First day out at massive new site! Military and other interesting relics found!

[dirtwizard]

Hey guys I just got permission to hunt a farm house with a lot of history! The first day I went out and was introduced to the owners it was raining so I didn't hunt. The property is large, hundreds of acres. There used to be a trappers hut there and a few generations ago a farm house was relocated from it's original location to the property I am detecting now. It is well known in the area that an Indian village was located nearby before the land was settled. I found what I believe are two arrowhead fragments while digging my metal signals today. If anyone wants to see those I will add pics. I left them in the car.

No rain today! This is the "road" to the property.

Once the fall harvest is complete I can detect this area as well, but there is enough mowed grass to keep me busy for a long time til then!

And finally this is what I was able to recover in about 2.5 hours today. (clad and trash not pictured, only found 4 modern coins today totaling 28 cents)

Top left is what I believe to be an animal tag. It's got to be pretty old, it shows a 5 digit phone number. It appears to be brass or copper.

Top middle is a riveted button that reads "US MARINE CORPS" Looks like it had a run in with a lawn mower.

Top right I have no idea what it is. Appears to be brass and is rather heavy. On the top edge there is a slot that is rounded in a way that a coin as thick as a modern quarter will sit in it nicely. I'm guessing it's part of a firearm.

On bottom we have what I was told is the equivalent of today's license plate stickers. Apparently this would go over the top or bottom of an existing expired plate to renew it. Looks like it would be for 1963.

These finds were discovered with my fisher F2 and garrett propointer. I didn't begin to scratch the surface of this property today. When I got home from the hunt today I got a post office notification that a package is held there for me and I can pick it up tomorrow morning. Looks like my new detector is here! I'm going back to the place I found these things and trying out a minelab safari for the first time tomorrow. I'm also bringing a cooler with drinks and lunch, I'll be out there all day tomorrow getting a feel for the minelab. Hopefully I can update this thread with some more cool finds!

 

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[mangum]

Beautiful land! Sound like it has great potential! Native American artifacts is a plus too!

 

[BosnMate]

I need more pictures to be positive, but your top right item looks like an under lug that holds a muzzle loading rifle barrel to the wood stock.This lug fits on the under side of the barrel, and a "barrel key" passes through the wood and the slot in the lug holding the barrel in the stock. The arrow points to the location of the key, which is passing through a brass escutcheon on this particular gun.

 

[dirtwizard]

I need more pictures to be positive, but your top right item looks like an under lug that holds a muzzle loading rifle barrel to the wood stock.View attachment 808053This lug fits on the under side of the barrel, and a "barrel key" passes through the wood and the slot in the lug holding the barrel in the stock. The arrow points to the location of the key, which is passing through a brass escutcheon on this particular gun.
View attachment 808061

Ask and ye shall receive.






click pics twice each for giant view.

There was a signal very near where I found this that was hitting high numbers which I did not dig because it seemed about 3 feet long and thin. I was thinking it was a section of pipe or fencepost. maybe it's a gun barrel, might have to dig it depending on your response which is greatly appreciated!

 

[dirtwizard]

The slot is rounded, deeper in the middle than the sides.

 

[BosnMate]

I was wrong, misunderstood your initial post. i don't know what it is.

 

[doc-d]

Sounds like you have some great days and finds coming......keep us updated on progress.......Good Luck, God bless, ejd

 

[dirtwizard]

What a day. Started off at the post office this morning to pick up my minelab. They open at 8:30, I was there at 8:45. Felt like a kid at Christmas. I had an appointment at the vet at 10 so I rushed home, assembled the safari and installed the ML2900 battery I bought from RNB. Powered it up, looks like it works as it should.

Took my cat to the vet as scheduled. She has been fighting renal disease or kidney failure for the better part of the past year. Results of recent blood work showed her condition was worsening, and she was losing weight and very dehydrated. As a side effect of her condition she had developed sores in her inner cheeks which I believe were causing her such pain she could not hardly eat. The Dr. and I decided it would be best to end her suffering and put her to sleep this morning. I cared for that cat for over 10 years and it was a very difficult decision to make. I had a good cry, said my goodbyes and a few long hard moments later I was headed home with my cat wrapped in a blanket. They offered to cremate her but I chose to bury her near my childhood dog at the house. The first hole I dug today was one flooded by emotions and memories. It occurred to me that for everything we take from the ground detecting, eventually the ground will take something back from us. I covered up my dear friend, gathered myself and loaded the detecting gear into the car.

What better way to cheer yourself up than heading to a new site with a new detector!


