Tennessee Creek Hunt 7-25-09

[Tnmountains]

This was the plan.Go to some land I lease and go Metal detecting some old cellar holes.

The ground was like concrete it was hot so this is where we ended up .

The water was ice cold. I have found a few here before but really don't hunt here that much.But after watching everyone on here hunt creeks thought I might give it a good look.I may have hunted about 100 yards before dark. Went back to get the camera after I saw I was finding some but only got one good water shot.

Out of the water. Does not look as blue now.

Kinda rough old one ?

Decent knife

Scraper some kind of light chert.


Not sure if there was an impact fracture then turned into a tool ? It is knapped in the curve.

Oldie? Worn down dalton maybe? I wish.

Preform

Last one a scraper.

Got dark and that was it. I will have to go back and spend a day on this creek. It runs for a couple of miles on my lease. Its full of wood ducks and trout. The water is so cold it hurts when you first get in it.It is all spring fed from underground limestone caves.
Thanks everyone for looking.
TnMountains

 

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[uniface]

Impact fracture.

Runs all the way down the side.

 

[Th3rty7]

Looks like a salvaged impact fracture to scraper to me. Couple questions for you. What is that nice multicolored material in your water insitu? Do you prefer or have better luck in small feeder creeks like that one compared to larger bodies of water?

congrats on that haul Tn, you pulled some nice stuff out of that creek.

 

[Treasure_Hunter]

I have a suggestion for you. Get a 5 gallon bucket, cut a hole in the bottom leaving a lip around the bottom approxmiately 1 inch or so. Now get a clear piece of plexiglass and cut it to fit on the bottom. glue it over the bottom of the bucket using the 1 inch lip I mentioned. Use marine epoxy or some other kind of waterproof glue.

Now when you hunt you can use it to look in the deep holes found in streams. I used one when I lived in Missouri and found it worked really well and made it easy to see point I would have missed otherwise.

 

[Tnmountains]

Looks like a salvaged impact fracture to scraper to me. Couple questions for you. What is that nice multicolored material in your water insitu? Do you prefer or have better luck in small feeder creeks like that one compared to larger bodies of water?

congrats on that haul Tn, you pulled some nice stuff out of that creek.

I agree on the fracture. It was reworked.This creek starts as a spring and in time becomes a creek and hits the river. The picture in the water is deceving.The color changes I will post a pic for you. The larger rivers always produce much better specimens and variety than the creeks around here maybe due to the size of the water and quick available food in mussels and also length of occupation.(Paleo to De-Soto) The creeks seem to produce the average field variety where as the rivers may produce say a washed out cache or buried item and be very multi component. The problem with the rivers is its there for just a second before a wave can suck it away to never ever be seen again.The creek will keep churing up stuff from the sites along the banks for ever.
Here is a close up of that point in the water it looks bluer that it really is. Material I would say a decent hornstone.See what the experts think .Here is that point still under the water.


here is a typical ancient trash pit washing away and collapsing in the river.Lots of meals in that shell.You can not dig under any circumstances on the river .On that creek I have a lease that includes all archeological rights so if I did want to dig I could but odds of finding much are slim.This creek cuts thru numerous field sites for miles. I have sifted a few points from leased land before but can never seem to find the trash pits.


Hope this helps??

 

[Tnmountains]

I have a suggestion for you. Get a 5 gallon bucket, cut a hole in the bottom leaving a lip around the bottom approxmiately 1 inch or so. Now get a clear piece of plexiglass and cut it to fit on the bottom. glue it over the bottom of the bucket using the 1 inch lip I mentioned. Use marine epoxy or some other kind of waterproof glue.

Now when you hunt you can use it to look in the deep holes found in streams. I used one when I lived in Missouri and found it worked really well and made it easy to see point I would have missed otherwise.

Now that sounds like a fun idea. I like it and will give it a try. Time is all I need now. Thank you there are some deep holes that might work in. Its either that or just dig them out to buckets and then sift.
Thanks

 

[terryo]

OUTSTANDING site, and pretty too! I would love to have archeological rights to that piece of property! I would definately hit those creeks some more, nice material too, on at least some of the tools. You lucky guy !

