Does the freezing and thawing of ground make it easier to find treasure?

[MetalKid]

Sorry if this is a simple question to answer but I'd like to share my evidence. If you don't want to read that, feel free to jump down to the last paragraph.

My girlfriend, who has never even touched a detector or anything of the sort, was walking through her backyard when she saw a coin in the snow. She picked it up and found an undated Buffalo Nickel. There is no way that she or her family members had just dropped one that they were for some reason carrying around and it is a closed backyard so I doubt it got there recently. It also has that dirty look of a coin that was dug up but dried off and water cleared the chunks of soil away.

Later, on a run with some buddies, I encountered a set of keys on the grass. The loop holding all the keys together was quite rusty, not something that somebody would be carrying around I feel.

When I got home, my dad showed me what he found when taking out our Christmas tree to the trash. Another set of keys, and this one had a loop that was so rusty it was practically crumbling.

So does the freezing and thawing of ground push treasure up towards the surface? I know that this can create potholes and small hills so it can't be much of a stretch. If this is true, I'm heading out after school tomorrow to start hunting. It was below zero for a week or so here and it just hit 50, so the land is ripe for detecting.

 

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[sawmill man]

Most of the time it just sucks stuff down. but rain can really settle the ground sometimes. you never know.

 

[Ogre1190]

Lotta factors move items up and down underground. Rain, like Sawmill Man said, temp extremes, earthworm activity, gopher/mole movement, landscaping work...lotta things.

 

[marjam]

I would think the thaw and freeze would move objects, but not so much that if something was a few inches in the ground it would push it to the surface. Moles and the like could move it to the surface, and rain could uncover items that are shallow. A tavern site I visited awhile back, the owner said that after a hard rain, you could go out in the yard and pick up silver coins off the top of the ground.

 

[tcornel]

When I was a kid we had a "country lawn".......basically mowed weeds. Every spring we would walk the lawn and pick up stones and rocks that the freezing would pop to the surface. We would wonder how did they get there since the yard was stone free in the fall. Different materials freeze and thaw at different rates which can cause movement in the position on the ground.

 

[against the wind]

You touched on a lot of good things.
First, with surface finds like the key rings. An object as large as a ring of keys takes a long time to get buried. It can be lost in tall grass and doesn't become a surface find until a good snow flattens out the overgrown grass and weeds.
Sometimes a rough winter with lots of ground freezing and thawing will move a coin, that was on it's side to a flatter position. That will make that coin more visible to your detector.
Because of the recent freeze of sub 20°F night time temps that went on for the last 2 - 3 weeks, today's 50 degree temps is not enough to thaw out the ground.
You need at least a week of 40 and 50 degree daytime temps with nighttime temps staying above freezing.

 

[Normsel]

There is a frost heave but lots of things have to happen. When the thaw starts the ice crystals expand and that may bring a shallow object to the surface but also the ground settling after a thaw may leave an object on or close to the surface.

 

[MetalKid]

Thanks for all your replies everyone, you've given me a lot to think about. I'll still head out today to search, but I'll keep everything you've told me in mind.

 

[A2coins]

When the ground is wet the conductivity is greater. The frequency of the total radius area is increased significantly turn the sensitivity up ground balance and turn disc down your gold. I have no idea what I'm talking about but it sounded pretty good for a minute. lol

 

[A2coins]

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