Best marker for surveying

[Logismos]

What are peoples favourite markers for underground survey stations?

I've used nail varnish in dry caves, but the one's I've had always seem to struggle with any moisture. Similarly, tippex has worked okay until it gets wet or becomes tacky from grit. Both seem to do the trick 95% of the time for a temporary station, but sometimes I find myself really wishing for a more permanent method at a key station.
I've heard of lollypop sticks, but I imagine they degrade pretty fast!

 

[alastairgott]

One of the Tresviso lot uses a spit driver and creates a short .5cm hole or less, and if required dots the centre with nail varnish. But only for “prime” points, ones which they will definitely need to return to.

Points in the middle of boulder chokes should probably be regarded as not permanent for more reasons than there aren’t any passages off.

 

[Chris Curry]

Depends how permanent you need it to be, and where in the passage you want it to be. We always used to use plastic plant tags, marked with sharpie. We then moved to lollypop sticks as a biodegradable alternative once we realised we would never get around to gathering in all the plastic waste we had distributed around the caves. Most of our surveys have been complex northern dales maze caves, meaning many markers scattered everywhere, and that was surveying with LRUDs, so centre-passage stations were desirable. Now I'm doing splays with a DistoX, I've now moved on to tipex.

 

[tim.rose2]

Wax crayons - lasts a year or so.
I've found the best option for 'permanent' stations (i.e. junctions) is to use an obvious fixed natural feature (that's not a hand / foot hold which might come off / move) and photograph it. It's easy to return with a photo and identify the same spot.
I've only surveyed dry caves so not sure if wax sticks in the wet.

 

[Cavematt]

Car touch-up paint dries with a rather more durable finish than Tippex (and is available in nice bright colours). We used that during the original surveying of Excalibur Pot in 2008-2009, and although most of them have been rubbed off now (intentionally, to avoid the main sporting route being full of yellow dots), we did put a few in some more discrete and less well visited higher-up places which have survived well.

For other 'permanant' markers, as Tim has said above, pick a very prominant nab or rock, easily recognisable, and unlikely to move, and use that, and record it in your notes (whether they be digital or analogue) so that you'll always remember it. The photo is a great idea too!

For more temporary measures to jam in between rocks or tiny fissures, bamboo burger skewers are great (as they have a little flag-end to write the survey station number on). Available at low cost in packs of 100 on Amazon and similar.

These, like lollipop sticks, start to show signs of degradation in wet caves after 1-2 years, so are only any good as temporary.

We've also used golf tees in particularly muddy passages, which won't degrade and you can get bright coloured ones which are easy to find again for removal once they are no longer needed.