Pet Caches

Blending caches in with the environment can be tricky and there are a lot of ways to do so.  While camouflage can be very basic, to truly get it just right takes practice.  But there is another fun way to do camouflage that we will look at today, along with several examples of this method.  Because of the various methods used, it will be hard to provide a materials list that covers every possible method.  So we will try to highlight what will be needed for each of the provided examples so you can get an idea about how to approach the method.  And what is the method...

ANIMALS!

Yep, I said animals.  So what exactly does that mean?  Those of you who have found a lot of caches may have seen a cache built like this before.  It a geocache built to look like an animal.  In some cases, the animal part is a prop that has been turned into a geocache.  Other times, it is a geocache that is attached to some kind of animal prop.  And in some cases, the animal actually hides the container.  We will look at one of each of these methods.

MATERIALS
One hard part about the methods we will be looking at is finding the right prop for the design.  There are two easy places to find these items, though they aren't the only locations.  One is a Garden Center.  Many stores that cater to landscaping and gardening will often have some animal related props.  Another location would be Halloween stores.  While these are usually only found in early Fall, with a little bit of looking you can sometimes find stores that sell Halloween related goods year-round. 

ANIMAL IS THE GEOCACHE

Our first example is an animal that has been turned into a geocache.  In this example, the animal is typically a larger prop that is hollow in some form.  Is this always the case...definitely not.  I've seen examples of bison tubes made to look like insects.  But for this post, we will focus on a larger version.  For this example, you will need a few items:

• A fake cat
• Logsheet
• Weather resistant glue
• PVC Plug and respectively sized threaded PVC adaptor

For the PVC Plug and adaptor, you can commonly find something called a PVC Cleanout W/Plug.  This would fit perfectly.  You just need to find a size appropriate for your design.  First, we see the cache itself, held by one of my caching friends:

You can see the cat, along with the black PVC fitting attached to it's belly.  A hole was cut into the belly, cut to the diameter of the bottom of the PVC Cleanout. The cleanout is then glued to the cat.  The PVC Plug then can screw into the cleanout to create a water-tight seal (provided you've properly glued the cat to the PVC).  In this photo, you might also notice a small metal loop in front of the PVC plug.  This loop was used to attach the cat to a tree, as seen here:

To attach this the way it is shown, the person who hid this would have had to drill a small hole into the tree, then take a hook screw a bit larger than the hole and screw that into the tree as well.  This would then provide the hook for the loop you see in the above photo, thereby attaching the cat to the tree as shown.

While this design is pretty cool when you see it in person, this did require putting a screw into a tree, which could cause damage to the tree.  If you like how this is setup (and it was pretty cool when I saw it), I would encourage you to find a location that doesn't require drilling into a tree.  I have seen reviewers archive caches that do this and they are right to do so.  It may not seem like much, but this can cause damage.

As you can see in this image, the design does create an interesting atmosphere for a cache, especially on Halloween. I know I laughed pretty hard upon finding this because my first thought was that we had actually found a cat.  Imagine the logs you would receive with a cache like this.

ANIMALS ATTACHED TO THE GEOCACHE

The next type of animal cache involves attaching animals to a geocache.  One of the first examples of this that I ran into involved a fake rat attached to a 35mm film canister, hidden under a log.  I happened to go after it at night, which made the cache even more fun to find.  These types of hides are rather simple and require nothing more than a geocache and some kind of fake animal to attach to the outside.  Spiders, snakes, and rats are the most common fake animals you'll see used, but insects often work wonderfully as well.

When building a cache like this using a smaller cache size, you typically need nothing more than the geocache itself, the animal to attach, and a method for attaching it.  Weather resistant glue is the most commonly used method.  For larger caches, like ammo cans, some geocachers will use items like snakes and large spiders and just rest them on top of the cache.

Here is an example of a micro attached to an insect.  The photo was taken by rhondapalooza.

