Can find show directories with contained directories' time stamps?

Question

I have a script to clean out old files and directories in a log area like:

find . -mtime +${NUM_DAYS} -type d -exec rm -rf '{}' \;

However if I run this 2 levels up from the files that have changed it will often show the parent directory because the time stamp isn't changed by changes in a sub-directory

Is there a way I can use find (or something else) so I don't try and delete the parent directory?

For example if I have the file system:

# ls -ld /var
drwxr-xr-x 24 root root 4096 Aug 16  2010 /var
# ls -ld /var/net-snmp/
drwx------ 2 root root 4096 Aug 28 15:49 /var/net-snmp/
# ls -l /var/net-snmp/
total 4
-rw------- 1 root root 1174 Aug 28 15:49 snmpd.conf

Running my find command from / with will try to recursively remove /var, even if NUM_DAYS is set so that Aug 28 is within my time scale

Answer 1

You could use the -mindepth option :

    -mindepth levels
        Do  not  apply  any tests or actions at levels less than levels
        (a non-negative integer).  -mindepth 1 means process all files
        except the command line arguments.

Answer 2

Assuming linux, I'd give tmpwatch a try.