FRS Radio Usage Frequencies, etc

[Noel Wamer <nwamer@jacksonville.net>]

Carolinians,

I am currently working with an informal discussion group organized by the 
American Birding Association, whose objective is to develop some regional 
and national recommendations for the use of the Family Radio Service (FRS) 
system by birders.

A brief digression for those who are not familiar with Family Radio 
Service... FRS is wireless radio service that uses small transceivers about 
the size of small cell phones.  No license or fees are required to use the 
radios.  The practical range of the radios is two miles or less.  While 
this limited range may seem insignificant, you might consider that this 
transmission radius would probably provide good coverage for many of our 
state's more popular hot spots.  There is obviously some use for this 
system to locally communicate birding information.

A problem with making the FRS system useful for general birding purposes is 
that the system has 14 channels and 34 sub-channels for each of the 14 
channels.  Breaking out the calculator, this comes to out be 448 
channel/sub-channel combinations!

If you are using FRS radios in the Carolinas I would like some input from 
you and how you're using them and what channel and code you use.  Thanks 
and please respond off-list.

Later...

Noel Wamer
Jacksonville, FL, US
The Virtual 'Hood: http://www.badbirdz.com/dripperCam.htm
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