When I arrived I decided to go over the area I hit with the F2 yesterday. I am working in the back yard as far from the home itself I can get without getting into the woods, and working my way toward the house eventually. This was my first outing with the minelab safari and I wanted to get some targets under my belt and familiarize myself with how it pinpoints before I go digging this guy's front yard. Trying to keep the yard looking nice for him so he lets me keep hunting there. I went back to the target I found yesterday with the F2 and went over it with the safari. Seemed to be a thin, long item so I dug it. Wasn't a muzzle loader barrel, turned out to be an aluminum arrow. Dug 3 total today. Having no experience with the machine I was using and being stressed from the cat ordeal this morning definitely hurt me today. I ended up checking a lot of targets found with the minelab with my F2 before digging just to get an idea of what the target may be. There were a couple targets the minelab found the fisher could not pick up. One being the projectile end of a small caliber bullet that was pretty deep. I have read you need to spend 100 hours with a safari to learn it. By the end of the hunt I was nailing some small targets such as a dime pretty easily without digging a big plug to get to it. I have found it pinpoints right to the center of the 11" DD coil pretty accurately, and I LOVE how it locks onto a signal to pinpoint rather than dragging you to a stronger nearby signal like the F2 sometimes does. This is a great machine!






Todays finds were nothing too spectacular but I did pull some old items out of the dirt. Below are all the smaller finds from my pouch today.


In the pic below we have an old door key. I want to clean this up with an electrolysis bath as it appears it may have been modified in some way. Also there is a center punch tool, a small pulley of some sort, a lead fishing weight, and some melted blobs of metal. On the right of the blobs is a merle norman lipstick container that appears to be copper. Found the base and the lid about 10 feet apart from each other. The lid says "princess" on the top. Bottom right are old cut nails which can be had by the handful at this site or so it seems. Found 3 in one hole. At the top right is what I think may be an arrowhead fragment I turned up today.


In the pic below we have four 12ga shot shell ends. My friend mentioned they may have been paper wrapped but I'm not sure. Right below the shot shell ends is the projectile end of a small bullet. Next is a large buckle, maybe a saddle buckle? Top right is a piece of pottery, white on one side black on the side shown. Middle is a spoon end. I have no idea what the two items in the bottom row are. One looks like a bottle opener on steroids. It's 1/4" thick. And finally we have today's coin haul. One 1998 dime, 1961 copper cent, and two zincs.


I also dug the things below. When I first found the fan blade (which I assume is a cooling fan from some sort of old engine) I only had the tip of one blade exposed in the hole. As I was digging it out I originally thought it was the end of an airplane propeller. I love those moments when you think you have something better than you really do! Also pictured are the 3 aluminum arrows I dug. The minelab seems to like to find these.



My next day off is Friday and I intend to go back to this site for the day, weather permitting. As I was leaving I was talking with the owner again and he pointed out an area where 3 old barns were located. Apparently the area in front of one of those barns had some kind of horse ring where folks would attend horse shows. Sounds promising! I'll update this thread with more finds as they are unearthed. I know there is silver at this site, I just hope I can find it.

 

[Sovereignelite]

Sorry to hear about your cat. I had to do the exact same thing (my cat had the same condition)and had the same experience (put her to sleep and brought her home in a blanket and buried her, in the rain no less) I am glad neither of our cats are suffering anymore. The vet said I could force feed her and she might live but would likely have seizures and eventually die. I didn't want her to go through that...so anyway I feel ya.

On a happier note looks like your enjoying your Minelab. My friend who hunts with me has an F2 and rarely finds much. You should do well with the Safari. I have an Etrac and it's the best detector I've ever owned!

 

[dirtwizard]

thanks bud. It was the right thing to do, which as we all know isn't always the easiest thing to do.

I'm definitely loving the minelab so far. I need to familiarize myself with how it works some more, for example I wanted to discriminate out everything but copper and silver for a bit in one area and couldn't figure it out. I bought it used for a fair price and unfortunately it did not include an owners manual so I am reading the .pdf version and watching youtube vids for a crash course at 3am haha.

It wore my arm out though, it must weigh twice as much as the F2. I don't mind it, I have already seen it is more depth capable that my F2 so it's worth the swing. I see you have the sunray X5 coil for your etrac, how is that combo treating you? I am going to get one for the safari I think. Most of the areas I am hunting have very trashy sections where I can dig several iron targets from the same hole once I get the pinpointer in there.

The RNB battery is awesome in it's own right and I am very glad I bought it. I usually turn my detector off while recovering targets, but the minelab takes so long to noise cancel I just started leaving it on. I was out there from 1-6pm and hunting the whole time. That battery didn't budge from full.

I know one thing for sure and that is I need to slow my pace down a lot with the minelab. I know I missed some good targets today by swinging it too fast, I had to keep reminding myself to chill out and listen.