pedals Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 it has come to my attention after talking with a local provincal park superindent that i know that geocaching is becoming a big problem in the provincal parks and it has been something that has been brought up at their last few meetings. the parks staff do not want geocaching going on in them because of what the geocachers are doing to the natural life of the forests. some of the caches are being hidden more then 100 feet off into to the woods and geocachers are going trampling through the woods disturbing the wildlife and looking for these caches. they are even considering finding all the geocaches in provincal parks and taking them out. i agree with them because i went a found one at a local park and had to walk through the forest for 20 minutes off the trail before finding it and you could see the trails of other geocachers all around, crushing all the grass and little trees. so please people do not continue geocachign in provincal parks Quote Link to comment
+mtn-man Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Can you be more specific about where you are talking about? Quote Link to comment
pedals Posted July 2, 2003 Author Share Posted July 2, 2003 quote:Originally posted by mtn-man:Can you be more specific about where you are talking about? sorry i am talking about ontario provincal parks....but i also think the same things are going on in parks around the world that are there to help save the forests and wildlife Quote Link to comment
magellan315 Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Could you please be really specifc. Like where do you live?? Have you even bothered to contact local Geocachers to see if they would work with you to help find better locations for their caches. I'm not sure where you live, but with a phrase like "provincial parks" are you outside of the United States. I'm sure there are any number of Geocachers who can give you examples of local, state, and federal agencies that allow Geocaching and have come up with some very simple and easily instituted policies you could use. On the other hand, you have yet to have a logged find to the website, for all I know your a troll. Quote Link to comment
+mtn-man Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 quote:Originally posted by pedals:sorry i am talking about ontario provincal parks....but i also think the same things are going on in parks around the world that are there to help save the forests and wildlife Yeah, we should probably ban people from the face of the earth. Quote Link to comment
gm100guy Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 ontario parks Go to this web site and you will see that this has been under discussion for months now. Also go to the Canada Forum and you can find a few threads there about caching in parks in Ontario. forum links The parks staff and some cachers are working on a solution. cache removed ontario parks You have markwelled gm100guy http://members.rogers.com/gm100guy/cachepage.htm Ontario geocachers http://groups.msn.com/GeocachinginOntario/homepage Quote Link to comment
+Renegade Knight Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Geocaching, orienteering, hiking, camping, and park rangers wandering off the path to yell at people enjoying the park all have an impact. Worse still if you got rid of the park and the improvments that invite people to use the part you would have less visitation. Inviting people to a park and then slapping them for enjoing nature is counterintuitive. But that's just me. Quote Link to comment
+canadazuuk Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 pedals May indeed have been a sock puppet, but the points raised are valid... Why do cachers freak out at the slightest suggestion that their caches *can* create damage to off trail areas? I've seen it first hand... Quote Link to comment
+GroundClutter Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Zuuk, I agree with you. I've seen it too. I used to wonder how people could find caches without their GPS. Simple...follow the beaten green trail. I'm a bit dismayed at the angry responses to pedals post though. A valid point should not depend on how many finds you have logged. And the flippant remark about banning people might just be a good idea after seeing the damage that has been done in some areas, litter, fires, plundering, poaching etc... There is damage done to parks. Trails are designed to allow people to have access to a park, without causing further damage to the habitat. It's one of the last few ways we can see nature without man's big ugly bootprint all over it. Not all cachers walk softly. Some thrash and stomop about. Did you know it takes 7 years for a Trillium to bloom? How many are being trampled in a mad effort to find the treasure. If a cacher can't find a way to hide a cache without causing a new trail, then find a new place to hide the cache, or create a virtual. In my humble opinion (gleaned from 64 finds in case that matters), THAT is responsible geocaching. Step away from the tupperware! Quote Link to comment
+canadazuuk Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 By all means as well, if there can be a solution, then I hope those willing to wade those waters will come up with one. Caches are not allowed in certain areas in the US, geocaching.com will NOT approve them... Canada doesn't yet have any such areas. Our Provincial Parks are about as close as you can get to the same areas in the US that do not get approval... Is it a matter of time? Sock Puppets be gone. But validity lingers... Quote Link to comment
