical geocaches in live firing ranges, but this area is not used as that. Its basically woodland. Then you had no right to put it there, you can't just tramp over land belonging to somebody else without their permission! "It is necessary that you read and understand the Cache Listing Requirements and Guidelines prior to placing each and every geocache. Please make sure to obtain permission from the landowner or land manager."

Who gave you permission to place it there?

I refilled a cache with a load of goodies only for a local cacher to come and take most of the new stuff out to make room for some TBs he was setting away. If he put something bigger than a micro or nano himself he could have put them in one of his own.

I use a Mac (would never think about a PC) and a Garmin 60 CSX, I just plug my GPS in with a USB then on the cache list I click the GPS icon, it finds my Garmin and transfers it straight over, it takes seconds.

I just read that through and I know I sound a right miserable cow but I do feel like the proverbial purple faced farmer sometimes, I want to jump up and down and shout "get off my land" If we leave the gates open we are regularly visited by 'scrap metal dealers' and have had all sorts stolen, chainsaws, generator, welding stuff, trailer, building materials so it makes us more suspicious of normal people just being nosey to see what's at the end of the track or in the barn. We've also had a couple of nasty incidents with escaped horses thanks to riders letting them out while they go through the gate. I do like geocachers and I am even friendly sometimes...

We had a cache placed on our land without permission, near to a pubic footpath but adjacent to a field due to have lambs in there (a family pet dog was shot two weeks later for running off lead amongst the sheep) When I complained it was archived after a few days but in that short time it was active we had two occasions when cachers parked at the private entrance to our farm, leaving enough room to get a car through but the tractor wouldn't have fit through. I watched one couple try to take a short cut through the woods which are private and have no public right of way. Another (a man with a GPS so I assume he was caching) drove up to the top of the track, went off to find and then complained that they had been locked in - the shepherd had locked the gate behind him. We had to drive down to the gate to let them back out. The people who placed the cache (friends of friends so I recognised two of the group) were seen walking across three fields with no public access where there was a new born foal with a very anxious mother. Nothing serious but very annoying that they see fit to just tramp where they want, and do what they want on our property. It makes me want to find out where they live, park on their drives and walk around their gardens, see how they like it. The majority of cachers do care about their impact but that still leaves plenty who don't. A landowner deserves the choice of having a game played on their land or not.

Yes it does matter, if it's on private property then the landowner should have a choice if they want it there or not. It's not just about a hidden box, it's about people looking for it and the way they look for it. Not all geocachers care about the impact their actions have on other people.

Maybe they went to the same finishing school?

Do you have a smartphone? There are apps you can download for geocaching

I often use the Days Inn on Warwick Services on the M42, a family room is anything from £15 to £30 on late rooms.com. There are some lovely restaurants in the villages close by and you can park right at the front of the hotel. It's always been lovely and clean when we have stayed there

I have also met some fantastic people since I started caching, friendly and kind. I know they are in the majority but it only takes one person to spoil the fun.

I have thought about placing a nice puzzle multi cache up here, I have some excellent sneaky bits all ready and I thought it would be good to spot geocachers nearby and offer them a cup of tea and have a chat but they are not all nice people and we can't pick and choose who would come looking. We have a bridle path which is along the track to our house, we have had to lock the gate at the bottom (half a mile away) because we get all sorts of people coming along, from people just being nosey to others looking to see what they can steal (why do they always assume there is scrap metal along a track). We get walkers who find it easier to park at the top of the hill rather than walk the half mile extra (it is steep!) They get quite angry when we go out and lock the gate behind us and they are stuck inside until we get back! When the gate is locked we get cars parked on the other side which leaves enough room for our cars but not for the harvester or the sheep truck and tractors. One now and again is annoying, we just don't want to do anything to encourage more. We do have all of the ROWs marked with the council signs, we make sure they are clear and make sure our own dogs aren't running loose on our land unsupervised and we do make the effort to be friendly because it's embarrassing for some people when they find they need to walk within a few yards of our family out having a barbecue and they have every right to be there, it was a ROW long before we moved here. It has made me much more aware of other people's property when we go caching, in the past, before we moved here, I wouldn't have thought much about sticking to the path but now I can see how annoying it can be to somebody else if I don't.

Please don't place caches on private property without permission (then lie about it on your submission) and just assume that it will be alright because the landowner is not likely to find out about it. We have several public footpaths and bridle paths across our property, they are a right of way only, the land you walk upon still belongs to the landowner. It's bad enough having to put up with trespassers who think it's OK to drive up the bridle path and park on private property while they go for a walk, they think it's OK to take a shortcut across fields with livestock (with loose dogs killing free ranging hens or chasing a two day old foal) rather than stick to the rights of way and walk the long way round without having the unwanted extra foot traffic from geocachers, some of whom are as irresponsible. We have some lovely people out walking here, we always help them if they are lost and have let them use the loo and even given a lift to five lost walkers who were five miles off route so we aren't anti public but it would be lovely if there was some kind invisible force that kept them on the rights of way and off our land.

