Does Anyone Else Dig EVERYTHING Above Iron, or Am I the Only Fool?

[AusTexDude]

Am I greedy, just meticulous, or on a fool's errand?

I can't pass up a target because I'm afraid it might be something great.

Yes I have pulled 22 rings from the park I'm working, but that was not cherry picking. That was digging every target above iron.

I pulling a ring about every 100 or so pull tabs. There are so many though.

Today it took me 5 hours to dig an area about 10 feet by 20 feet. But after you go over it, it is now target free except for the deep alum can I did not feel like digging out at 10 inches.

So many targets I spend a good amount of my time detecting from my knees so my 55 year old carcass does not have to get up and down a million times.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

A Handbook of Civil War Bullets and Cartridges - Grab it through Amazon!

[robertk]

I dig everything including iron, if the iron sounds interesting.

 

[Older The Better]

for the most part I dig everything, there’s always exceptions if i go on a long string of nails or bits of fence I lose enthusiasm and move on, other big ones are when my pockets are getting overloaded or I’m running out of time I’ll get selective.

The way I see it if I dig it and remove it from the site i won’t waste time finding it again the next time, it can also be masking a better target, and lastly I’ve had some pretty ugly iron signals be surprisingly good finds

 

[TORRERO]

This is when you have to decide what your willing to accept, I'm too old to dig everything, although when I was younger I did. Sometimes you just have to say "Its ok if I don't get everything of value out of THIS spot"
On sandy beaches I generally dig everything but we were in Brazil last week and the beaches were so choked full of trash that I just skipped targets I thought were bottle caps and pull tabs.. because there were hundreds and I got tired of digging them and showing the tourists watching me ...

 

[Back-of-the-boat]

I have Iron like, bottlecaps and bobby pins ,nails notched out but will still find big iron. I mostly do playgrounds although sometimes I hit the grass also. Mainly a park detectorist.

 

[AstralDruid]

I also dig all targets,, except those that scream like a dentists drill... Alu.....

 

[AstralDruid]

I reckon, with a little bit of 'ole fashion' knowhow , i would be able to build some sort of machine out of all the parts and pieces I have dug up... A big ,heavy rusty looking yoke, like you might see behind a disused shack way out in the wilds of Louisiana or some such place !..

 

[AusTexDude]

I probably dig 40 of the 70s style beaver tails to every 1 newer pull tab.

 

[Older The Better]

I guess i should add, i have two sites in the middle of big farm fields, there’s nothing to really mark them so i do leave the nail signals so i can locate them in the future with my detector

 

[TORRERO]

I also want to point out, that no matter what people SAY... there are ALWAYS times when nobody digs everything.... 🤣
Example #1. Its 100 degrees outside and your walking in a field with no shade and your melting... you CHERRY PICK ...
Example #2. Its 20 degrees outside and you can't keep your hands warm and you CHERRY PICK ...
Example #3 You crossed into property that is questionable .... and you CHERRY PICK !!
Example #4 You are in a field full of COWS and one BULL ... and they are watching you... YOU CHERRY PICK 😳🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Thanks for laughing !!

 

[AstralDruid]

or when out picking cherries.. you cherry pick.

 

[sibbley]

I normally dig everything. Since I got the 1850's school permission, I have actually been learning a lot more about the way targets sound with the Deus 2 and Manticore by NOT digging it all. Working slowly through the iron infestation has given me a great idea of what the bent nails sound like as opposed to a coin signal. So, for now If I hear that scratchy sound on either side of the high tone, I just move on. At the parks I frequent, I just dig everything.

 

[Blackfoot58]

I’m always looking at a properties’ history (private ground). I love a good ring or IHP as much as the next guy, but square nails, machine parts, etc are great too. I remove everything so I don’t find it again later. The exception being car frames, tractor wheels, etc that are too big to carry. If I’m digging on a “permission”, or public ground, I haul out the trash that I dig; can slaw, tabs, wire, bottle caps and foil.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

I'm primarily a beach hunter and use Minelab detectors, I dig everything that doesn't null (iron), dug many gold and diamond rings, and a few sounded trashy at first
I would rather dig a thousand junk targets than walk away from a $20k ring because I was too lazy to dig it.

 

[Gare]

GREAT posting T_H. On Friday a friend gave me a $2.5 gold coin.For a LONG LONG time I would not dig anything under a 85 on my Deus2. The coin registers around 70 Now it sure makes you wonder don't it !!