 

[Tnmountains]

OUTSTANDING site, and pretty too! I would love to have archeological rights to that piece of property! I would definately hit those creeks some more, nice material too, on at least some of the tools. You lucky guy !

Thanks Terryo
I got ran out one time by an arckie and his class off what I had always thought was my site,lol. Now I lease a lot of land and had the chance to help write my leases and rights. So I include all artifacts now so that I am always with in my rights. I am even considering leasing the rights to some fields. I would never sell anything but figure the finds in a years time would be worth my hobby and compensate the owner in a small way at the same time. In a way I do not like this approach but I have lost a lot of old hunting grounds to over hunting and to many people wearing out a farmers field.
Be curious of other hunters thoughts on this.

 

[creek astronaut]

great finds and that looks like a dandy creek.if i was in the position financially I would be leasing alot of dirt here in ohio for hunting purposes only.I have daydreamed of a day when I could buy some prime farm/hunting land and lease it out to a farmer and have my own private hunting spot.have you ever thought of doing that tn mts?thx for sharing the pics

 

[DemonCatSpaceStar]

I'm sooooo jealous TnM I would probably camp out at the site!
Your finds are great!
Keep us up to date on your sites!

 

[DemonCatSpaceStar]

I have a suggestion for you. Get a 5 gallon bucket, cut a hole in the bottom leaving a lip around the bottom approxmiately 1 inch or so. Now get a clear piece of plexiglass and cut it to fit on the bottom. glue it over the bottom of the bucket using the 1 inch lip I mentioned. Use marine epoxy or some other kind of waterproof glue.

Now when you hunt you can use it to look in the deep holes found in streams. I used one when I lived in Missouri and found it worked really well and made it easy to see point I would have missed otherwise.

Great Idea! Thx

 

[*Molly*]

Nice find TN.

Molly.

 

[uniface]

The lease idea sounds good but state laws must have nearly no similarities. Here in Pennsylvania, as I understand it, the state claims ownership of the bed of any creek/river that can be called "navigable" with a straight face on as far up the bank as the highest water line. Meaning nobody can own a creek -- only the land on either side of it. Since other laws make it illegal to dam even little creeks &c., it must be a blanket claim. (Same as it claims a paved roadway and six feet on either side of it in case it wants to widen it later).

There was a big court case over that a couple years back. A bunch of rich people (Washington VIPs and such) leased a stretch of prime native trout stream (a mile or two) around Chambersburg for their fishing club and posted non-members out. What it came down to (again, as I recall -- I'm not a lawyer) was that anybody could stroll down the stream, fishing as he went, so long as his feet were in the water. They could deny him access to it overland across their preserve, but not to the stream itself, provided he entered it somewhere they didn't control and left the same way.

As for getting run off a site by archaeological types : a friend I used to work with in the sceptic tank of the state juvenile system used to hunt a river site I hunted. As you can probably imagine, that kind of job is not for people incapable of being "strongly assertive."

Anyhow, Ray's a genuinely friendly and peaceable guy, pretty big, out walking the field for relaxation, and there are a bunch of archie students there that day with their professor (who's probably filled their heads with stuff about collectors being "looters of the archaeological record"), doing a "controlled surface hunt." (When we do it, it's "uncontrolled." When they do it, it's "controlled." Makes it so much better). (LOL !) One of them, as it happened, a co-ed, leaves the group, walks up to Ray like she's the artifact police or something, and says And just what do you think you're doing here ?.

Ray (who's friends with the land owner) fixes her with a stare that goes through her and out the other side and says, "Looking for bottle caps and sea shells. Got a problem with that ?."

And that was the end of that nonsense right then and there.

Ray was probably a little over the top on that one. But you can't just turn it off when you leave work after a while, any more than hot zone troops can when they're back stateside. It re-programs your responses.

