infiniteMPG

Oh, okay. Great!! thanks!! Poked all around the new website and don't see anything referencing a rating system or rewards system and doesn't appear to be anything new on the log entry page either. Is there going to be a "new" new website? And when you're on a cache listing page the GC logo in the upper left is only partially displayed and that is the only way to return to the main GC page as the "home" link in the upper left is gone.

I can see your point but if someone logged a DNF on a cache I own because it was surrounded by palmetto bushes and they didn't like pushing thru palmettos, and the next person logged a DNF because they were too hot from the sun and turned back before getting to GZ, and the next person logged a DNF because the direction they approached from had too much poison ivy, and the next person logged a DNF because they heard something rustling in the bushes and they got scared, and the next person couldn't get to GZ because of muggles.... then my cache would have a ton of DNF's and no one would search for it as they would all see it as all DNF's yet it's still there and still active but no one put the effort into looking for it. Lots of people filter out caches with multiple DNF's and won't search for them. Lots of people still push thru palmettos and poison ivy and critters and heat and find the cache and note that in their logs. If someone's really concerned about the area around GZ then you would need to read logs anyway and text in a note will tell you just as much as text in a DNF log. Agree with that sentiment more then you can imagine! If the cache was at least half way decent, give the owner a little notice for their efforts and write a log entry.

I'll give anyone 5 free finds if they can fix the fact that this site hangs occasionally and then double posts messages that can't be deleted.... ::sigh::

Anyone who wants to pad thier numbers, post a new PAG online but don't hide a container, when it gets published log 10,000 finds to it and then archive it. Feel better now? We would too as it would totally invalidate every find number everyone ever had and we can get back to having fun hiding and finding caches.....

Find 'em and date the find pre-your adoption, the find will be lost way deep in the archives (unless there's not many finds). You can also type whatever you want under the "Who placed the cache?" field so just enter "tansnairb" or "oevnafang" or something on your adopted caches and see if anyone ever notices.....

Hmmm, with +250 hides I could jack my numbers up really QUICK!!!! While you're at it why not claim the FTF on all your caches, too? I mean you were the first one to locate it after it was hidden.... Naw... that's about as low as low can go and unless numbers are the only reason someone caches, they shouldn't even have that thought cross their mind. I have some hides where I grew up in NC and I have placed caches here to pay back people for helping me maintain them. They have ownership of them but I maintain them for them. They are not "mine", do not show up as "mine" but show up as not found caches in my home territory which irks me. But no way I'd even think of claiming a find on them, I hid them! Duh! I do have a local PAG that's camo'ed good and got some DNF's on it about 6 months ago and when I checked on it, I almost gave up after 15 minutes but finally found it myself. Then a month or so ago, I started to get DNF's on it again (it's tricky) and when i checked on it again, once again I almosy wrote it off as missing but found it. After all that work I felt like I should get to claim a find.... but no, I won't.

They have a few blurry still shots, too, and Fish & Game are investigating. Was thinking bobcat at first, too, but this is a lot bigger then any bobcats I've seen and the coat is solid tan, no dark markings like most bobcats have. Should have any answer back today as New Channel 8 WFLA picked up on the story and hopefully will have a news story broadcast today as they interviewed his wife last night. Agreed with our Florida State Bird (the skeeter) being a big danger and some places between they and the horse flies it's a race to see if you can outrun them. Had a nest of ground dwelling bees in a palmetto shrub by the house, disturbed them when on the riding mower and they dang well let me know they were not happy.... ouch!

If hanging and you want it light, I'd avoid the ammo can if you can.... that coming down by accident could do some damage. We have a local cache that's actually a 5-gallon bucket waaaaaay up in a tree and it's using camo rope thru a pulley system to let it down, can't put weight like that just in a rope over a tree branch, would cut in too fast and jam. Here's another alternative and you can probably call these folks up and request a "sample" for something you're working on. Although not with these people direct, we do that all the time http://www.cleartecpackaging.com/cleartec-catalog-2007.pdf Good luck!!!