ANIMALS HIDING GEOCACHES

The last example involves using an animal to hide the geocache.  Now the above example of the cat might seem like it fits here to but there is a difference.  With the cat, the cat was turned into the geocache.  The PVC parts merely provided an easy method to open and close the container, but the cat's body was the geocache itself.  For this last method, the fake animal isn't the geocache itself, it's merely the camouflage designed to hide the geocache.  Here, let's see an example of this:

In this example, the bird is the camo.  If you look closely, you can see the red, rounded edge of the geocache sticking out the back end of the bird.  It is hard to tell from this view, but the bird is actually carved from a lightweight wood, carefully painted to look like a real bird.  Using a drill, a hole was created for the bison tube.  A perch was created and tied to the tree on which the bird is attached.  Look carefully and you can see a triangular piece on the back end of the perch which helps prevent the bison tube from falling out accidentally.  To retrieve this cache, the bird rotated forward just a bit.  This was achieved by making the feet loop around the perch, but with a little bit of looseness to allow the rotation.  Rotate the bird forward, pull out the bison tube, and sign the logsheet.

Birds are definitely the most commonly used animal for this method, at least from what I've experienced.  Here is another example of a bird geocache (which happens to be an exact replica to two bird caches I have seen) as taken by Wrapped In Piano Strings, who we should welcome to the geocaching world as this is a picture of their very first find:

Once, I saw a large GINORMOUS Bison using this method up in St. Joseph, MO.  Always good for a laugh when taking someone to find it.

So there you have it.  Three ways to turn a simple geocache into a creative geocache using animals.  Have you seen an example of this before?  Post a GC code in the comments.

TripCyclone

P.S. I am waiting for permission from a few people to display their photos on the site.  I will update the post with photos as permissions arrive.  For now, I've merely linked to the photos I am awaiting permission from.

A Sprinkle of Finds

Yesterday, I was reminded of a cache container that is a classic example of creativeness.  Both the design and placement can confuse many geocachers who haven't seen the design before.  And better yet, it's easy to build.

Here's what you need:

• 1 pop up sprinkler head
• A 35mm film canister
• Logsheet
• A small spade

Optional items:

• Bison tube
• Toothpick, thin Dowel Rod, or popsicle stick
• PVC
  

The best sprinkler head to get is one of those common round black ones you can find in most Gardening or Hardware stores.  For the spade...well that will depend on the location you choose to place it at. We'll discuss that after looking at the build.

The first thing you will need to do is unscrew the top of the sprinkler head, marked in the image to the left.  Once open, look carefully at the guts.  Sometimes there is a hollow piece running the length of the sprinkler that could easily hold a rolled up logsheet.  If not, just pull out everything, leaving the sprinkler casing and lid.

Next, get your logsheet ready.  The simple way is just to get a standard micro logsheet.  You can staple a few sheets together if you want to allow more finds between log refills.  Now if there is a hollow piece inside, you can slide the logsheet into there.  If this is an option, I recommend attaching something at the center of the roll that people can grip to pull the rolled up logsheet out.  A popsicle stick or thin dowel rod works great.

If there is not a hollow piece inside, then grab a micro container like a 35mm film canister, bison tube, etc.  Make sure it will fit inside, then add the logsheet and then toss the container inside the sprinkler head.

Once you have everything inside, just seal it up.  Now you need to find a location for it.  This is where this one can be tricky.  If you pick a spot with mulch, there's a chance the mulch is deep enough that you can just clear out a hole, place the sprinkler inside, and position the mulch around it to fill gaps.  You could also find a small bush, insert the sprinkler head through some branches, and cover the top with a leaf or two.  But sometimes, you might need to dig a small hole.  If you have exhausted other options and decided on digging, make sure you have permission from the landowner if it isn't on your property.  This is especially true at parks.  If a muggle sees you pulling up a spinkler head, they might get suspicious enough to report it.  You'll want the parks department to be aware of it.

