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G0ldNugget

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Despite the postings in this forum complaining about all the micros, urban caches and PnGs, those quickie caches certainly get more traffic than the well placed ammo boxes in the woods. My friend and I are both COs of multiple caches and her micros and parking lot caches are found dozens of times per year, where my carefully placed, well crafted, swag laden regulars go months between visits. 

An example is a local nature preserve where we both have placed caches. Hers is a micro PnG in the gravel parking lot. Mine is nice ammo box, loaded with goodies but requires a short walk down a good trail.  Her micro gets logged often, but very few bother to take the walk to find the regular nearby. 

As much as we all prefer the stocked ammo can hidden in a well chosen spot, it's the LPC and the PnG that get all the love. Support quality hides. Visit a rural cache today!

Edited by G0ldNugget
more accurate description of location
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Since this hobby has sorta  turned into a game with many, I agree that "points matter" and those easily accessed get more finds. 

I have caches that might be found once or twice a year.  One is only a mile round-trip in the woods.  Our roadside micro gets more finds than all combined.  

 - But since this "game" even has third-party sites devoted to keep stats for the masses, as much as I agree, I don't see what can be done to affect a change.  There are many (most?)  who believe rural/remote hides aren't fun or productive (to them), with "quality" based on opinion, and/or  not necessary...

 

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All my hides are in bushland, many well off the beaten track, so get few finds. Only one of my thirty active hides has reached triple figures and that's close to an interchange on the motorway north out of Sydney and gets a fair bit of passing traffic. Many of my more recent hides have yet to reach double digits - a 2/3 multi I hid fifteen months ago has still onlty had two finds but it's a 6km hike each way. But even though the logs are few and far between, those that I do get nearly always run into multiple paragraphs telling of their adventuires in reaching the cache (or not reaching it in the case of DNFs), whereas the P&G micros around here that get several finds a week are nearly always "TFTC" or "." or, more recently, just an emoji. I know which I prefer.

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5 hours ago, G0ldNugget said:

An example is a local nature preserve where we both have placed caches. Hers is a micro PnG in the gravel parking lot. Mine is nice ammo box, loaded with goodies but requires a short walk down a good trail.  Her micro gets logged often, but very few bother to take the walk to find the regular nearby. 

Have you considered whether more people visit your ammo can because they stop for your friends micro? Yes, it's true, many geocachers today see geocaches as something you drive to find, not a walking activity like you and I do. But I can't count the number of times I've chosen to take a nice walk to an off-road cache because there was a micro flagging the parking lot to help me figure out where to leave my car.

It's fine to like ammo cans and hikes better, it's fine to encourage people to find them, and it's fine to want your cache to be appreciated more. But micros aren't stealing cachers away from your cache. Those easy roadside caches have brought many more people into the hobby. You don't like to find them yourself, and that's cool, but they're why geocaching is so popular today.

My advice would be to work with your friend to create interesting situations that integrate the two kinds of geocaching in order to help people that like one kind appreciate the other.

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Are there significant differences in difficulty / terrain between the two caches? Seems even slight increases in difficulty or terrain can noticeably reduce cache traffic. I believe the Official App only shows up to 1.5D x 1.5T caches for non-premium members.  Non premium members can see higher D/T caches using the website though but it seems like most newer cachers predominately use the App only.  Just my $0.02.

Edited by boisestate
always a typo...why can't I see these before I post?
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14 hours ago, dprovan said:
19 hours ago, G0ldNugget said:

An example is a local nature preserve where we both have placed caches. Hers is a micro PnG in the gravel parking lot. Mine is nice ammo box, loaded with goodies but requires a short walk down a good trail.  Her micro gets logged often, but very few bother to take the walk to find the regular nearby. 

Have you considered whether more people visit your ammo can because they stop for your friends micro? Yes, it's true, many geocachers today see geocaches as something you drive to find, not a walking activity like you and I do. But I can't count the number of times I've chosen to take a nice walk to an off-road cache because there was a micro flagging the parking lot to help me figure out where to leave my car.