+Renegade Knight Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 The only human activity that has no impact is to never be born. Period. Since I rather like having been born I can deal with the fact that I have an impact. Face it. What's the problem with walking off a trail? Nothing. Nada. Zip. My foot does less harm than any hoof I've ever seen. It's only when you make a park and invite 2 bazillion people to that park that they want to keep you on the trail. If you build it they will come and if they come you will have to manage them so they don't trample the park. That's the trade off for having a park. If tomorrow they dug up the park and pulled it out how long would it take before nature recovered? 5 years? 10? Pull a geocache, and give it one season. Done. Nature has reclaimed the location. Unless that cache is placed on top of some lilly livered water crested dung rose that is endangered there really isn't an issue with geocaching. That there is an impact is by definition. The the goal is to minimize it and to avoid placing the cache on top of the dung rose. Isn't minimizing the harm the creed of every other outdoor activity? The harm doesn't stop cavers, rock climbers, hikers, rock crawlers, mountain bikers, hunters, and everyone else. The harm caused by geocaching is minimal and recoverable quicly once the cache is removed. All caches have a limited life span. Quote Link to comment
+BrownMule & Jackrabbit Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 quote:Originally posted by Renegade Knight:The only human activity that has no impact is to never be born. Period. The harm doesn't stop cavers, rock climbers, hikers, rock crawlers, mountain bikers, hunters, and everyone else. The harm caused by geocaching is minimal and recoverable quicly once the cache is removed. All caches have a limited life span. My preference is not to damage the resource at all so that it does not have to recover. This thread is just another "I am a protector of the natural resource vs I am a protector of my rights to do any darn thing I want". I vote for the natural resource. _________________________________________________________ On the other hand, you have different fingers. Quote Link to comment
+mtn-man Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 quote:Originally posted by BrownMule:This thread is just another "I am a protector of the natural resource _vs_ I am a protector of my rights to do any darn thing I want". Yep, and a no win situation. Either you ban people from the planet or you learn to coexist. Personally I like the planet and want to coexist. DON'T walk on the path made by other cachers. Be smart and you can leave no trace... and still find the cache. Quote Link to comment
+welch Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 quote:Originally posted by canadazuuk:Why do cachers freak out at the slightest suggestion that their caches *can* create damage to off trail areas? I've seen it first hand... I was thinking maybe the 'freaking out' was related to a post made by someone who registered just a few days ago, has no reported finds of anything, has made only two posts to date, does not provide any info. about who they are or what they do(or why they are posting, other than to get a rise), and seems to be bouncing email. And starts off telling about all the damage caching is doing, says the park staff do not want caching and are thinking of removing soem cache, verifies their reasoning because s/he has seen it, and implies all caching in the the area should stop (even though the specific locations or problems and/or solutions are not given). If it talks like a duck... Its all right here: quote:Pedal:it has come to my attention after talking with a local provincal park superindent that i know that geocaching is becoming a big problem in the provincal parks and it has been something that has been brought up at their last few meetings. the parks staff do not want geocaching going on in them because of what the geocachers are doing to the natural life of the forests. some of the caches are being hidden more then 100 feet off into to the woods and geocachers are going trampling through the woods disturbing the wildlife and looking for these caches. they are even considering finding all the geocaches in provincal parks and taking them out. i agree with them because i went a found one at a local park and had to walk through the forest for 20 minutes off the trail before finding it and you could see the trails of other geocachers all around, crushing all the grass and little trees. so please people do not continue geocachign in provincal parks Quote Link to comment
+canadazuuk Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 The balance is lost when crazed geocachers become sufferers of 'must-find-the-cache-itis', and then proceed to trample the area... Of course, I am not in support of removing caches from parks, or banning the placing of them in parks... I just think we need to take a serious look at where caches are placed etc... which is what some folks appear to be doing. Quote Link to comment
+Spzzmoose Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 We were caching in Ontario just this last weekend. I did notice a very...VERY slight path to one of the caches we hit. Not bad at all...and if you don't know what to look for I bet most non-catcher’s wouldn't have even noticed it!! I tell the kiddies to act like an "Indian" and try not to leave a trace!! I usually have point, and I feed them some such bull like the Huron tribe will be mad and come after us if we don't cover our tracks!! You should see the 10 year olds trying to "high step" it out and not disturb a single leaf!! Great fun!!! I love messing with their heads!!! They are soooo gullible...but at they same time they also learn a valuable lesson. Quote Link to comment
