critterator

I was a Brownie and Girl Guide and always found our trips were pampered and 'girlie'. I didn't learn any outdoor skills. In brownies they taught table setting, and a good friend who lived in a small isolated town, got to watch a intructional video on being a good wife while in Brownies (this is in the 90's. by the way). The only good part about my years in Guides was the cookies. Girls in Canada are now allowed to join Boy Scouts (So I guess it's not boy scouts anymore)

It would be kind of neat to make it a "pay it forward" geocoin. Whoever finds it then has to do something extra nice for someone else. It is a bit cheezy I know, but it would be a nice wway to hounour the person who sent it to you.

I've been trying harder to bike or take a horse to caches, which takes a good deal longer (a three part multi took me all day yesterday), but I get some exercise out of it. I try to keep my car caching to a minimum, or when I'm already in the area doing something else. Gas prices make a great motivator to reduce my CO2 emissions!!

definately fake!! wiggling around you say? It's obviously robotic...the cord around the tree is obviously a decoy. The real cache is inside the fake robotic snake!! At least you got some good snake pictures out of it, I'd probably be happier with the pictures than a ftf.

Slammers would be great swag...no worries about soggy cardboard! Me and my sister used to make our own because they were too expensive. hmmm...I wonder where they went.

perhaps a letterbox hybrid. Coordinates to a parking lot don't have to be particularily precise since a parking lot usually takes up more room than a very localized cache location. That would fail the GPS use test required in the guidelines. The coordinates would have to be to a specific object. A parking lot does not fulfill that requirement. Good to know. *grins* why a newbie should never be trusted to give another newbie advice.

perhaps a letterbox hybrid. Coordinates to a parking lot don't have to be particularily precise since a parking lot usually takes up more room than a very localized cache location.

*edit* *points way up* this is in response to confucious cat...got a little distracted while writing and new post appeared. We will have to shoot the bears, coyotes and innocent fluffy bunnies as well...we could turn it into a community event... Once again, it comes down to the park. Most parks apart from small urban parks, list both the enjoyment of the people and protection of natural resources in there mission statements. The park system I work for stated goal # 1 as "secure and enhance regionally significant landscapes and critical habitat" followed by providing outdoor recreation and improving quality of life. And yes, we have parts of the park where people aren't allowed. For the rest of the park, it's about finding a balance between the two. In a natural area thats rather close to a large population, its easier said than done. Opening the trail up to the public would take significant resources. Increased use, would create a need to resurface the trail, maps reprinted, signs changed and added, bear-proof garbages installed (which are surprisingly pricey), and allow for staff time to patrol the trail. Of course, after all this, all the fun of one of those side trails is gone. If we don't do trail improvements it becomes a liability issue. It's the problem with a natural area so close to high populations. Now you say "what do you think people are stupid?" well not most people...but for the same reason coffee cups say "warning:contents may be hot", and peanut packets say "may contain traces of peanuts", we have to remove potential dangers from high use trails. While I personally love the smaller, less maintained trails, and am always annoyed by the need to denaturalize nature, the best place to experience them is in the backcountry, or at least a bit further from high population densities where fewer users mean a bit more freedom, and a far better wilderness experience. Lots of land (well at least around here) that is not managed by a parks system and open to the public is full of great trails that will satisfy the adventure seekers needs.

That is a REALLY broad brush! Many parks and public lands do not limit use by the public to "on trails only." And "park managers and ecosystems worldwide" differ widely in their sensitivity and rules. Park geocaching as we know it would soon go by the wayside if ALL parks required all caches to be on trail. This is true to some degee, very high use day areas, and urban or city parks, are often an exception (but not always). The sensativity of an ecosystem, the level of use, and the park maagers job all play a role in how they treat off trail activity. In the far reaches of the backcountry, where there are no trails, people are encouraged to spread out rather han centralize their impact. I like the idea of cache permits, or having a clear set of rules. I realize it can be a pain in the but for those who are placing a cache. Parks Canada, and as shop99er stated, some state parks, have some fairly sticky rules about where a geocache can go (parks Canada even requires that the cache be educational). Getting something a bit more formal for cahcing in parks has been something I've been wanting to do. Both provincial parks and regional parks in my area have no system set up and the result is some ineffective management practices. Park systems everywhere just need more geocachers v As for our off trail paths...no I'm not blaiming geocaching for there existance. Actually, the trail probably started off as a game trail, which a few people decided to go up, then a few more, then a few more. Now, we have people walkeing around uing flagging tape to mark these trails and remoing natural barriers we put up. The cache owner and cachers who find it probably don't even know that we don't maintain or encourage these trails. Nevertheless, there presence is definately not helping the problem. As I said before, most cachers use there sense when placing a cache. I'd be hard pressed to find a cacher who wants to increase their impact. Anyway, I've decided just to contact them myself explaining the situation. If that fails, I guess we'll send a message to Groundspeak. Thanks for the advice folks.