To the right is an example of how to hide it to blend in.  Notice that unless you were looking for the cache, and even if you are looking for it, this sprinkler head looks like it blends in rather well.  You might not even realize it's not real unless comparing it to surrounding sprinkler heads (if there are any).

As you can see, this cache is a great example of concealing a cache out in the open.  It has become more common in the last two - three years, and some Geocaching stores will even sell ready to go versions of this.  The downside is blending it in.  Many parks and homes now have these pop-up sprinklers installed.  If you know what location you are aiming to place it, you can try to match the design as closely as possible to better blend it in so it doesn't stand out. Imagine an all black sprinkler head as the real sprinklers, then having the cache in one that has a bright white stripe around the lid.  An observant person might notice that.


Also, if you look at the picture of the cache surrounded by mulch, you'll notice the white base, a piece not seen in the first image.  An additional way to set this into the ground is to use a piece of PVC pipe that snuggly fits the sprinkler head.  Then, when you set up the hole for the cache container, you can place the PVC pipe in the hole.  Now, when the cache is retrieved and then put back, it will quickly slide into place.  No need to make sure dirt or mulch doesn't fall into the hole and force finders to redig them back out.

Now we have one more photo to show you.  In this case, it's an example of a homemade logsheet.  A longer piece of paper, likely from a calculator printer roll, has been rolled up with a small toothpick in the center.  The toothpick is taped to the printer roll.  Just twist to tighten the paper up on the toothpick and then pull down.  The housing is a small plastic sleeve glued inside a small piece of PVC pipe with a Geocaching logo taped to the side.  A rubber plug is at the top end to help seal that side.  And this all fits nicely into the sprinkler head.  Even though the logsheet isn't in a baggie, it has remained quite dry.

Like I said, a rather simple hide to build, not to bad to place, and great for concealment in plain view.  And this design works with any type of cache: traditional, multi, or puzzle.

TripCyclone

Ant Hill Cache

Here at Creative Caches & Containers, we are not impartial to creativeness from outside sources.  We encourage you to let us know about your ideas so that we may help spread that creative nature to interested geocachers.  It is in that nature that we present this next idea straight from HeadHardHat (HHH), host of the geocaching video series known as GeoSnippits and the author of the GeoCache: I'm NOT Obsessed...Right? blog.  With his permission, we provide you with this video on how to design an Ant Hill Cache:

Let's quickly look at what is needed for this design:

• Bondo
• Bondo Hardener
• A small bucket or cup
• Latex or vinyl disposable gloves
• Something to stir with (and disposable)
• Spray Paint (textured, and roughly the color of ant hill sand)
• Plastic 35mm film canister

Bondo is, simply put, a putty. But it's not like the Silly Putty that most people play with as a kid.  Bondo is a two-part putty.  This is because Bondo alone is okay.  But once you add the hardener, it hardens FAST.  And the more hardener you apply, the faster it will harden.  This is why you want the gloves.  It will harden to anything and you don't want it under your fingertips when it does.  Bondo was originally designed for automotive use and is commonly used in automotive repair.  But there are many other uses. Just looking it up I came across pictures of people who have used it to design creative outsides for their Wii, making hand holds for rock climbing walls, making a ceiling fan look like helicopter blades (complete with helicopter hanging below), and even for making buttons on a Guitar Hero controller that light up when you push the buttons.  There are likely limitless ideas for its use, so it's no surprise that it can be useful for making geocaches.

The video pretty much sums up how to make it, so I'm not going to go over that.  When I first saw this, I commented to HHH that most ant hills I've seen don't look so vertically tall.  Guess the North Carolinian ants are bigger. :P  But all kidding aside, you don't want to create an ant hill that doesn't look like the ant hills commonly seen in the area you want to hide the cache.  I've seen ant hills that look like his but half the size.  I've seen ant hills that are small in height but are wide and circular.  What we are going to look at now is how to modify the design to blend this cache in with the ant hills in your area.

