Sounds like you've struck Ft.Knox! If an area as large as you describe gives one solid hit with a detector you have 1. a problem with your machine 2. a problem with the operator 3. a buried junk yard 4. all the rocks in the mound are heavily mineralized.

Think about this for a minute. If you had a very large treasure to conceal would you bury it under a pile of rocks so that anyone who passed would wonder what was there and dig into it.. It ain't treasure. It could be a treasure marker. Look the surrounding area over for a half mile to the NE-SW and the SE-NW in cross pattern. If it is a marker you've found there will be other clues found within the search area. If you don't find anything else you are probably spinning your wheels.. Another thing to ponder is that this mound may be something made by Native people. If so it would fall under Federal Protection and could gain you a big fine and jail time for messing around with it. I don't know about Apaches or other Indians that may have claimed that area, but the Osage, Cherokees, and other Eastern tribes used Rock monuments for trail markers and Warrior monuments placed along their warpaths. Most of those have not survived the invasion of the white eyes so give this one a break.. OK One last thing.. In regards to what some rogue scientists may have stolen from us citizens, if someone else does something dishonest or unethical or immoral does that make it alright for everyone to do the same. No! Treasure hunters in particular must try to do the right thing every time. We already have over half the world against us so why give them more reason to hate the fraternity of metal detectorists. Its hard enough to make a living at it now... the Old Indian HBB