[kingu]

Geocachers have a blind spot: The rules say nothing can be buried. All caches are to be above ground, hence, even though the site had been visited by well over 900 geocachers while he had his stash there, his stash had never been disturbed in the slightest. It didn’t hurt that you had to go around a big boulder and through a bush to get to his stash.

He maintains a number of geocaches, and has a very heavy and varied GPS log of his ‘finds’ which conceal his stashes extremely well. If you only go out into remote places JUST to maintain your stash, you’re likely making a big bold arrow for LEOs to follow. But if you’re constantly in out of the way areas, handling ammo cans and the like for geocaching, the actual data is buried under a mountain of inconsequential acts. It is very similar to the method of using an underground cable to conceal your stash - LEOs do not follow a lead when it appears to be something else.

[Mad Dawgg]

"The rules say nothing can be buried."

Not quite. The rules say a geocacher should not have to dig with a shovel to find the cache.

For instance I have been to a geocache that was hidden under a pile of large stones. It was buried but I didn't need to use a shovel to find it.

The idea behind the rule is so that geocacher seekers aren't digging holes looking for things. That could get messy and damage property.

Another example, it is kosher for me the geocache hider to dig a hole and bury a piece of PVC that sticks out of the ground and made to look like some bit of pipe that looks like it is a service opening for buried infrastructure. But the seeker of the cache should not be required to unearth the pipe to get at the cache. Usually there is a hidden lid or door on such things. (The hider must have permission to disturb the ground for the cache to be kosher)