Trading up or trading even...

[5beavers]

Is it just us or has anyone else noticed that lately there seems to be alot of junk or just plain trash is being placed into caches? We always buy new items to place into the caches we visit and when we place new caches there are always new items in them to start out with but it seems that when we visit other caches or maintain our own we seem to see nothing but trash in them. We were just wondering if anyone else has run across this same problem? :|

[Rusty_da_dog]

I myself has seen it on occasion. Sometimes I think it has to do with people are new to geocaching, they find a few then want to go put a cache out themselves. When they do they take whatever odd and end junk they have laying around throw it in a butter dish and hide it in the middle of no where. Now, I am not opposed to hiding caches in the middle of no where,and I have even searched for a few, but when you find the cache that is in the middle of no where and it has nothing but junk in it, well that hacks me off.

I say if you are gonna put out a cache and all you have is junk, just put a log book in it and add some trade items later. I would much rather find a cache with a log book and nothing to trade (since I rarely trade anyway) than a cache full of junk.

I also on this note think it sucks people who trade down when it comes to trading, I have had some good stuff in my caches that gets sucked down to happy meal toys while they haul off the good stuff.

just my .02 Cya on the trails,
Rusty

[jacksonb]

I don't trade items very often because that is not the most exciting part of geocaching to me. I just like the find itself. However, I have noticed in particular in my coin toss cache people not trading even. I started that cache with a number of foreign coins, wheat pennies, bicentennial quarters and such. Within 3 or 4 months, it basically held some pocket change.

This is also a challenge when geocaching with my boys, 13 and 10. I have to remind them from time to time that this is not an opportunity to make out like a bandit. I have to ask them once in a while if they think a bouncy ball is an equal trade for a deck of magic cards. But they are young and hopefully they are learning.

[5beavers]

we rarely trade unless the kids are with us but when we do we always keep our cache bag full of good new swag.

[flannelman]

I like to keep some trade items with me, especially when the kiddos go. but I don't trade often. When I place caches I start out with new stuff. It doesn't have to be overly expensive though. A lot of little dollar store items can make a great cache. Some people just don't get it when it comes to leaving things better than when you found it.