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Trackable Etiquette


BugLuv

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I found my first trackable. I actually have seen them before, but did not know what they were.

 

My question relates to the goal/purpose of the trackable. For example, if I can somewhat meet the purpose in 2 weeks, and I can really meet the purpose in 2 months (related to travel), what is the etiquette? Better to keep it in circulation or keep with you for a bigger progress. 

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Congrats for your first trackable find.    Correct log and a pic too !  :)

 

I like it's goal and agree  (I did  ;-).    I like to see trackables move cache-to-cache, and it's already met it's goal.

 I personally don't care for, "what if I hold on to it just a little longer..." thinking that's what got some into hoarding,  but if you feel your actions can help it further, email the TO and ask if it's okay with them. 

I'd prefer being asked than someone just keeping a trackable  hostage  "visiting" for months on end.  ;)

 

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Thanks!! I thought about asking-wasn’t sure if I should. Great tip. My instinct was to keep it moving.

 

Haha- great goal, but poor Darth ended up in IL-we can’t have that!

 

How can you tell this one has met its goal? I tried to see if the contest was over, but couldn’t tell.  

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I never bother reading a trackable's goal before I grab it.  Sometimes I do and sometimes I do not further it on its goal...but I do, however, ALWAYS move it to another cache eventually.  Sometimes on the same day, sometimes days, weeks or even months later.  I never keep one for myself.  

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I always read the goal before picking up a bug.  If nothing else to check it's goal isn't to get to the cache it is sitting in (that has happened).   

 

Generally if I know I can really hit a goal in a near time frame, I hold it.  That means the trip is already booked and less than ~3 months in the future.  Especially if the goal is very specific.  

 

For example - on Memorial Day of 2017 we picked up a bug wanting pictures with Reindeer and other horned animals.   We had an Alaskan vacation planned at the end of July.  That seemed like an obvious case to stretch the hold time out.   I ended up getting a picture of it with all 8 of Santa's Reindeer at Santa Claus's house and a shot of it with a wild Caribou at ~10 ft away in Denali before leaving it at the Anchorage zoo.   On the other hand, in October 2016 we had a bug wanting to get to specific caches in British Columbia.   We placed that one right away because the Alaska trip was still a concept rather than a booked trip and further out.  We did log one of the caches on that Alaska trip so we could have hit it's goal.   As it turns out that trackable almost beat us to the area.   It got jumped to Seattle and picked up for a cruise to Anchorage then it jumped to Hawaii.   Right now it is in the United Kingdom.      

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26 minutes ago, BugLuv said:

How can you tell this one has met its goal? I tried to see if the contest was over, but couldn’t tell.  

 

"Travel far and fast away from NJ!"     It's in IL.     Humor.  

A couple say, "To not get stolen...".    A wooden nickel, "To stay dry..."      

 - You could email the owner to ask, but there's no links (or any other info) on this coin's page to the "patch race".   

 

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25 minutes ago, J Grouchy said:

I never bother reading a trackable's goal before I grab it.  Sometimes I do and sometimes I do not further it on its goal...but I do, however, ALWAYS move it to another cache eventually.  .  

 

Same here if it's placed after I've looked at the cache page and head out.   Most times I already know what's "supposed" to be there.

Not using a phone, if the mission/goal isn't included with it, I could go against it's goal by taking it to move along.

 - Did that with a "code" trackable that needed to stay in a certain area for a bonus cache's lock.  Turned out I was the second to move it, and already a state away when I found it.   :)

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Haha on the joke(went over my head). 

 

Basically, in a couple months I’m going out of the country, so will be a long way from NJ but long time to wait, not really fast! I’ll try to message the owner. 

 

Great idea deal on the horned animal pix. So many ways to be creative!

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3 hours ago, BugLuv said:

I found my first trackable. I actually have seen them before, but did not know what they were.

 

My question relates to the goal/purpose of the trackable. For example, if I can somewhat meet the purpose in 2 weeks, and I can really meet the purpose in 2 months (related to travel), what is the etiquette? Better to keep it in circulation or keep with you for a bigger progress. 

Whatever you think is best. In rare cases, I've kept a TB for a couple month if I can do something nice for it, but only if I'll have a chance to visit it to caches in the meantime. If it's just going to sit in your pocket without the CO knowing what's going on, then best to send it on its way sooner with a lesser achievement. Just imagine how you'd feel if it were your TB.

 

2 hours ago, schmittfamily said:

I always read the goal before picking up a bug.  If nothing else to check it's goal isn't to get to the cache it is sitting in (that has happened). 

I figure if a TB's reached it's goal, it's looking for something else to do. Naturally if it's only been there a few days and the goal implies that the TO wants to retrieve it, I'll leave it there, but I'm not going to worry about reading the goal before I take it just because that unlikely case is happening since it's not really a big deal for the TB to travel more before coming back to its goal a second time.