+briansnat Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Generally, I've found that the further the cache is placed from the trail, the less the impact. With the built in error in a GPS unit, it's very unlikely that any geocacher will take the same path to the cache, which spreads out impact and allows the area time to recover. You talk about ''trampling through the woods and disturbing wildlife'', but walking on an established trail does exactly the same thing. Something about your post did't ring true and while typing this, I checked out your profile. No finds, no hides and an invalid e-mail address. Hmmmm. "Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, he'll sit in a boat and drink beer all day" - Dave Barry Quote Link to comment
+Renegade Knight Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 Well now mtn-man you bring up another delima do you dilute the damage by spreading it out? Or concentrate it and minimze the coverage? Parks do both. They concentrate the people so that they blanket an area of some scenic or recreational importance. Then they build trails and facilites to try to minimize the impact. The world is a facinating place. I would hate to have to view it through the glass walls of an improved trail system. If everyone thinks wanting to feel the mist of a waterfall, the mud in the bottom of a river, a deer close up are "the debate about doing whatever I dadgum well please" they are pretty much missing the point. Trials for for where throngs of people gather. They are for 4x4's, ATV's and the like. My own two feet in the larger world are not a problem. If anyone really thinks that then they deserves to be enslaved to the concrete jungle we live in. Then they can enjoy the acrid smell of hot wet asphalt after a summar shower time and again. Quote Link to comment
+mtn-man Posted July 2, 2003 Share Posted July 2, 2003 I think dilution is best. I have been a Forest Service Volunteer specializing in trail maintenance and improper trailside campsite removal. I have busted up hundreds of fire rings. I have seen areas recover very quickly once you divert people away from a hiker-established campsite area. One of my favorite areas in GA is a steep hillside near Raven Cliffs. There was no established route to the cliff and the area below was about a 50' wide by 200' high area of totally bare dirt. I constructed a set of log steps and the area recovered trememdously in one year. Two years later you could not tell that the whole area was trashed. If you look at this web page you will see the log steps a year and a half after I put them in. Even though they were getting covered in runoff that was coming down the hill (which I cleared out) you can still see that there is new growth coming up on both sides of the cleared area in the pictures. Those areas were bare. The area continues to recover. The bare area would be represented on the bottom picture on this page starting at the bottom just left of center going up to and beyond the two people standing to the right. Quote Link to comment
+Ish-n-Isha Posted July 3, 2003 Share Posted July 3, 2003 We just returned from a 2400 mile Canadian BC tour. The entire Province except for a central hwy 97 corridor is worthy to be called a "Provincial Park" Very undeveloped and beautiful. However as to geocaching impact, I kept wondering if the hundreds of deer we saw, the scores of bear, the herds of elk, and the dozens of moose understood how they were affecting their environment with their sharp hooves and bushwhacking. Some say they even refuse to use certified "leave no trace" sanitation practices. Obviously BC provincial parks will be decimated in months. See it while you still can. Cachin's a bit sweeter when you've got an Isha! Quote Link to comment
freewrite44 Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 Nature is powerful. Trees can sprout from solid rock; weeds will quickly work their way up through the cracks in your paved driveway. Two excellent examples of nature's determination and recovery are lava flows from which sprout many plants, and the Mayan temples that were overrun with growth until humans discovered them and cleared them out for all to see. Certainly, there is concern about young trees and rare plant life being trampled. That's valid. But as some posts point out, how many people are going to be stampeding the caches? And what route will they take? Forcing people onto a prepared trail makes sense when bus loads are visiting, but that's not the issue here. What about hikers and rock climbers, as one person noted? Forcing people to stick to a path takes away from the enjoyment of nature. Aren't we already forced into "avenues" like sheep? If Parks Canada removes all the caches, is that really going to stop kids from charging off into the bush, or adults who want to see more than the back end of their predecessor? As a nature photographer, I will venture into any area that promises an interesting scene, whether it's on or off a path. Parks Canada can't stop all of us, which makes their decision in this matter an unfair one, should they decide to ban caching. It might be to everyone's best interests if the Parks people take time to identify rare areas and alert visitors not to go there, rather than making this a blanket demand to stay out. What's interesting too, is that the government takes our taxes to maintain the parks, then tell us we can't use them as we'd like (within reason and I don't think hiking is unreasonable). Makes no sense Quote Link to comment
dave and jaime Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 when begining an arguemment like this has anyone actually considered how many people attempt to visit the average cache on an annual basis ? most caches in my area recieve, on average, abour 1 visitor per 2 weeks. this isnt a lot of trafic to expect the enviroment to recover from when one considers that inconsiderate wildlife roam the great out doors constantly . thats it! to save the enviroment we must elminate all wildlife !!! 'Get to the point---speak English!!!!' Quote Link to comment
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