cleaning out trashy caches....

[+rk91279]

Possibly already hashed over but here goes.

After reading most of the replies in Pxtysons thread about what you would like to see in a cache and the dislikes of mctoys,dirty golf balls,worthless junk from the bottom of a kitchen drawer or any paper material that is ruined, be it from water or just old and ripped up, I have a question, Is it ok to clean out someone else's cache for them when it is obvious the cache is not being attended to?

[+briansnat]

Clean out? Not really. It's not your cache. Trade out garbage? Great idea!

[+CSpenceFLY]

Look at it this way. Alot of caches a $3 item from Wal-mart would be a fair trade for everything else that in it.So trade away

[+007BigD]

If it needs "cleanin" I clean it!

 

If its full of water or damp and I got time to check the area ill take out all the soggy paper and let everything set out in the sun til im done playin...That is if the area is cool enough to check out further and there are no muggles to grab the log hangin on the clothes line

 

I have also removed rusty stuff from inside as well. It was at a Bikedog cache and outside of Bikedog leaving us last year and couldnt maintain it, it was way out where it seldom gets visited.- If its gonna ruin the other swag...Ill take it out or trade it out.

 

I found a blown up flour head in one cache...there was flour all inside! I also saw that a vial of alke county diamonds that I put in broke once...I had water in it to enhance the stones. Needless to say I dont add water anymore and try to protect the little glass vial too.

 

Another thing I saw was with a cracked lid, you can carry a few stickers to cover some cracks so they dont leak...maybe even some camo tape.

 

I do what feels right as far as adding a slew of cool swag or doin a quick mend or clean up job, and I note what I did to the cache too.

[+mamid]

okay, Mctoys have their use. My kids (the preschooler and younger crowd) love Mctoys. Then again, I have to carry enough trade loot for 3 people - stuff from me, and stuff from each of them. if I don't, they get p'o'd cause they can't take "treasure" from the cache.

 

So, Mctoys have a place - for kids that love toys and don't care if its a Mctoy or from that swanky toy shop in the corner.

 

So has second hand stuff and stuff from dollar stores and liquidation stores. I found a ton of TY beanie babies in all of the above, so I grabbed them and saved them for caching. I just have to keep them away from my kids. I also make sure they have their tags. For the price of a Mctoy or two, I got 4 TY beanie babies with tags for trades. I put each one in their own individual ziploc bag just to keep them from my kid's toys.

 

But for adults, I have other trade items. keychain fobs and more. I can easily stuff a large cache full of items if I wanted to, but if I wanted to do that, I'd have nothing for trades.

 

I figure, if I can clean up a cache, I'll do it, but really, its the owner's responsibility to maintain the cache, but a cacher's responsibility to let the owner know it needs it.

[+Knight2000]

but a cacher's responsibility to let the owner know it needs it.

Great point. Unfortunately in my area people add the smiley and forget about the needing maintenance.

[+narcissa]

I always leave behind at least one more thing than I take. I always leave quality items.

 

I have taken to commenting on the quality of a cache's swag in the log if I find it to be less than stellar. And I will trade out items that shouldn't be there.

 

I wish people would think about how well an item is going to stand up to the elements in a cache, and how likely it is that someone else will actually take it. Around here I see a lot of "My Little Pony" type toys with ragged, mildewy hair.