Advice for a Newbie

[Whitewings]

I have been a member here for a couple of months (I think) and have been out with my MD several times mostly in my back yard. I have two buckets of aluminum cans and assorted other trash that was thrown in the yard over the years. Last week I went out on the spit here in Port Angeles Wa and hit the beach at low tide. While I was walking an older fellow (I am 65 and he was older than me) stopped and walked over to see if I was doing any good. He told me that he had been MD'ing for thirty years and we talked a little. He told me something that should have been common sense to me but didnt occur to me. He said to go back over my back yard as I had all the trash out of it and the good stuff would start showing up now.

You fellows and gals that have been around this hobby for a while keep on throwing hints to us newbies, what seems obvious to you is new to us. I had rather hear the same thing several times than not to hear it at all.

Bill W.

 

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[Sandman]

Welcome to the hobby. I have been at this about 30 years too and started with a BFO detetor. Heck, I can't even remember the name now. My first TR machine was a C & G Bobcat and that is when the real fun started.

Read Western & Eastern Treasures magazine for those tips and check on every book you can get your hands on.

If there is one tip that is most important I think it would be to ground balance, overlap your swings and keep your coil close to the ground the whole swing.

HH,
Sandman

 

[rb]

Hey there Sandman, It is true that the trashiest places will usualy have the best finds. I have spent hours cleaning trash out of hunting placese and then the GOOD finds will start comming out. So clean up the yard and find the goods. HH RB

 

[Sandman]

Hello rb. your right about the trash hiding some food stuff. Most newbies and lazy pros pass over the trashy areas and look for the easy stuff. It is almost like real work removing all the trash too.

HH,
Sandman

 

[Jeffro]

What seems like an old park, playground, school, etc. simply because in your mind it seems to have been there "forever", may have only been in existance 30 or 40 years. To find the older stuff, go to the library and check out the actual ages of the park, or whatever area you choose to hunt.

Try and find old pictures of how the park, etc. USED to look. Look for the areas where people congregated most, and try and put yourself in these spots.

You have just put yourself in much better favor of a good find.

 

[Paul in WA]

Hey whitewings, you should have some really low tides around the end of June. I use to go to Alki & Golder Gardens about 2 hours before the low tide, and work the edge as the tide went out. It gives you more hunting time.

Paul in WA

 

[Gigisdiamonds]

Hey can anyone tell me what you would look under to find old pics of parks ...etc? Of my town or other little towns around? And what do you do with any or all the junk jewelry you find? I mean like the odd earring and broken necklace ...etc? I'm sure you have good ideas that would get more out of it then I do, and I would like your input. I know pawn shops just rip you off! And gold is going up in price.

Thanks for your help!
HH Gigi

 

[Michigan Badger]

Probably the best sites to hunt today are the yards of those very old houses you see in what was the rich part of town 110 years ago.

Back in the Victorian era, yards were used much more than they are today. That was before computers and children spent many hours playing in the dirt around the house. I say dirt because few houses had nice manicured lawns like we have today.

Since children have always enjoyed burying things, most of what you'll dig was probably some child's buried treasure. And, because their minds were not yet fully developed they almost immediately forgot where they buried the item(s).

Rich kids would be given adult items such as jewelry, coins, etc., to use as play things. Grandmother would stop in for a visit and give little Susie some very old silver spoons or trinkets to use while playing dolls. Well, you get the idea.

I enjoy hunting old Victorian house yards more than almost any other type of sites. But, it takes some work and ingenuity to gain permission to hunt these places. The ideal is to find some nice little old lady who doesn't care and says "why sure, just be careful."?

 

[tgravatt]

Hi Gigi!

Well it seems as though we are both from Kansas. What I have been doing is to go to the library and look in the resource center for old platt maps, city maps etc.