Sad to say I can beat that Zero miles http://www.geocaching.com/track/details.aspx?id=853636 http://www.geocaching.com/track/details.aspx?id=1291360 I've lost quite a few in this area, I very rarely let any go now.

I thought it was a paper one also, until I looked at the photo. I agree that there is already a lot of graffiti and the tower is derelict so the damage won't really make a huge difference, it just makes me angry that they thought it was a normal thing to do! Let's hope we don't see more "Lunchbox and Pete waz 'ere" carvings in trees and fences at cache sites. I have fond memories of the cache, it was our third, done on my birthday when we first started out, it took forever to find the tower and when we did it was dusk. I'm frightened of the dark anyway but there were twigs tied up in symbols all over like the Blair Witch Project film and I was pooping myself trying to find the way out of the woods. Even worse, we got lost on the way back to the car so I ended up dragging my poor kids on a 9 mile walk through the lanes while my husband drove around them looking to rescue us. Not to be beaten we went back in daylight the next day to find it (after reading the instructions for our new GPS) I think that's why the log made me angry, we had so much fun that day and it was an adventure for us, reading it felt like they had defaced the memories as well as the cache site. Silly and sentimental on reflection I suppose.

I was just looking through the logs of a local cache as it has a high favourite listing and came across the last log. It's a new cacher logging as a first find, however they couldn't find the cache so to prove they had been there they carved into a brick on the building! Why on earth would anyone think that it's acceptable to do something like this? http://www.geocaching.com/seek/log.aspx?LUID=b5b16119-c2a2-4ca3-965a-0a09a5bd2415

I like to do both, I live in the countryside, I can drive 6 miles to the coast, a couple of historic towns and have a beautiful old city 7 miles away. I have enjoyed caching in all locations but if I am on my own I feel safer in the 'urban' environments. If I have company I will venture out into the countryside then if I fall over and break something, get lost or encounter a weird person I have somebody with me. I'm off to Athens at the weekend for a wedding and hope to find at least one cache in the city for my map.

I wasn't suggesting that anyone should stand and be attacked, I was just trying to help by suggesting one solution. I don't have a problem with anyone defending themselves against an aggressive dog whichever way is chosen. Having been very badly mauled on one occasion and fended off numerous attacking dogs during my career, I would personally try and deter a dog by startling it before I would start a fight with it.

The trouble is that inflicting pain on a dog causes either fight or flight, fine if it runs away but if it triggers a fight response you could be very badly bitten.

These compressed air cans are good to carry and squirt at dogs that come near you http://www.moreforpets.ltd.uk/corrector-spray-p-1084.html?osCsid=av3t84isa3gtes5ba88aunmcr7 You don't have to be bitten for a dog to contravene the dangerous dogs act, even if you only fear that you will be bitten or hurt that is enough for the police to be involved. If a dog barked at you, made you jump back and you tripped over and hurt yourself that's enough for the owner to be prosecuted. A dog doesn't have to attack to be deemed dangerous. I don't think a lot of dog owners realise how far reaching the law is. We have quite well trained dogs and we're lucky enough to have enough space to exercise ours without taking them to public places but when they do go out they are never let off lead. It's just not worth the risk.

Auctions finish today, thank you for your interest

I'm selling a lot of my collection, some lovely coins listed with more to follow, please check out my auctions here http://shop.ebay.co.uk/rustyfairy/m.html

That is correct, I asked that they not be sold. Some people have honored my requests, others have not. However, I have always offered a trackable in exchange but in the end, the person who holds the coin gets to do what they want. I learned a very valuable lesson with this coin I'm sorry, I had no idea about this, I bought the coin on Ebay a few years ago. I am selling them to help my son with his university fees so swapping for another coin isn't really an option for me at the moment. I am sure Stephanie is kind enough to understand that if I bought it then I have the right to sell it and recoup my outlay, had it been a gift then of course it would be wrong to sell it. I don't really want to enter into a prolonged discussion, I don't like selling any of my coins but needs must.

I apologise, it's the first time I have sold any coins and obviously didn't take in all of the guideline information.

I have begun listing my geocoin collection on Ebay to help with my son's university fees. The first to go is one of only 15 coins released as an Artist Edition by Stephanie of Tsunrisebay. I'm happy to ship worldwide. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie...4#ht_500wt_1085 I will also be adding my lilypad, and rainforest frogs coins so please check out my other coins too <non-trackable mention removed by moderator>