Glad to see that occasionally I get a log email from someone who still writes a nice long adventure story. But that might go hand in hand with the kinds of hides today, too. We sometimes write a little in the cache log book but I know there have been times we've been literally getting eaten alive by our Florida state birds (the mosquito!) and it's all we can do to scribble something, re-hide it and RUN!!!!! And we also look at the more you write, the sooner the log will fill and a maintenance run be required by the owner. Sometimes we see micro logs with BIG TEXT signatures or people that write their whole caching name on a nano log. We save most of our writing for the online log.

I think most everyone in here ended up at the same destination, just took different paths to get there. Not going to be the GBI (Geocaching Bureau of Investigation) but we'll all deal with blatent bogus logs as much as we would any other issues as we defend and protect our property (our hides) as responsible cache owners should. As far as the burning at the stake.... got any marshmallows?

Another potential solution.... go to Lowe's or Home Depot and snag a piece of 4" or larger PVC pipe. Then glue on an plug end cap and on the other end put a female threaded cap with the big threaded plug like this : This way you can find the PVC pipe that best fits inside the camo, cut the pipe to the length you need and custom make it and cachers can just unscrew the end (might add something light glue on a bar for a handle to make the plug easier to unscrew as some people might tighten it tighter then others)

Did you bring the cache container along as some means of self defense?

....and more competitive. Not what this is all about. I'd rather see a cache rating system.... oops! Didn't mean to bring that up.... again. Yes he did.....

Sounds like you had one lonely hippo around Cottonwood Creek (not a good day to be out geocaching in your hippo outfit) And that bear looks strangely like Bigfoot....

I know that each area of the country has it's share of critter who prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that man is not necessarily the top of the food chain. A co-worker's wife spotted something out their back window and captured THIS short video of a rather large Florida Panther stalking something in their back yard. They live in a very urban area of North Port, Florida (just south of the Tampa Bay area on the west coast), and it's a pretty strong wake-up call that those late day trek's into the wilderness alone, might be an invite to be a main course. Ran across bobcats, gators close by, large snakes (stepped on one which got me a "Focus!" geocaching t-shirt as a reminder present), and large families of wild hogs that I almost ran over one on my mountain bike, but have not ran across one of these kitties yet (and hope I don't). Do things like this make you hessitate to head into the wild, especially alone? What exeriences have you experienced with critters in the wild?

Dang double posts..... ::sigh::

You do have a pretty broad selection of Tupperware and Lock-n-Lock sizes and shapes as stated by wesleykey. There are also military ammo holders (like for rockets) like THESE that are 13cm diameter X 26cm long (apx 5" diameter X 14" long). But I am sure if you search around you can find other sizes.

New for 2009 - Wii-Caching.... comes complete with the thorny vine attachment to wrap around your legs, cyber-mud buckets for your feet, surround sound skeeter buzzing sound track and realistic controller that will have you swearing you're really holding that soaking wet log sheet!

Just got a FTF on a church cache that had listed they had the pastor's permission. Went there on a Monday morning and the parking area was packed and the cache was behind a fenced off storage area way in the back where church equipment is stored. While I think the pastor may have given permission, it did not appear the congregation or general church public knew as the looks I got walking thry the parking area in my camo gear made me think about going inside to ask for forgiveness. Church caches are borderline on my list even with permission, unless very carefully placed. There is normally daycare services, schooling and lots of children's activities there even during the week and outsiders are often scrutanized.

I think there is a little misunderstanding of what a DNF is for a lot of people. Once I found myself owning enough caches to have to make maintenance runs a couple times a week, I got a new perspective on DNF's and we also use in our searching. If we reach the cache area and something beyond our control stops our search, such as a thunderstorm rolling in (in Florida this time of year is every day between 4pm-10pm), police parked 10-feet from GZ, bumper crop of poison ivy protecting GZ, grunting sounds in the darkness, etc, then we only post a note that we were halted and we'll be back. if we put forth any decent effort at GZ to search for the cache but can't find it then we post a DNF. As an owner, a DNF alerts us that there may be problems with the hide, so we keep a closer eye on it. If someone didn't even really look, I'd rather not have that DNF pop up and put us on a higher state of alert. When the log emails come thru, the ones with the term "couldn't find" in the title are the first ones we read. The others are entertainment

