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Problems in Virginia National Forests?


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Hi all

 

We just found out yesterday about the special use permit and potential $59 feel, when a cache we placed in the Jeff. NF in Blacksburg (VA) was not approved. Lot of great information in all these posts!!! Since I'm new to this topic, I am wondering whether one of the folks who has been involved in this debate would be willing to put together a little flowchart on how to approach this. As in: go to your local ranger office, ask for form xxx, if they require a fee, do yyy, etc. I don't mind filling out a form, but I very much do mind, and question the legality of, paying an annual $59 fee for a cache.

 

If this is something the forest service in fact requires, I would be interested in getting together a group of cachers and work to officially change this policy.

 

Eva (for PetraEva)

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I contacted the local ranger's office a couple of weeks ago and was told the chief Ranger would be getting in touch with me regarding the Jefferson National Forest issue. I had heard a few different things about placing geocaches in the JNF and wanted to find out more, but I haven't received a reply yet, so they must be pretty busy. I'll post again once they respond.

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I have good news: I heard back from someone at our district office. We had talked about this before and she had previously said that they were discussing the situation--that was in mid-May. What she told me was that they were not going to ban caches in the Jefferson National Forest area or require a $59 permit per cache for any hides within the Forest area. They didn't encourage caching in the JNF, but they weren't going to go hunt them down, either. I did advise her that my geocaches were not placed in any environmentally sensitive areas, and she was very polite and said she appreciated me asking them about this. Some of the geocachers on this board, like Konnarock Kid, know me personally and can vouch for the authenticity of what I have said this morning. That is where we stand at the moment. :-)

Edited by Fuz N Law
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Yes that is good news-did they say why?

 

If you have a Garmin, my Eastern Public landownership map has the ownership of the JNF: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/byuser/193/

 

They told me that they didn't have the money or manpower to do it. I'm thinking that if they had the resources to do it, they would apply the permit fees or maybe remove the geocaches altogether. But as for right now, they are apparently leaving the caches alone.

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Yes that is good news-did they say why?

 

If you have a Garmin, my Eastern Public landownership map has the ownership of the JNF: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/byuser/193/

I use Garmin MapSource and a few others, even some paper maps. But alot of information is incorrect on the maps. One of the places where we hunt shows to be on JNF property. But when they logged some of the areas in the last couple of years, the NFS personel marked many boundry lines with red paint around the trees and yellow signs. I have a couple of their pipe cap markers listed on the Waymarking site. This had alot to do with getting my last listing on this site published. Looking at the map shows to be on JNF property, but it is not. There is quite a bit of private property in the area. An areil view shows the 20 or so cabins in the area. There are some real good hiking trails that have geocaches along them, glad that they are not being hunted down and removed. My son and I listed a EarthCache in a area that is marked NFS property, but the map shows that it is on private property because it may have just been recently aquired? Hope the get things worked out soon. At least our State Parks in Virginia are geocache friendly. A free permit is required, and they have guidelines, but we can geocache as a recreation.

 

You are right about incorrect info on maps. The NFs in the Eastern US tend to not be shown or some maps will show the purchase boundary instead of the ownership. Land can be exchanged or purchased so lwnership does change in a few tracks. For the Jefferson (which I have visted a few times)I used the Forest Service's ownership data. So it shows what Eastern Land Ownership shows is the public land managed by the FS. My Trails has the FS's trail data for the Jeffereson.

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Yes that is good news-did they say why?

 

If you have a Garmin, my Eastern Public landownership map has the ownership of the JNF: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/maps/byuser/193/

 

They told me that they didn't have the money or manpower to do it. I'm thinking that if they had the resources to do it, they would apply the permit fees or maybe remove the geocaches altogether. But as for right now, they are apparently leaving the caches alone.

 

Don't beleive everything they tell you. They may have figured out it was illegal to do it.

 

Anyway if anyone has problems on another National Forest, send me an email.

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