First, you'll want to go out and find some ant hills as examples to see how you want yours to look in the end.  Part of why his is taller is because of the position of the 35mm film canister.  That's going to be hard to position any different.  You could use something smaller, but I have another thought that will help in making a smaller ant hill while not necessarily reducing the size of the container.

If you want to make one of these that doesn't stand up as tall, then don't build it around the cache itself, but around a cache holder.  Let's first look at some additional supplies that are needed.  First, you need to know what size container you are going to use.  Avoid anything larger than a 35mm film canister.  Try to aim for something thinner. The goal is to lay the cache on it's side inside the fake ant hill to reduce the height, but still allow geocachers to open the container.  Bison tubes, Advantex film canisters (more oval shaped than the 35mm kind), nanos, and other small containers will work well for this.

Once you have the size picked out, make a thin plastic sleeve that fit snuggly around the container.  If using a nano, you can also just get a magnet the same width as a nano.  You want this sleeve to fit snuggly to help hold the container in place, but still be able to remove it from the sleeve as needed.  If need be, you can try to hunt down some moldable plastic.  It's been a while since I've seen it in stores, but there is a product out there that can be heated up in boiling water so that it is moldable.  Take it out of the water, and within a few minutes it will harden into whatever shape you position it in.  I'll try to look for in the future, but if you know what I'm talking about, send me the info.  Once you have this mold made, you then just snap the container into the sleeve and you have a cache holder. When you apply the Bondo, this will take the place of the 35mm in the video.

For added measure, we're going to design a cover to go over the cache to help ensure it doesn't fall out by accident.  To do this right, you'll need to design this part first, before you make the ant hill.  Figure out roughly what size you want the base of the ant hill to be (width wise) and about how tall you want it to be.  Get some hard plastic and cut it out to be about that width of the base.  Then get a screw that will be a bit smaller than the planned height of the ant hill.  Put the screw through one end of the plastic piece.  Have this with you when you apply the Bondo.

Before apply the Bondo, have newspaper down like in the video.  Take that plastic sleeve that you'll use to hold the cache and place it on top of the plastic piece with the screw.  Make sure it's not right up against the screw.  Then place a small piece of newspaper between both plastic pieces, covering up the bottom piece, but with the screw poking through the paper.  You are doing this because you want the Bondo applied to both the sleeve and the screw, but not the plastic piece that is attached to the screw.  Now apply the Bondo.

When finished applying the Bondo, and once it's hardened, remove the small piece of newspaper that you placed between the two plastic pieces.  If designed right, this will create a plastic cover that can be rotated open to expose the cache inside, and rotated closed to help protect the container from falling out.  This won't protect against the elements, so make sure that the inner container can be sealed.  If the shape isn't quite what you want, sand any undesirable parts away.

Now all that's left is to apply the spray paint.  As HHH mentions, use a textured spray paint.  Try to find one that closely matches the color of the ant hills in your area.  Paint it, let it dry, and there's a modified Ant Hill Cache.

Thanks to HeadHardHat for making this video.  It really shows how some creativity can produce interesting cache designs.  Keep up with his blog for some great general geocaching tips.

Halloween Series - The Skull

Yesterday, we looked at The Rat as a Halloween themed cache.  Today, we are going to look at how to build a Skull Cache.  And this one definitely has some variety to it depending on what you use for the skull.

Required supplies:

• Logbook
• Micro Cache Container
• Fake Skull

Optional supplies:

• Power drill
• Screweye
• Fishing line/rope
  

Let's start with the skull itself.  There are a variety of skull products out there.  Hard plastic, soft plastic, foam, hollow, solid, and everything in between.  This will probably be the most important decision you make with this design.  What skull you use will define how to build the cache and how to hide it.  If you use hollow, all you need to do is open it up to hide the cache.  If you use a solid skull, you will have to drill.  That's where the power drill will come in.  If you use foam, you better be prepared to buy a lot of spares as the weather will ruin it.  Better yet, just stay away from foam.