It's fine to like ammo cans and hikes better, it's fine to encourage people to find them, and it's fine to want your cache to be appreciated more. But micros aren't stealing cachers away from your cache. Those easy roadside caches have brought many more people into the hobby. You don't like to find them yourself, and that's cool, but they're why geocaching is so popular today.

My advice would be to work with your friend to create interesting situations that integrate the two kinds of geocaching in order to help people that like one kind appreciate the other.

This is very true. Locally, geocaching activity has taken a noticeable downturn in the last five years or so. Far from dead but this area used to be a real hotbed of caching. I started in 2008, which was pretty much right at the peak of caching in my local area, so it was bound to drop off at some point. That didn't surprise or disappoint me. What did surprise and disappoint was the game that was left behind seemed to forsake creativity and rewarded banality. And if something isn't a few steps from the car, many people just won't bother.

I have no issue at all with hiking a trail and finding 20-25 caches, even if they are all just those "boring micros" seemingly chucked at the base of a tree every 528'. But, when I find a trail where every 528' there is a good mix of creative, fun, inventive caches to go with the "boring micros", it feels like paradise. I also have no issue of seeking out caching destinations and visiting them. I'll chase creative caches to the ends of the Earth if it comes to that.

As a CO, I create caches that I'd want to find but I know that when I create them, I'm almost condemning them to a lonely life. I don't put out many caches but I use what little skill I have to come up with something creative and fun. They get found but entire seasons can pass between those finds. Do I wish they would get found more often than that stopsign micro? Of course! They're my caches and I want more people to enjoy them. But, I know that creating multicaches and mysteries pretty much eliminates about 90% of the caching traffic around here. I can't say I'm OK with it, but I've come to accept it.

I just remind myself that as much as I want my caches to be found, so does that CO that puts out micro after micro after micro. I may put out caches that I want to find but they put out caches that others want to find, so when you boil away the fat, they are serving geocaching better than I am. Maybe I don't particularly enjoy that reality but I accept it. I accept that geocaching would not continue to thrive without powertrails and geoart, where cachers can chase numbers if they so desire (and based on the results, do they ever desire it). Personally,  I'll just keep putting out caches that I enjoy and keep hoping that others find and enjoy them.

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I,m with you all the way Crow-T-Robot,quality over quantity anyday.

Its true that the way of geocaching has leant towards quick easy finds that don,t require much effort and it doesn’t,t seem to matter what the container is or if it has any regional significance or particular attractiveness.

i have several hides in the town where I live and the most finds are close to town.

And as you say multi and puzzle caches are not the preferred cache of choice for today’s time poor cacher, which is a shame because i think that hiders of these cache types put more thought into the cache container and want seekers to have a better caching experience than a simple mint tin or lock and lock container.

though as you rightly point out the best found it logs are from cachers who have made the walk or have taken the time to solve the puzzle and posted their experience as a fun time and recommend to other cachers.

Sadly I think attraction to geocaching seems to be diminishing as most of my new hides are found by repeat cachers and that there seem to be lot of cachers that find a few and then lose interest.

 

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On 2/20/2018 at 7:03 PM, dprovan said:

Have you considered whether more people visit your ammo can because they stop for your friends micro? Yes, it's true, many geocachers today see geocaches as something you drive to find, not a walking activity like you and I do. But I can't count the number of times I've chosen to take a nice walk to an off-road cache because there was a micro flagging the parking lot to help me figure out where to leave my car.

It's fine to like ammo cans and hikes better, it's fine to encourage people to find them, and it's fine to want your cache to be appreciated more. But micros aren't stealing cachers away from your cache. Those easy roadside caches have brought many more people into the hobby. You don't like to find them yourself, and that's cool, but they're why geocaching is so popular today.