 

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5 hours ago, BugLuv said:

My question relates to the goal/purpose of the trackable. For example, if I can somewhat meet the purpose in 2 weeks, and I can really meet the purpose in 2 months (related to travel), what is the etiquette? Better to keep it in circulation or keep with you for a bigger progress. 

 

Reminds me of the TB that I picked up in New Jersey that wanted to visit Maine lighthouses.  A month later, I went to Maine to visit my sister.  We took a special trip to a lighthouse to drop off the TB.  Next cacher picked it up and took it to Ontario.  At least it visited one Maine lighthouse!

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12 hours ago, dprovan said:

I figure if a TB's reached it's goal, it's looking for something else to do. Naturally if it's only been there a few days and the goal implies that the TO wants to retrieve it, I'll leave it there, but I'm not going to worry about reading the goal before I take it just because that unlikely case is happening since it's not really a big deal for the TB to travel more before coming back to its goal a second time.

 

 

It can be a big deal.

 

We came across a trackable in Vancouver that was owned by a family in Germany.   The goal of the trackable was to get to Vancouver in time for the owner to pick it up on a trip which happened to be the next month.   Us taking it 1800 miles away would completely blow the mission so we left it.   The next cacher picked it up and left it in Chile.

 

Another time we moved a trackable trying to get Switzerland in time for the cache owner to pick it up on vacation.   That one actually made it there about a year in advance.   Then it got moved to Ireland and missed the owner despite having the goal as a the trackable name.      

 

Another time we picked up a bug that was trying to get into the hands of 5 specific video blogging geocachers.   We researched the cachers in questions and placed it in a cache owned by one of the cachers that was a tribute to another one of the cachers on the list.    The video blogger picked the bug up live on periscope for the bug owner because fortunately the cacher that found the cache between us and the video blogger read about the bug and didn't take it.   

Edited by schmittfamily
it was Chile - not Columbia
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I would say take it to a local event let others discover it and give it to them if they can help out the trackable.

Otherwise for example I picked up a trackable near my city. Didn't know it was a trackable (I literally did not look at the back of it) and I visited a couple of caches and was about to drop it off as swag and right there I saw the back of it and realized what it was. Then a newbie player picked it up from that cache and did not log it...nobody knows where that trackable is now.

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Hi there, I've just bought myself 2 travel bugs and had this crazy idea to attach them to my 2 dwarf hamsters (not physically of course!) and send them out into the world to compete agaisnt each other to travel the furthest...  My question is, is it possible to link two bugs together, or cross refer to them somehow?  

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You could simply add a link to each other on the trackable's page, a link to merlin's on Houdini's trackable page for example. Pics too.

In the trackables section in the Help Center,   3.9. display multiple trackables on the same page (from "Own Trackables"), shows how to do it. 

Have fun.     :)

Edited by cerberus1
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On 7/17/2018 at 1:02 PM, BugLuv said:

My question relates to the goal/purpose of the trackable. For example, if I can somewhat meet the purpose in 2 weeks, and I can really meet the purpose in 2 months (related to travel), what is the etiquette? Better to keep it in circulation or keep with you for a bigger progress. 

 

Chiming in a bit late, but hoping to be helpful.  We recently made a cross country trip, and I "collected" trackables with goals on the East Coast inthe weeks before we traveled.  I emailed the TO's to ask if I could hang on to their TB with the intent of leaving it closer to the goal or giving it some miles as we traveled.  I either got no response (and kept the TB to drop off across the country!) or the TO said they wanted me to take it with me.

 

I scattered the ones I had as we traveled the East Coast, and traded for several that I have brought back to California with me.  And I will be dropping them off soon as well.  

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Another etiquette question---If you find a cache with a lot of trackables, how many can/should you take? I have only been taking one, even if I could help move along others. The reason I only take one is that I have no idea what the standard "rule" is. But, basically, I would like to a couple more. ; )

Edited by BugLuv
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1 hour ago, BugLuv said:

Another etiquette question---If you find a cache with a lot of trackables, how many can/should you take? I have only been taking one, even if I could help move along others. The reason I only take one is that I have no idea what the standard "rule" is. But, basically, I would like to a couple more. ; )

 

Take none, or as many as you can manage.  As in, how many can you reasonably place into caches, so they can continue to travel?  You can't always place them all into one container.  And each trackable requires a log on the caches, and a log on the Trackable.  Four human-typed logs for each Retrieve/Drop cycle.  Most alleged Geocachers just do the minimum non-log logs, with no story, no picture.  Don't be those guys. :)

 

Beware that the logs may be very messed up.  For example, someone placed it but hasn't yet even logged the retrieval in Sweden.  He's on a trip and will log it in a few days.  If you intend to "Retrieve" it, you may have to wait for the "Drop", and contact the guy and ask what the deal is.  When I volunteered to move 12 trackables from an Event one time, it was quite a challenge to place them all, and I even have go-to caches all lined up to place trackables.  I won't dump them into one cache, and definitely place them in decent caches quickly, I will never do the cherished Geocaching tradition of making the Owners wonder if I'm "keeping" them forever.  "12" is definitely too many for me.