 

[creek astronaut]

yea uniface i ran into a similar problem a couple years ago.a land owner owned the property on both sides of a creek i was hunting.he had it posted every 30 ft. he tried to throw me out of the creek,when i told him the law that he can not deny me access to any navigatable waterway/creek he threatened me with calling the sherriff.I told him that the laws have been on the books for 200 years and that I would call the sherriff for him,he ended up looking like a fool.wish i would run into some archys in a creek.really show them how to do a controlled surface collection.lol.

 

[The Grim Reaper]

TN, I would hit that shell midden hard if I was you. I have found some of my better pieces out of shell middens on my Ft Ancient sites. You just never know what might have gotten throw out with the trash.

Nice finds by the way. It looks like your creek is producing some fine pieces. Congrats and thanks for the pictures.

 

[Tnmountains]

Hey thanks everybody.
OK the skinny on that creek is I bought it and sold it. I had wanted to build on that land but was made an offer and sold it but retained all arch& hunting rights. My clear title stated that my lines crossed at one point and then were to the middle of the creek. I am still involved with the property and have been looking at putting a crossing in. I had an enviro engineer come out and do his study so I could pull permitts from the state. I did. The state wildlife ask me for permission to stock it. I say NO because then I would have to open it to the public to fish and it creates a liability for my insurance.

Bottom line is this creek is private property. I can not dam it or pollute it or take away the water but I can stop anyone from being on it for any reason. A creek does not allow the right to ingress or egress ones personal property. The gov controls no flood plane here.
On the shell trash pits I can look at them but I can not dig in them. Surface hunt only on the rivers. They are trying to say you can not even pick up an arrowhead on the rivers anymore in the USA due to the ARPA laws of 1901 &1979.

I might just sift that whole creek if things keep going the way they are.Lol

Everyone here needs to read this post going on on metal detecting. It affects all of us in our hobby to some degree.

http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,257946.0.html

Thanks everyone I am excited about that creek. Its always fun to hunt.
TnMountains

 

[Tnmountains]

I'm sooooo jealous TnM I would probably camp out at the site!
Your finds are great!
Keep us up to date on your sites!

It was you guys that got me out and back hunting all my old sites. I was dying watching everyones hunts on here. I was lurking long before I joined. Some sites are now gone but have also found many new ones.The easy sites are worn out its the ones off the beaten paths that are fun.
Thanks

 

[Tnmountains]

Uni
I was thinking more along the line of leasing some more agri fields to hunt similiar to Larsons lease but only get the artifact rights. I will let the farmers do the farming and I can get the hunting. I have some fields now that produce artifacts and deer but never put artifacts in those leases.
What you think?

 

[uniface]

Sounds like a plan to me, TnMountains. And maybe a wise move, seeing as how dominated by contracts and legal-ism everything is getting to be.

One arrangement that comes to mind is one a friend's had with the farmer-landowner of a big multi-component site here in Penna. for years. He gets to keep the paleo stuff and turns everything else he finds over to the landowner, sparing him the trouble of walking the field himself.

At another (heavily posted) paleo site there's a longstanding gentleman's agreement between maybe four or five guys with access that So-&-So gets first crack at it (one hunt), then after the next rain it's What's-His-Name's turn, and so forth. Everybody ends up finding something most years.

 

[Tnmountains]

great finds and that looks like a dandy creek.if i was in the position financially I would be leasing alot of dirt here in ohio for hunting purposes only.I have daydreamed of a day when I could buy some prime farm/hunting land and lease it out to a farmer and have my own private hunting spot.have you ever thought of doing that tn mts?thx for sharing the pics

Greg I dream about it all the time. Sometimes I dream I find a cave and inside the cave its full of artifacts. Just like they were left thousands of years ago. The land I lease I turn around and sub lease so it ends up not costing me anything. I would look for large hunt clubs in your area with agriculture on rivers and creeks and see about aquiring artifacts rights or at least the chance to look in the off season. Agree to pick up trash mend fences whatever if the land produces.
But from what you show you are doing ok