Duckie Park Traditional Geocache

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juzzlea: Archiving this cache so that others may be free to replace it, or find a better location nearby.

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Hidden : 6/8/2008
Difficulty:
2.5 out of 5
Terrain:
3 out of 5

Size: Size: small (small)

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Geocache Description:

Welcome to the Duckie Park.

This is the park where I often took my daughter while she was a toddler when it was just the two of us. Many a happy weekend was enjoyed watching the ducks, and climbing on the rocks. I have always being impressed with other caches that I have visited in the way the cache hider managed to make the trip both interesting and informative. As my first cache, I wanted to offer my fellow geocacher some little bit of knowledge, but I didn’t know any interesting little bit of history about the area.

However, while searching for a good hiding spot, geo-daughter asked if she could feed the ducks. I told her that it wasn’t actually good to feed the ducks bread. Like all juniors, she asked “why not”. So, I googled “don’t feed the ducks” and found the answer, And here is it!

Bread and birdseed do not contain the nutrients required to keep native birds healthy. They do contain additives that are not part of the diet of our indigenous birds. The wrong types of food and a lack of required nutrients can cause birds to become sickly, less resistant to disease and less able to escape predators such as cats and foxes. Birds become dependant on handouts and will no longer forage for their "natural" foods.

Bread attracts other pests:
Foxes: which prey opportunistically on local native wildlife.

Birds: Starlings, Mynas and Turtledoves, which aggressively compete for available food and nesting sites, forcing more timid native birds out of the area.

Fish: Feral fish such as carp and mosquito fish, which can
cause conditions which lead to destruction of habitat for native water-life by muddying the water and eating the larvae of beneficial insects and crustaceans.

Other pests: Whatever is left over becomes food for vermin such as mice, rats, flies and European wasps.

Biodiversity: Food handouts attract Domestic feral ducks
which can, and do, cross-breed with native ducks. In New Zealand, for instance, the population of native pure-bred Black Ducks is under serious threat due to cross-breeding with feral ducks.

Disease: Rotting food scraps and build-up of faecal matter can cause botulism, the cause of death of many Pacific Black Ducks at our waterways.

Snakes: An increase in vermin can also cause an
increase in snake numbers as they breed when there is more food about.

The above information comes from (visit link)

Watch out for thorns as you get to GZ!

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Ng gur onfr bs gur gerr, haqre onex

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)


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