Let's look at the container.  Again, a matchstick container works best but a 35mm can be used as well, just like with the rat cache.

Now for the hide.  The skull can provide some interesting ways to get creative with the hide itself.  You can use some of the common "in the woods" methods such as covering it with brush or finding a hole in a tree.  A more creative way involves hanging from something like a tree. Attach a screweye (for those unfamiliar with that, it's the screw that has the round loop at the top) to the top of the skull and then tie a line to that.  Attach the other end of the line to whatever object you are hanging it from and you now have a hanging skull cache.

In the end, it's a rather basic setup.  The key thing to consider is what kind of skull you want to hide.  That will help define how to build the cache.

TripCyclone

Halloween Series - The Rat

Wow, didn't realize it had been THAT long since my last article.  Well, I've been pretty busy between work and...well work.  But, I thought that as we approach Halloween in five days, I would do a series of quick articles on Halloween themed caches.  Most of these will be short articles and very similar to each other, but with slightly different props.  We'll start with a classic - THE RAT.

Building a rat cache is rather simple.  Here are the needed supplies:

• Rubber rat
• Micro Cache container
• Logsheet

An optional supply would be some sort of adhesive.  That depends on the final design.  In the simplest sense, you will be attaching the container to the rat.  How you attach it will depend on the container used.  35mm film canisters work well, but waterproof matchstick container (easy to find among camping gear in stores) is better.  Mainly because the screw top and O-ring provide a more durable waterproof container (imagine that...a waterproof matchstick container being waterproof!) than a film canister, which can easily get smashed, broken, chewed on or have the lid pop off.

I've seen the attachment go several ways.  If you purchase a rat that is hollow, you can cut a hole on the belly and insert the container inside the rat.  If it isn't hollow, look to see if there is a space between the paws where you can slip the container (this might be where an adhesive would be valuable).  Unless it is a bigger rat, a micro is the best size for a container.

For hiding spots, try to find a good hole at the base of something, be it natural or manmade.  Up in a tree just seems less natural than on the ground.  Most of the time, the rats will be black or brown but I've seen white and gray ones before.  The darker ones will be easier to blend in, and if found in the dark, are more likely to startle someone.  The first time I saw a rat cache, it made me hesitate before reaching for because I was looking at night.

There you have it.  A simple halloween cache.  Next up...the skull cache.

TripCyclone

Building a 35mm Film Cache

I know what you're thinking.  "Why is he talking about building a 35mm Film Cache.  That's so simple and uncreative."  Well you are right...if you are thinking of a traditional film canister hide.  This one is a bit different, and it can be used in a VARIETY of ways and with traditionals, multi's, or puzzles. Uncreative...HA HA HA!

Let's look at the materials needed:

• 35mm film canister
• Micro log sheet
• Tape
• Scissors

Before we deal with how to build this, let's look at that first item.  A 35mm film canister.  Now you're probably thinking of the small plastic container that film comes in.  That's not what I'm talking about.  Instead, you need the metal container that the film is actually housed in.  The piece that would go into the camera itself.  For the young ones out there that don't remember film cameras, it looks like this:

Whether you regularly use film or not, chances are you aren't going to have these sitting around the house.   So how do you get your hands on some?  The best place is a film developing center, or a 1-Hour Photo Processing store.  While getting my hands on some, I went to CVS, Walgreens, and Wal-mart.  Many 1-Hour Photo stores will have some kind of system set up where they can get some money back if they send in boxes of used film canisters and those plastic film containers.  At least it used to be like that.  The CVS and Walgreens I went to seem to throw them away.  Good thing Wal-mart still recycles them.  Way to be green Wal-mart.  If you go to the photo lab and politely ask them for either item, usually they are willing to give you a handful.  If they look at you weird and ask why, you can always tell them what they are for or you can tell them something else.  As a science teacher, I can easily say that I'm using them for class and they don't have any more questions.  You can also tell them they are for an art project, or that you use the plastic containers to store things like tacks and paper clips.  A simple reason will usually suffice.  Just make sure the metal film canister (like the one pictured above) has that small piece of film still sticking out and it isn't damaged.  That's important.  From here on out, when I refer to film canister, I'm referring to the metal item in the pictures.

