He recognizes the
values of Geocaching and feels it's an ideal activity for National Forests. He
doesn't think formal permission is required to place caches in Tonto, but as he
said, "it can't hurt to stop in at the ranger station and let them know what
you're doing." And he reiterated that caches do not belong in designated
wilderness areas.
Is it
possible that someone official could log on the Main website and Request an
Archive of those Physical Caches?
as after
logging a find on Scorpions2003 was emailed by the owner with this
question:
Why would the
rangers go out looking for it?
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, February 03, 2003 7:42
PM
Subject: [Az-Geocaching] Our Day in
Tonto
J. Scott Wood,
Forest Archaeologist and Heritage Program Manager for Tonto National Forest
today took a group of Geocachers on a tour of some of the archaeological sites
within the Cave Creek Ranger District along the Seven Springs Road (FR24). He
described methods of identifying sites, site etiquette, and the problems and
challenges of managing such sites on public lands. He worked his way from the
more obvious to some very subtle indicators of where sites are located. If
this sounds familiar to those of you who have had site steward training, it's
because we were given the same tour, and the same topics, although perhaps not
to the level of depth that the stewards get.
We had a sunny
but very windy day. It was chilly by comparison to some of our recent weather,
but it was still a great day to be out in Tonto. Scott also prepared a special
"virtual" cache for us. He gave us the coordinates for an archaeological
site and challenged us to find it. Just to make things interesting, he gave us
the coordinates as they use them in the Forest Service: UTM and NAD27!
(Note to Garmin owners: If you ever have to change format and datum in
your GPSr, make sure you change the format first and then change the datum.
You can ask just about any Garmin owner who was there why you need to remember
that.)
The Arizona
Geocaching community is very fortunate to have someone like Scott at the
Forest Service. Scott believes that the public owns the land and it's the
Forest Service's job to manage it on behalf of the public. He recognizes the
values of Geocaching and feels it's an ideal activity for National Forests. He
doesn't think formal permission is required to place caches in Tonto, but as
he said, "it can't hurt to stop in at the ranger station and let them know
what you're doing." And he reiterated that caches do not belong in designated
wilderness areas.
About the Mesa
Ranger District confiscations and the reports that all caches in the ranger
district would be confiscated: Scott told me and some of the other attendees
that he "chased that all the way to Washington." There is nothing coming out
of the USFS that prohibits Geocaching on Forest Service land in general. He is
going to have a talk with the staff at the Mesa RD office and make sure that
they are only removing caches in the Wilderness.
We had an
enjoyable and educational day. Scott is amenable to doing this again if the
interest is there.
Steve
Team Tierra
Buena