 

[TORRERO]

GREAT posting T_H. On Friday a friend gave me a $2.5 gold coin.For a LONG LONG time I would not dig anything under a 85 on my Deus2. The coin registers around 70 Now it sure makes you wonder don't it !!

You have to judge a site your hunting, OBVIOUSLY a schoolyard or playground probably WON"T have $2.5 gold coins ..
so in some circumstances it doesn't matter.. If your hunting an OLD Church then maybe you should be digging everything above iron..

 

[pepperj]

Digging everything out of a site, good luck.
So it's cherry picking every target over iron.
I hunt old homesites/cellar hole mainly.
Most are cropped field and hay fields.

Digging iron is understood to a point, but not feasible for the amount of good recoveries.
Most iron patches are just that. The structure burnt by accident or to dispose of it.
Thousands of nails spread out in a concentrated area. Buried, turned by the century, decades of field work.

I dig every signal over iron, then on each return a few large iron pieces, to the point of what is left is fence wire and nails mainly.
There's the close sites that I visit 3 or 4 times a season. Being digging them now for 10+years.
I have thought of how long it would take to dig every signal from just one site.
I don't have enough years left. There's 10's of thousands signals at a few of them.
So I will leave that for the next guy.

 

[sibbley]

GREAT posting T_H. On Friday a friend gave me a $2.5 gold coin.For a LONG LONG time I would not dig anything under a 85 on my Deus2. The coin registers around 70 Now it sure makes you wonder don't it !!

I've found in my schoolyard that the 70's signals are mostly big iron on the Manticore or Deus 2. I had a great signal one day, a loud 70's, turned out to be a driveshaft yoke! During the 60's and 70's the farmer that owned the property stored and repaired his equipment on the property. They just removed parts and dropped them on the ground. Just the other day I had a nice loud 74 on the Deus 2. Turned out to be a window weight buried vertically in the ground. How does that happen?

All the lower signals 10-upper 40's are always aluminum bits or foil. There are tons of 80 signals around the schoolhouse. Good signals, it's like a dream come true till you dig them and find flashing triangles from when they refurbished the outside of the building.

I've learned to dig three signals in that schoolyard. Manticore: 50-60 IHP, 80-86 Wheaties, 88-89 silver dimes. Deus 2 gives me 86-89 for all those. Nickels rang up 23-26 on the Manticore and 59-62 on the Deus 2. But I've only ever found two nickels. One with each machine.

 

[pepperj]

I've found in my schoolyard that the 70's signals are mostly big iron on the Manticore or Deus 2. I had a great signal one day, a loud 70's, turned out to be a driveshaft yoke! During the 60's and 70's the farmer that owned the property stored and repaired his equipment on the property. They just removed parts and dropped them on the ground. Just the other day I had a nice loud 74 on the Deus 2. Turned out to be a window weight buried vertically in the ground. How does that happen?

All the lower signals 10-upper 40's are always aluminum bits or foil. There are tons of 80 signals around the schoolhouse. Good signals, it's like a dream come true till you dig them and find flashing triangles from when they refurbished the outside of the building.

I've learned to dig three signals in that schoolyard. Manticore: 50-60 IHP, 80-86 Wheaties, 88-89 silver dimes. Deus 2 gives me 86-89 for all those. Nickels rang up 23-26 on the Manticore and 59-62 on the Deus 2. But I've only ever found two nickels. One with each machine.

I have set up another custom program next to the one I use.
So on the certain targets I can just hit the - pad where the X/Y screen is and recheck the target.
If you're digging everything then that doesn't apply.
But at a blacksmithing site it comes in handy.
Certain 70 & 80 #'s can sound really good.
Another sure way is go to pinpoint on the detector.
If the signal footprint is a foot long then I'm pretty sure it isn't a keeper.

Digging field sod where everything is 10" deep or more, one gets really creative in the amount of digging.

 

[sibbley]

I have set up another custom program next to the one I use.
So on the certain targets I can just hit the - pad where the X/Y screen is and recheck the target.
If you're digging everything then that doesn't apply.
But at a blacksmithing site it comes in handy.
Certain 70 & 80 #'s can sound really good.
Another sure way is go to pinpoint on the detector.
If the signal footprint is a foot long then I'm pretty sure it isn't a keeper.

Digging field sod where everything is 10" deep or more, one gets really creative in the amount of digging.

I have a custom program setup using the X/Y screen but rarely use it. I really should start learning it. I should use the 2d trace on the Manticore more too. I've mostly been going by sound. I do use pinpoint to see how large a target is. That's a great way of getting rid of the large iron.