How Do you Attack the beach with your detector?

[turbolwf]

OK so I went down to OBX NC and hit the beach just after a storm from the night before. I got out there on the beach excited but didn't know where to start or even try such vast sand everywhere. So any advice for the next time? I first tried the shell line that had washed up and went over it pretty well but seemed to get false readings but it was good experience on learning my detector. I hit on some very large peice of metal that had some of the road that was washed out from the last major storm. I tried up around the walk paths leading to the beach around the stairs but no luck. There are not many people out there yet so I didn't know where to check so if you were me and in the OBX about MP3 what would you do? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks

 

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[Native Floridian]

The first thing to do is research. What is the beach you plan on detecting used for? OBX has everything from swimming beaches to fishing beaches to Wind and kite surfing beaches. That doesn't include miles of empty low traffic beaches that aren't used for much of anything.

if you are looking for fresh drops, then you want to go to the most popular swimming beaches. if you are looking for older coins/treasure then you want to go where people were, not where they are. Again, research.

Most of us work either top down or bottom up. WE divide the beach into three areas. Water, wet sand, dry sand. First decision is what area do you want to work?

if you are working the water walk a straight line. if you are working the wet sand walk a W pattern to establish a find line. if you are working the dry sand grid the most popular towel line areas. You could spend a day driving from access point to access point just detecting the trails that lead to the beach.

If OBX is your area try to hook up with other OBX hunters. Listen to them. If you are on your own - first places to try would be the most busy beaches in front of the hotels, resorts and campgrounds. Don't forget the bayside as well.

I would give the hang gliding dunes atry if they are legal to search. All sorts of stuff lost over there.

 

[turbolwf]

That is just the kind of info I so needed to know. Cutting it into three areas makes total sense. The shell line where the bigger shells wash up what would i expect to find in that line of shells? It sort of makes sense that if a shell can wash up that far then coins could as well. The closest beach to me is going to be Virginia Beach. That beach I will hit with the attitude or goal of finding what it left around the towel line areas. So all of your info it great for this newbie. Thanks

 

[makton]

Turf,
Do a Google search for a link to a blog for Treasure Beaches reports for treasure coast beaches
I realize its a different location but the guy writes interesting info about reading beaches and sand movement.

Makton

 

[bigscoop]

Here's something to keep in mind. On the east coast sand typically leaves the beach in the winter and returns in the spring and summer, the currents and prevailing winds dictating this situation. Post-winter is usually a pretty dead beach period at the beach, not much activity on the beach as the sand begins to return. As a result the sand sort of builds up a dead zone, just as we're seeing on my area beaches at present. Once this dead zone period occurs you can't access the deeper targets and there's no fresh drops taking place so the hunting is very slow going. During the summer months targets will begin to accumulate on the beach and in the water, many of these eventually working their way into the sandy depths. Then winter returns and begins to strip the sand off the beach again allowing you access to those accumulated deeper targets. Now this is just a very general picture of our seasonal beach sand movements and some beaches will be effected more or less then others, but it does offer you the importance of being able to read a beach and its sand movements. Every inch of removed sand is often an inch in your favor regardless where you're hunting.