My advice would be to work with your friend to create interesting situations that integrate the two kinds of geocaching in order to help people that like one kind appreciate the other.

I just don't agree that geocaching is more popular. Yes, there are a lot of people coming in and trying geocaching. It's "cool" and different at first but most of them don't end up staying too long because of the caches they're finding. I think it's simply that they get bored because they're pretty much only finding micros in uninspiring locations.Sure, scoring is probably fun for a while too but even that gets old for many when they realize those numbers don't amount to much.

Guess you could say in a way, that geocaching is popular because more people know about and are trying our hobby. But imo, being more popular today means that there are more people actively enjoying our hobby than there were yesterday, or the year before. Of course there are more people than ever signed up but, how many are active? Popularity (geocaching activity) in our area has dwindled tremendously and i suspect a lot of areas are seeing the same. :(

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On ‎2‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 2:35 PM, G0ldNugget said:

An example is a local nature preserve where we both have placed caches. Hers is a micro PnG in the gravel parking lot. Mine is nice ammo box, loaded with goodies but requires a short walk down a good trail.  Her micro gets logged often, but very few bother to take the walk to find the regular nearby. 

I think boisestate has a point...   Have you noticed a difference in find totals between your own 1.5T caches and the 2.5T that's  "a short walk down a good trail" ones?   Maybe your T rating's too high for  a short walk on a "good" trail, and folks who normally filter higher ratings are simply skipping what is really an easy walk.   :)

Realize that the official app, what most start with in this hobby, a basic membership ends at 1.5/1.5,  with your 2.5T caches classified as "advanced" .  They can't see them without a PM.  So if you're noticing your friends 1.5T caches hit and yours aren't , that's another possibility.

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47 minutes ago, Mudfrog said:

I just don't agree that geocaching is more popular. Yes, there are a lot of people coming in and trying geocaching. It's "cool" and different at first but most of them don't end up staying too long because of the caches they're finding. I think it's simply that they get bored because they're pretty much only finding micros in uninspiring locations.Sure, scoring is probably fun for a while too but even that gets old for many when they realize those numbers don't amount to much.

Guess you could say in a way, that geocaching is popular because more people know about and are trying our hobby. But imo, being more popular today means that there are more people actively enjoying our hobby than there were yesterday, or the year before. Of course there are more people than ever signed up but, how many are active? Popularity (geocaching activity) in our area has dwindled tremendously and i suspect a lot of areas are seeing the same. :(

I guess it's different for different areas. The cachers most into geocaching in my area love the quick drive up finds. From what I can tell, most of them like hiking, too, but they don't limit themselves to finding or hiding caches out in nature. This is as true for the old timers that have cached since the beginning as well as the newer cachers that have only been seeking and hiding for a few years. No matter which kind of cache I look for, I find the logs dominated by names I recognize. Oh, yes, there are a lot of casual and temporary geocachers, but not so many that I noticed them unless I think about it.

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Thank you all for responding to my post. From reading these forums, I thought naively, like a Field of Dreams, that if I put great caches in amazing places, they would come. My friend  (actually, she's my daughter) and I often work together on caches and we have several collaborations that I am proud of. I used the Nature Preserve as an example because I follow both caches and the difference is stark. I think I just needed to know that it is normal and dedicated COs care lovingly for caches that others rarely visit, and thats ok. So thanks for the pep talk. I'll keep hiding caches that I would like to find in amazing places I would like to share. 

And go search for that ammo box in the woods you've been thinking about. It will remind you of why you started this hobby while you make some COs day. 

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My ammo boxes in the woods, and my puzzle caches, don't get as much traffic as my park and grab caches.  It's a fact of life that the more convenient a cache is, the more traffic it's likely going to get.

At the end of the day, I hide the kind of cache I like to find.  I try to extend that philosophy even to my park and grabs - I try to make the theme and/or the hide for my park and grabs creative so that they are more than just generic caches put out for the sake of hiding a cache.

