[aprssig] Lost Goat - APRS Beacon?

[Kent Hufford]

This application reminds me of COWS IN SPACE. Back in the early days (1990s)
of GPS and APRS, a college put trackers on a bunch of 
cows in a field to track them on their grazing habits.

Kent
KQ4KK 

-----Original Message-----
From: aprssig-bounces at tapr.org [mailto:aprssig-bounces at tapr.org] On Behalf
Of Steve_wG0AT
Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 1:22 PM
To: aprssig at tapr.org
Subject: [aprssig] Lost Goat - APRS Beacon?

I just picked up a tinytracker at Pacificon from Byonics and thinking  
of putting it on my dominant packgoat Rooster.  The reason is the  
goats usually never let me out of the sight since I'm their alpha  
goat. However on our last big adventure we were hurriedly down  
climbing a 12k-ft peak and we somehow got separated! I spent over an  
hour frantically looking for them as we were in the path of pending  
forest fire. Fortunately I was able to track them (hoof prints) and  
literally ran them down! Not an easy task above 10k feet ...the  
running part that is!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDXMiaaqcpE

If I'd had only a little knowledge of the where abouts I could have  
cut that time to just minutes to locate them! LAT/LON and direction  
and/or speed would have been a huge aid while in my panic search mode!

So I'm now building up a TT3 w/GPS and now looking for a an old HT to  
put a 1w APRS beacon on my goats. I can easily mount it on their  
saddle w/19" whip and maybe even use a solarpanel to charge the  
battery. Kinda a fun project. I carry a Garmin GPS60CSx and had a  
VX8(I can't locate it it at the moment??) but considering getting a D7  
instead. Seems I could use these tools to get a quick fix on the goats  
should we get separated again?

Any considerations this APRS application? Like on path programing or  
should I use a non standard freq to reduce APRS traffic? Comments/ 
Suggestions welcomed!

73, Steve ...wGØAT/R&P
http://www.youtube.com/goathiker