I'm a park worker. Usually, people around here caching in parks stick to park etiquette guidelines, and I've never bothered with worrying about them. At a park I recently switched to, we have a big problem with people making there own trails. Some of them are so well used that they look park maintained. The park is fairly cache heavy and though I haven't fhad the chance to find it yet, one cache inparticular states that it's along one of these paths. I brought it up to a co worker and she said the week before I arrived, she and the bossman found some folks coming uot of one of these paths. When questioned they said they were geocaching (this being the first time the two park workers had heard about it). The Bossman told them to go remove the cache, which of course they didn't. Removing someone elses cache is just rude. But for us, and especially me, it's now become a liability issue (since we know about a reason to go off trail that could easily be removed) So here's my question to you? what would be the most appropriate way to approach people and tell them that there cache placement isn't park friendly. I've herd of other rangers in other parks doing thing like leaving notes in the cache telling te owner to remove it, which doesn't seem effective or just removing it, which I wouldn't want to do since I'm a geocacher myself. Would it be appropriate to make an account under the parks name (with the park managers permission of course) and send them an email explaining what's wrong with it and asking them to move it or disable it?, or would this be considered inpropper use of an account? should I contact them as myself and risk having local geocachers think I'm a tattle tale? Other people have also pointed out in the logs (somwhat subtly) that the cache is inappropriatley placed, but there are also logs like this. The hider has responded saying the path hasn't grown since the cache was placed...of course it hasn't disapeared either, which is what the park wants. But there are still logs like this: We are also planning on baracading all user made paths in the parks, since natural barriers haven't been working. And finally a quick plee to all other folks, for the sake of your parks and the safety of your cache (from evil park rangers such as myself), please place your cache on trail. Those fun little side paths may seem great, but they reate headaches for park managers and ecosystems worldwide.

Well, that's the last time I place a cache in the men's room!, but what if I have to pee really badly and the lineup for the ladies room is ridiculously long??

Was it in a park? Park workers who find geocahes during maintanence, or are worried about off trail caches in the park may go on a cach removal binge (including the on trail ones). Though in most instances I've heard of, they'll contact the cache owner. Every park, and park system is different in how they treat geocaches and how much they know about geocaching (often nothing).

From a log on the earthcache page (the earcache seems to be at the bottom) The path looks fun but it seems you have to be sneaky (and brave/stupid/carzy) , with anchors in some of the sketchier areas (though the anchors are probably equally sketchy). It would be pretty cool if it ever got restored.

They were probably playing some sort of crazy world-wide game that none of us no about and were wondering what the crazy muggle (they call them muggles in their game too probably) was was doing under the bridge, and have now written about it on a forum about a someone crawling around under the bridge when they thought they finally had te area to themselves.

A new cache appeared on a horse trail near my house so I decided to bring my horse. I got to the area and dismounted. I looked around a bit, but was restricted to the length of the reins for distances I could look off the the trail. I saw a great stump a few feet away, and decided to let go of the horse for a brief moment to check, hoping the horse wouldn't notice. Of course the horse realized she was free, and took off towards hom. At least I'd tucked the reins up so I knew she wouldn't get tangled, but I had to kick myself for the bad horse sense, and worry about her and any other people she may have passed on the way home. I found her at home, perfectly fine, and no frightened hikers or horseback riders on the way home. I returned later that day on foot. As it turns out, it was in a birdhouse...I could have reached it without even getting off the horse . Next time I bring the horse I'll have to remember a halter to tire her up with.

The point with bird's nests though is they don't have to be torn apart to potentially scare a momma bird away from her eggs or young ones. Even just feeling around and leaving your scent is all it could take. But I do appreciate all opinions, I just hope the bird nest cache doesn't catch on too much. Actually thats an old wives tale that was proved false long ago. In fact wild life experts say that wives tale actually very much harms birds because someone will see a baby bird on the ground and refuse to touch it for fear of the mother abandoning it because of the human sent, in reality you HAVE to pick up that bird and return it or the mother has no real way of helping it. Birds are not cats, they can't just pick up their baby and fly it back up to the nest. While the whole scent thing has been prooven wrong, that doesn't mean that a cache near a birds nest won't cause a disruption, especially at a busy cache site. The sight and sound of a cacher rummaging around near their nest will cause stress to the babies and scare mom and disrupt her feeding and care of the young. Also the cacher could inavertantly bump the nest. It may not seem like a big deal, and maybe it isn't if the cache isn't visited very often. Researchers will poke around nests without any obvious ill effects on the birds, but in a busy place, the birds are going to start getting stressed.