10 hours ago, G0ldNugget said:

From reading these forums, I thought naively, like a Field of Dreams, that if I put great caches in amazing places, they would come.

Chico is a little outside my commuting distance.  If I'm ever in your area, I'll make sure I check yours out.

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11 hours ago, G0ldNugget said:

Thank you all for responding to my post. From reading these forums, I thought naively, like a Field of Dreams, that if I put great caches in amazing places, they would come. My friend  (actually, she's my daughter) and I often work together on caches and we have several collaborations that I am proud of. I used the Nature Preserve as an example because I follow both caches and the difference is stark. I think I just needed to know that it is normal and dedicated COs care lovingly for caches that others rarely visit, and thats ok. So thanks for the pep talk. I'll keep hiding caches that I would like to find in amazing places I would like to share. 

And go search for that ammo box in the woods you've been thinking about. It will remind you of why you started this hobby while you make some COs day. 

I like the log you got on one of your recent hides. Your old-fashioned "traditional" style cache got a log that reminds me of the days when people would swap and note what they took and left:

Quote

FTF! Nice little hike in the rain to make the find. Always great to find that endangered species, i.e. a regular with swag. T: FTF prize L: Harley-Davidson poker chip and signed log about 1 PM. TFTC!

 

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I just submitted my first hide for a review. It is out in the country a little bit but you do not need to walk through the woods to get it. It can be found 1 minute after getting out of the vehicle but is also hidden well. I put lots of good stuff in there. To be honest, I would rather have a high quality cache that less people visit than a micro one with a roll of paper and nothing much in it that is visited every week. And, its easier to do maintenance on caches that are larger and are not visited as much, even if the content of the cache is better. Hopefully mine gets approved as I think I will put out nothing but high quality caches, I do not want to become another micro guy where only a few items can even fit in the container. I will say however that I DO like finding ANY geocache despite the size, but the micro ones especially in a forest can feel like more work than its worth. Not to mention if you are hiding something in the woods, it might as well be larger.

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The vast majority of my caches are longish hikes ranging from maybe a mile to about 10 miles round trip.  They are rarely found these days.  Some of them may go a year or two between finds and many may receive only two or three finds a year.   At one time it kind of bothered me that these good caches were largely ignored, but if I were to slap a  Hide a Key on a dumpster behind the 7-Eleven I would receive a constant stream of grateful logs.  

It no longer bothers me at all.  The caches are out there for those who enjoy that type and the people who find them really seem to like them. The others are missing out.  That's their loss. 
  

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After playing the game for a while and trying out the wide variety of caches, most folks consistently choose to spend their time finding more caches rather than fewer caches.   As a practical matter, this means more caches per mile or to restate it, more caches per hour.  If you have a cache that requires an hour or more to walk to it will have far fewer finds than an entire roadside power trail.  In Florida, there are several long sections of byway with hundreds of roadside micros and hundreds of finds for each of them   These are ever more popular in terms of the number of finds. The scoring system reinforces this behavior to a remarkable degree.   The favorite point system reveals the curious situation that the more popular a cache is the less people enjoy it.  Individually these roadside caches have a Favorite Point % of 0 to 2%.   Since you get to award a FP for every 10 caches you find, if you find 200 in an afternoon, you can award 20 FP, and typically a few of the caches will gather the majority of the FP.  On the other hand, the typically one mile woods walk over interesting terrain will have a far higher percentage of FP, though many fewer finds.

One way to increase you satisfaction of placing caches that require more time to find is to switch your measurement scale from the one provided (number of finds) to an effort and time based measurement scale.  If you only have an hour to go caching, would you rather spend it walking in the woods and hunting one cache or driving down a road stopping every .1m finding as many caches as you can.   For some reason, far more people would rather do the latter.  Aside from the obvious ("they want more points because they see points as important') it may be hard to understand this behavior.  People clearly do what they prefer to do. even if by self report they don't seem to enjoy it very much.  

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