Like the examples I have included here in the pics, you can see that I have a map of Oakdale park and Kenwood park, 1887, Salina Kansas, and then another in 1933 of the same parks as well as what I use now, the same parks? in 2006 on my microsoft streets and trips program. I also now have a google satellite image of the same area.(http://earth.google.com. Get that program, its a free download and it is really great with the satellite images) It helps to overlay the maps and mark out consistent roads and stuff so you can see how the old maps compare to the new maps and this helps to zero in on the most likely places to start.

I had hunted in this park before, without these maps and the park, being as large as it is, I wasn't finding too much to speak of, having the maps helped to narrow down some of the areas to hunt in. For example, in the 1887 pic, you can see the "Grand Stand" area, look where it says OAK DALE PARK on the left side of the oval regulation horse trotters race track, and just above the gap between OAK & Dale is a black block with the words "Grand Stand". After I got the old maps and oriented myself to the way it looks now, I started to look in that area, and found about 12 indian heads, 1866 Shield nickel, 1914 D Barber dime that looks like it just came from the mint, numerous other barber dimes and mercury dimes, a 1898 Barber quarter, a few buffalo nickels, a 5 cent military 7th batallion field artillery coin, even a 1910 canadian cent, plus a bunch of old tokens, a Jap Rose key fob, and many? more old stuff. Then on the Kenwood park side, after realizing that there was an old automobile race track (from the 1933 map), I went to that area, and the first hour starting finding old silver and lincolns back to 1910, 1912, etc.

In the Thomas park map, 1887, I went back there and found first, a barber dime from 1907, a bunch of old wheaties including a 1909 VBD (no, not the "S" one-rats!) and the Pope Leo XIII medalion after realizing how the park was back then to the way it is now. Researching our areas using old library maps is one great way to zero in on the old areas. I have also found a lot of pictures from that time period in the same way. That also helps to get an idea on where to look.

Hope this helps.

HH and Good luck!

T.G.Creations

 

[johny mc.]

A couple things.....

1. A lot of the technical sophisticated stuff you hear on forums and from some folks is only applicable to a few people. Those folks often will dig deeper than the average detectorist too. They are trying to get maximum depth in areas that hold good stuff.
2. With today's lower/middle end reasonably priced detectors you will get reasonable depth.
3. So now what's it all about...............................................a little secret that real estate agents knew a long time ago: location location location.
4. Trust me I've studied this......talking to people...being in the outdoor industry....detecting...and being cautiously analytical.
5. In response to your question- if your property has an older tradition then it makes sense what that gentleman said applies.......if it's not that old and has given up little in concrete finds to suggest there might be good stuff there then you are recovering old ground. Not a bad suggestion for certain areas but a time killer in others.
Example:
[ I had a guy come into my store..who is now a good friend and detecting buddy...He told me how all he was getting was clad. I asked if he had any "old sites" .....he said yes he had a friend Jeff who owned an old property with an old barn on it.....I told him to take a small area ....go ridiculously slow and cover it thoroughly.
He came back with a hand full of Barbers,Indians, Wheaties, and even one seated dime.]

6. So you could try that...my sense is you may still need to pull a lot of junk and the odds are it may not produce.

7. Getting back to locations.... that is the key in my opinion. I personally would rather hunt a new place everytime. I've been lucky enough to have finds from 1746 on. One reason is Pennsylvania has all those era sites....but the other reason is I go to as many different type sites as I can. Diversity in sites means more diversity in finds.

8. In today's permission-needed society it is more difficult to diversify...but you need to give it a try.
9. It also reduces the number of people who put the detector away for lack of finds. what do they say-
Familiarity breeds contempt.

10. Lastly whenever I need a new site I think woods.....why woods.... there are plenty of public places where there are woods where you can detect......those woods may be older ground...and they contain places that were used by people.....maybe for fishing hunting whatever.

aloha

www.theadventurelodge.com

 

[The Seeker]

Way to go with the info ...Everyone has hit it right on the nose.....Like the old saying..."What you put into it you will get out of it"......Seeker