 

Edited by kunarion
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I take as many as I feel I can do a good job.    That means movement that meets the goal, pictures of each at interesting places, and that I won't dump all of them in one cache.   In general caching for us that is 1 or 2.   Any more than that and it gets hard to place them.   On trips we will go up to 5 or 6.   That depends on how much caching we plan to do, what types of caches we are planning on doing, and what bugs we come across. 

 

My general experience is once there gets to be ~5 travel bugs in a cache, it tends to not go well for the majority of the bugs.      

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Thanks!  Yes, I wouldn't take too many, because then I get stressed (and not fun). : )

 

I thought about taking up to 3, if I can match the goal. I like to have fun with them, make comments, and take pictures. I have been restraining myself because it seems not many do this. I guess I will let my inner-weirdness shine through. ha!

 

 

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33 minutes ago, schmittfamily said:

 

My general experience is once there gets to be ~5 travel bugs in a cache, it tends to not go well for the majority of the bugs.      

 

Thanks to all who responded. Just to clarify, if there are less than 5 in a cache, they sometimes get neglected?

 

Things in this area seem a little slow. Some caches are not visited that often, and not too many TB. However, I was at an exchange cache with lots. So, I guess it would have been okay to take 2-3. I will keep this in mind for next time, or may occasionally go get one if I have a vacation, etc. that can move it along.

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1 minute ago, BugLuv said:

 

Thanks to all who responded. Just to clarify, if there are less than 5 in a cache, they sometimes get neglected?

 

Things in this area seem a little slow. Some caches are not visited that often, and not too many TB. However, I was at an exchange cache with lots. So, I guess it would have been okay to take 2-3. I will keep this in mind for next time, or may occasionally go get one if I have a vacation, etc. that can move it along.

 

My experience is when there gets to be more than 5 trackables in a cache it tends to not go well for the trackables. 

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26 minutes ago, BugLuv said:

Thanks to all who responded. Just to clarify, if there are less than 5 in a cache, they sometimes get neglected?

 

Sometimes it's an "all your eggs in one basket" thing.  Even if I have a bunch to move, I place 2 or 3 max, in a container that has none.  My plan is to spread them out as well as I can.

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4 hours ago, BugLuv said:

Another etiquette question---If you find a cache with a lot of trackables, how many can/should you take? I have only been taking one, even if I could help move along others. The reason I only take one is that I have no idea what the standard "rule" is. But, basically, I would like to a couple more. ; )

 

2 hours ago, hal-an-tow said:

Take as many as you choose, there are no rules.  (although some TB hotel owners will tellyou otherwise on their listing ... )

 

Agreed. The TB hotel owners sometimes place rules on taking trackables, such as "if you take one only if you leave one." Such rules that restrict trackable movement are intended to keep trackables in place so to attract other cachers to their cache. I understand the intent, but such restrictions make the TB hotel into a TB prison and are contrary to the wishes of the TB owners. Feel free to completely ignore such restrictions. My attitude is that instead of selfishly taking all the TBs for my self, I am actually freeing the TBs from the prison. There are lots of thread on point about TB prisons.

Edited by Team Christiansen
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I take trackables if it seems they've been there a very long time,  Just the caches I like to do, and some odd reason, find them in high-T caches often.

Most times I Discover them, so their owners (and the CO if curious) know they're at least still in play, and not missing (many logs not accurate any more).

If there's any mention of a "take one, leave one" or similar on a cache page, I'll take them all,  and I'll just have to cache more than usual to drop 'em in a more friendly cache.

 

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13 minutes ago, Team Christiansen said:

 

 

Agreed. The TB hotel owners sometimes place rules on taking trackables, such as "if you take one only if you leave one." Such rules that restrict trackable movement are intended to keep trackables in place so to attract other cachers to their cache. I understand the intent, but such restrictions make the TB hotel into a TB prison and are contrary to the wishes of the TB owners. Feel free to completely ignore such restrictions. My attitude is that instead of selfishly taking all the TBs for my self, I am actually freeing the TBs from the prison. There are lots of thread on point about TB prisons.

 

Agreed free them!!!! 

 

When I  first started logging trackable I actually had a FTF in a very remote area which I was camping at. The cache had two trackables in it and trying to be nice I only took one. Now I realize I should have taken them both and feel bad two years that guy has been languishing as I was the only finder of that cache. Maybe some day I'll get back there. Bugs are meant to fly and crawl not be stuck in a box.

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On 7/26/2018 at 6:56 AM, BugLuv said:

I thought about taking up to 3, if I can match the goal. I like to have fun with them, make comments, and take pictures. I have been restraining myself because it seems not many do this. I guess I will let my inner-weirdness shine through. ha!

 

 

While it's true that not many do this, most just visit TB's to every cache they find with no photos or notes or anythng... I enjoy getting photos and hearing stories of my TB's, and I will try to do the same with the ones I pick up and carry with me.  DO IT!  It makes the logs of TB's MUCH more fun to go through!

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