If someone KNEW a bogus log existed on their cache and then they did NOTHING about it then they could be seen as CONDONING it. If someone does NOT know if any logs are bogus on their hides and they don't do anything to investigate it, they can be 100% AGAINST bogus logs, it's just they don't have knowledge of any to act upon. As stated before if a bogus log were to come to most cache owner's attention, they would deal with it, including myself. We are just not putting effort in to validating if a log is bogus or not unless something throws up a flag and appears to be. Are you stating if we don't actively investigate if a valid sounding logs are bogus then we're condoning bogus logs? Because if you're not, somehow we're kind of agreeing on this

Some people look at a DNF as a failure, not realizing how valuable a tool that can be to the owner. We go by the phylosophy that if we actually put some effort towards searching and we couldn't find it we log a DNF. If we got turned away by muggles, or a storm hit, or something prevented us from putting forth any decent effort to look then we post a note stating such. As an owner, any DNF that comes across is an immediately flag on the watch list to see if more follow suit as the cache gets more attention in case it is missing. A note saying something like "We parked but it started pouring before we could reach GZ, we'll be back" would be less of an alert since no real search occurred. And sometimes "he" is busy and "he" stumbles over "his" glasses in "his" haste to read a post. Sorry about missing that.... Thought it said to delete posts that "appear" to be bogus? I think bogus logs should be deleted but someone could say that meant a log which "appears" valid but is bogus doesn't need to be deleted <---insert tongue in cheek here

Ebay has hard rules and it is a legally binding contract between buyers and sellers, the example was given to show that Ebay provides a forum for buyers and sellers to get together for a sales transaction. Ebay would step in for violtaions but if you read Ebay, the rules are concise, clear and legally binding. GC has vague guidelines and is not legally binding and non-contractual. It's just a forum for bringing owners and cachers together for some recreational fun. I would assume so, too, if it was proven to them. But proving it to them might be tricky. Or they might sit back and claim no harm no foul and let the owners handle them if they think they don't harm the game. They dealt a death blow to virtuals over this issue and I am sure if they felt this was a serious problem they'd deal with these, too. Since nothing has been done can we assume they don't feel this is a serious issue?

Allowing someone to log a bogus find and not doing anything about it is condoning them, allowing someone to litter and not doing anything about it is not condoning littering....? Hmmmm, me thinks that would be a tad hypocritical. I have never stated bogus logging is forgivable, condoned, or acceptble and I have repeatably stated I would deal with any that came to my attention and IMHO needed dealing with. What seems to be missed is I don't see a need to hunt for them if they're not jumping out at me somehow. Do you? As far as the OP is concerned it's totally up to the cache owner's personal believes of what to do with the logs of the cacher in question. If it were on my caches and if I felt concerned enough (which I don't as the logs sound entertaining) I would run out to a close by supposedly found cache and check the log sheet (they could be spewing BS in the logs and maybe they actually did find the cache and sign the log). Would be pretty quick to check. If no log exists I'd pick one (or a couple) and drop the cacher an email and diplomatically ask them some basic questions about the find(s) that anyone finding it would know. If they didn't respond then I'd reply stating that if they cannot validate their finds their logs would be deleted. If they didn't reply to that, then I'd scrub 'em. Not rocket science but it all starts with obtaining a belief that the logs are bogus and in some way harmful to my caches or the game of geocaching.

I NEVER said it's okay to log an armchair find and never will, but the question is WHAT ARE YOU OR ANYONE DOING ABOUT IT? Seems everyone agrees if something raises a flag or shows up during a maintenance run they'd deal with it, what is anyone saying they're doing beyond that and what results have they had? How many bogus logs have you deleted? NOT AT ALL.... for that example what I am saying is if your wallet is missing and you don't KNOW it was stolen because you might of just lost it or misplaced it, DO NOT RUN AROUND SCREAMING IT WAS STOLEN as that's just one theory of what might of happened! Same with MIA caches and logs posted up until it was pronounced gone, you have no proof the log entry was bogus so thinking it was bogus is only THEORY and always will be. With someone who states flat out they never signed the log you'd only be "assuming" they didn't find the cache so deleting their logs would be based on assumption and theory and not fact. There is also the possibility they did find the cache and they did sign the log but they're just baiting someone into assuming they're lying to stir the pot (and doing a good job of it). Just curious but other then the potential ethical issues, what harm comes from leaving the logs sit? After 5 more finds they're off the PQ radar anyway.