cuda-mark, there was a true case near me, where a 4th grade kid (a loaner nerd type) took his dad's coin collection to school, without his dad's permission, to show it at show & tell day in his 4th grade class.
Then at recess, the kid began to pass out the coins to fellow class-mates, to "make friends". And naturally, the fellow kids who'd never seen or held bust halves, silver dollars, seated quarters, etc.... must've figured it was like play money. Because a bunch of the coins ended up in the sand box, and elsewhere around the school yard.
Imagine a lucky md'rs surprise, a few months later, when he was plying the sand box at this 1940's school yard. He gets a couple of choice seated and bust coins! So he assumes "tokens" or "fakes". But a coin-collector buddy of his assures him they are real. So the two of them decide to go back and ply the sand for more. And they found a few more over the next couple of attempts. All told, they had perhaps 7 or 8 of these choice early american coins from the sand box.
So they devised an explanation that made sense: Since this school is just a few miles from the ocean/beach, then logically this sand must've been brought in with the last sand in-fill rotation (d/t they replace the sand every few years with new clean sand). Hence the coins must've been brought in from the beach ! How lucky , eh?
That theory worked ok, till one of the two men ventured outside the sandbox, to some nearby tall grass. Gets a signal , parts the grass, and there.... just barely below the roots, is ANOTHER choice early american coin! So the two men branched out the all the surrounding grass, and hoover-vacc'd that too. Now they were up to about a dozen choice early american coins. But their "sandbox fill" theory was un-ravelling, since some of coins now, were clearly in the grass.
But that was ok, because they got a new theory to deal with that: Since this school is just a fraction of a mile off the north-south road/trails (the el camino real) of yesteryear, then perhaps this school yard site had been the location of an emigrant/traveller stopping/camping spot. Yeah, that's the ticket.
Then FINALLY, one day, when 1 of the 2 men was out there alone, a janitor eyeballed through the window . The janitor came out and says to the md'r: "hey, do me a favor: If you find any old coins.... And I mean OLD coins, let me know". The md'r, w/o letting out any clues, asks "why? what's up?" . And the janitor told the man the story of the 4th grade kid. Once the dad got wind of what happened to his collection, he marched his son down to the principle's office by the ear. And the principle marched the 2 of them into the class-room. All the students had to stand to attention, while the teacher and the principal announced to the class that all the students were to return any coins to Mr. Smith, that they'd been handed the week before.
But, of course, the man got very few of his coins back. The other classmates denied having gotten any. Or said they lost them, blah blah.
You can imagine what's going through the md'rs mind as he hears out the janitor, right ? He immediately figures out where their coins had been coming from.
Ok, you tell me: Since those coins had been covered (albeit shallow, albeit in sand, etc...), by your definition, are they abandoned and their finders-keepers ?
If you were the man who had lost all his coins, would you figure that you had no right to ask for your coins back ? Wouldn't you feel like they are still yours, if you got wind of the fact that someone had found them ?