Do beach barriers cause targets to pile up on up-current side? Pic to illustrate..

[Ronnieb883]

Went down to Oceanview the other day to beach hunt some. Not much of a beach really so I basically scoured the whole Green area and dug it all. Nothing to brag about, some old Clad and lots of junk. But what became apparent to me is that I found a bunch of heavier stuff in one area. You can see the higher concentration of red dots in one area around the base of a barrier. Most of those other red dots are Aluminum can slaw and fishing wire. Maybe there's some other dynamics at work here with the area's geographics, especially with the Chesapeake Bay feeding into the area but it's apparent by the sand buildup on the backside of these barriers that they look like typical longshore sand drift "stops" and they're working. Any feedback? Ronnie

 

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[Tom_in_CA]

Yes. I would certainly think that if those "groins" or "barriers" meant to back up the sand-movement-drift of sand, then they would ALSO .... of course .... stop the movement of the targets IN the sand. Right? Now eventually, as we all know, sand *will* eventually makes it's way *around* those groin barrier things, after enough years of sand building up there (because the sand eventually exceeds the end of the barrier). But I have a theory that only the lighter sand continues around then ends of those things, not the heavier targets.

There was a particular man-made rock jetty on a beach here in CA (for the purpose of backing sand to keep a beach re-plenished). And a buddy of mine got the idea to dig at the bases of the giant boulders. Because during some erosion, where more of the rocks were scoured-out/exposed, he'd been hearing signals at the bases of the rocks. And he discovered fishing sinkers, and some gold rings by doing that. Not sure whether that's a natural reaction of the "gravity" of targets simply adhering to the action of being deposited next to a "fixed object", or whether it's because the sand itself is backing up along those zones. I guess both reasons.

 

[Jason in Enid]

I noticed the same thing at a carribean beach. It seems like half of one side was all light targets and all the heavies were in the other half. I wish I had time to hunt different jetty sections to see if it was true there too or if my spot was an anomally.