This afternoon Sher and our son and I went on a ‘hunt’ for a Geocache at a nearby park. We had looked it up last night on a map, and there it was! So off we went.
Explanation of how the swale works
This Geocache was not one of those hidden boxes or log books. This one was a feature at the park. We went in search of a Water Quality Bio-Swale. Yes, a feature that is designed to collect pollutants from rain fall runoff.
That’s the swale in the background
It actually looked like an ordinary swale for rain runoff. This one had a more complex design than you normally expect. There was a thick layer of sandy soil in the low part of the swale which filtered any pollutants. A layer of gravel at the bottom surrounded a perforated drain pipe in which the storm water runs off to a nearby river.
The story of Indiana’s state tree
The swale banks were planted with trees native to Indiana. One of the park volunteers was mapping the location and species of each tree while we were on site. He informed us that there will be individual ID signs on each tree and a brochure with detailed info coming soon.
I know there are some geocaches near where I live, but haven’t tried to find them.
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We went looking for one last night, but the mosquitoes nearly ate us up, so we’ll go back to that one after the frost! We’ve just started on the Geocache stuff.
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a friend near me asked me about mozzies via fb last night – in my experience, in then’van with open doors at night, Lemongrass Oil (few drops on clothing and a few on tissue in an open jar set up on window sill) seem to do the trick here- but I don’t know whether the species at your end did get the memo. 😉 Better luck next time in any case.
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Thanks for that tip! Have never heard that before, and will for sure try it out. Thanks so much for sharing! 🙂
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What a cool idea! Thanks for posting!
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We might not have found this without the Geocache connection. We had not been at that part of the park before. Thanks Brenda!
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Interesting. I’ve never gone geocaching before, but it might be fun to try.
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We’re just now dipping our toes in the Geocache waters, we’ll see how it goes. It does seem like possibly another thing in your bag of tricks, however. Let us know if your try it too…. 😉
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🙂
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That’s a dandy idea to collect the bad stuff, your comment on skeeters made me chuckle a bit, we don’t have them down here, wonderful!
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Yea, bet you remember them from Michigan, and enjoy them no more! LOL
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Very cool bio-swale.
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They have designed and executed well: one of the staff told us even with some of the torrential downpours the swale does not held water, so the drainage design is working.
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Nice post on the park!
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Thank you for the nice comment! 😉
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Please read my blog and comment too. Would really appreciate it.
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I choose to not go to your blog due to the conditions required. Besides which it looked like a commercial site. No thank you.
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Okay
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I’ve been Geocaching for a few years but haven’t some it for some time, great fun 👍
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Good to hear, we’ll give it a try and see how it goes. Thanks for sharing…
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