Now that you have the metal film canisters, let's make sure you have the other supplies.  For tape, any tape will do.  I used packaging tape only because all my scotch tape is back at work.  Lay out your supplies in front of you and grab the log sheet.  Depending on your log sheet, figure out which end is the top and which end is the bottom.  Grab the bottom end and line it up with the small tab of film sticking out of the film canister.  Now you need to tape the log sheet to the piece of film.  It can overlap a bit if you want, or you can do it end to end.  Use a small piece of tape and wrap it completely around to secure the paper to the film canister.  When you're done, it should look like this:

Once you have the log sheet securely fastened, carefully insert the film back into the canister.  You might have to work it just a bit if the tape/logsheet/film part is a bit thick, but you should be able to get it in without damaging the container.  If you look at the above picture, you might be able to see that I overlapped the paper and film, and it still went in.  Once you have the paper sticking in, find the round, notched gear on the side of the film canister (you can see it on the right in the above image).  If you are holding the film canister like you see in the above picture, rotate it counter-clockwise (backwards) until it begins to retract the log sheet.  Keep doing this until you get near the end of the sheet.  Like this:

 

You now have a 35mm film cache. Pull the tab out, sign the log, roll it back up.  You might want to put a small label on the film canister that points to the gear with instructions on how to roll it back up.  But what if a geocacher rolls it too far?  Well, there's a way to help protect against that too.  One thing is to put a label on the end of the log sheet that tells them when to stop rolling.  However, if the geocacher isn't paying attention, that won't help much.  So here's something else you can do. 

Get a small piece of paper, no wider than the logsheet.  You can always cut up a log sheet to about 1/3rd of it's original length. Then carefully fold up BOTH ends towards the middle, making a small thick tab.  Then, slide that over the end of the log sheet that sticks out and tape it down.  You've effectively made a brake for the log sheet.  As it is rolled up, when that hits the thin slit that the paper goes into, it will be too big to go any further, stopping a geocacher from rolling the log sheet up inside the container (which you will not easily get out unless you are familiar with working in a photo lab).  In this next picture, I've highlighted where I installed this "brake" in black:

So how would you use this idea?  Well, you can take any traditional 35mm film canister cache and put one of these inside to make it just a bit different. Those cachers expecting a baggie and a log sheet will be surprised at first.  But that's not all.  How about using it as part of a multi?  You can type up a message with the coordinates to the next stage and build one of these. Pull out the tab, get the coordinates, roll it back up and move on.  Maybe your stages involve answering questions.  This is an easy way to spice up the stages a bit.  One idea, that would seem strangely appropriate, is to use them in a multi with a "spy novel" element to them.  Sort of like finding a microfiche container that contains the secret clue to the mystery.  There are lots of ways you can incorporate this design into a variety of hides.

!!!WARNING!!!

This container is NOT a good stand-alone cache.  The very slip in the container that allows the logsheet to come out will also let in moisture, especially with part of the paper sticking out.  That will absorb the moisture and provide it with an easy path to travel inside the container.  So any use of this design will require another container to put it into.  You can try using Rite-In-Rain paper, but moisture might still be a problem.  Now, I haven't tested this, so it's possible that it does better than I expect.  But then you also have the issue with potential rust.  Hmmm...maybe that's something I should test.  I have plenty of spares.

Any other ideas out there for how to incorporate this into a cache?

TripCyclone