Geocaching Australia

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Many geocachers have Signature items that they like to leave behind in a geocache.
Some examples of these are:
• Custom Stamps
• Small animals (relevant to Cacher name)
• Cacher Cards
• Custom clothing
• Geocoins.
These are by no means compulsory, but many cachers enjoy adding this touch of personalisation when they hide/find a cache.

Do you have one? What is it?
Are they not just cache clutter?
What is the point?
What ‘good’ ones have you seen and liked?
Are they/should they be additional to other swaps?

other thoughts?

I don't have one but I'm assured by the manufacturer that they are on their way.

Mine will be a small AAA torch engraved with some special details.

I think they make special items for other cachers. I (will) use them as my "approval" of a cache. If I feel a cache warrants one, I'll pop it in.

I do a not of the TNLN logs because I find most cache contents actually worth a lot less than the trip there. I'd rather carry a few more expensive items and not actually "trade" but "gift" my signature item to the cache.

I also have cacher cards with I irregularly use, manily because I forget they are in the bag.

I like the idea of such items, and we've had a few over the years.

My favourites are the survival cards and the LED keyring torches. I got bulk of both of them online, and just added a bear sticker. They seem to've been valued when found, and they were are a mark of approval to (mainly) FTF caches that we liked.




We've scored an i! hat, an ecoteam keyring and shopping bag, a rare Alternate Route cap and a few other treasured sig items over the years, as well as lots of cache-specific finders' items, all of them proudly displayed (in a cardboard box in a bedroom!)

These usefull items sound like a good idea.

Are the Bear left pictures in hibination Ahh it's summer now.

Useable sig items are good swaps. Frogs and skippys are OK too.

Stickers and stamps are great. I have some reservations about cache cards though - get a few in a cache and they start becoming clutter and litter.

Has anybody found a really cool "cached" stamp as a swap, probably in a Tasmanian cache? I don't know what happened to it...

I've never been to sure on the protocol with sig items...

Are they a swap?

I remember getting an email a few years ago chastising me for taking a sig item (it had no details on it).....

When people place them, do they do it as a permamnet reminder, or as a swap?

I would assume that anything in a cache is fair game.

If it is to stay in the cache you would expect instructions similar to a travel bug sheet.

No instructions = swap item.

TeamBeanDare wrote:I would assume that anything in a cache is fair game.

Not quite. Things such as sig cards left by finders would not be considered fair game.

Andrew

Aushiker wrote: Not quite. Things such as sig cards left by finders would not be considered fair game.

Has the finder no longer "found" the cache if someone removes their card? Is that not what the log book is for? I've seen some small caches that were so full of signature "crap", that nobody would be able to put in a swap. What fun is that? The same goes for micros - who is it that figured putting signature cards in a micro was a good plan?!?

I know that some cachers in SA have started collecting one cachers signature item.

Hopefully by next years june long weekend, someone will have a complete quilt covered in team hurtle patches

We have two signature items, a calling card and an emergency cache kit, although we haven't put the second one in a cache for awhile - need to make up some more.

I think signature items are fair game, even calling cards. If someone wants to grab one of our cards out of a cache I've got no problem with that. Same goes for the kit. We won't put signature cards in micros or even small caches if they're likely to take up too much space. Normally they just slot in with the log book in the ziplock bag and don't add noticeably to the bulk of stuff in the cache.

I think its interesting to find a cache and instantly be able to identify some of the previous finders based on what's in there!

Not quite. Things such as sig cards left by finders would not be considered fair game.

I agree but why would you want to take vistor cards out of a cache as a trade item. Mine aren't anything special.

My opinion is that Signature items should be more significant than a business card.

As to whether they polute caches over time, I work on the principal that when my caches become overfull with non-trade items, I will remove some of them and place them in my cache archive.

These are just the guidelines I follow and are not hard and fast rules. As my caches are reletively new, I haven't had much experience with this situation as yet.

fehrgo wrote:

Aushiker wrote: Not quite. Things such as sig cards left by finders would not be considered fair game.

Has the finder no longer "found" the cache if someone removes their card? Is that not what the log book is for?

Signature cards are normally left, well in WA they are, for the cache owner hence my comment .... Can't see where you are coming from given what I said. I made no such claim as you seem to attribute to me

Andrew

Aushiker wrote: Signature cards are normally left, well in WA they are, for the cache owner hence my comment .... Can't see where you are coming from given what I said. I made no such claim as you seem to attribute to me

Andrew

Sorry, I came across to harshly there. My point was more that signature items which try to place some restrictions on the cache, finders, or the cache owner could be seen as unreasonable. If the signature item is being left as a gift for the cache owner, I have no problem with it, but I would be concerned if the person who placed the signature item intended that it never be removed from the cache.

I am in contact with a lot of geocachers in the San Francisco Bay Area, so when I visited last year Fairly Magic helped me out with a really cool signature item. Cachers there love to collect them, and they are probably swapped at event more often then going into caches - although that happens too!<P>