Hello All,
Got out diggin with Shanegalang and we had a long day out in the fields today. 12 hours total. Started off really slow, and then stayed really slow. He got a single flat button and I got a 44 cal. pistol bullet of some sort (ID help?)
Then it started to blow up a storm and Shanegalang decided to call it quits and head home. I told him that I was going to get the site to give me something good before I left. He said good luck and drove off. As it so happened, I got into a nice little patch of finds. First thing I dug was a coin silver monogrammed spoon!
This was totally twisted up like a piece of copper wire. I straightened it carefully with a lot of effort using a C-clamp (my preferred method of straightening plough-bent silver coins too). I didn't take a before photo, but you can see the spoon in the video about 40 seconds in...
Then the next target I dug was a great pocket watch winder (Federal era):
Then I got a pack rivet signal. These always sound like zinc cents, and read 60-64. Well, when I dug the target, a silver coin flopped out of the hole!
It was an 1814 half real in great shape! Nothing like 200 year old silver to break the drought! Feeling satisfied, I turned around to head home and save the hot spot for our next hunt. Immediately I dug two nice musketballs and a heel plate piece. Then I got a signal that read nicely in the 50s, which is usually a button. I was surprised when yet another silver was visible in the dirt! This was a worn, holed, New Orleans minted half dime!
Here's a nice green cupboard key I dug, along with a closeup of the initial on the spoon handle. Anyone able to identify the initial(s)?
The half dime had some awful fertilizer corrosion on the face of it, but I was able to get most of it off without harming the coin, using the aluminum foil and baking soda "weak electrolysis" method to bind the silver sulfide and remove it from the coin.
And here's the 1814 half real and a photo of all the finds with the straightened coin silver spoon. The half real is exactly 200 years old.
Great to get another Spanish/Mexican Silver for the totals for 2014!
Happy Hunting All!
Best Wishes,
Buck
Got out diggin with Shanegalang and we had a long day out in the fields today. 12 hours total. Started off really slow, and then stayed really slow. He got a single flat button and I got a 44 cal. pistol bullet of some sort (ID help?)
Then it started to blow up a storm and Shanegalang decided to call it quits and head home. I told him that I was going to get the site to give me something good before I left. He said good luck and drove off. As it so happened, I got into a nice little patch of finds. First thing I dug was a coin silver monogrammed spoon!
This was totally twisted up like a piece of copper wire. I straightened it carefully with a lot of effort using a C-clamp (my preferred method of straightening plough-bent silver coins too). I didn't take a before photo, but you can see the spoon in the video about 40 seconds in...Then the next target I dug was a great pocket watch winder (Federal era):
Then I got a pack rivet signal. These always sound like zinc cents, and read 60-64. Well, when I dug the target, a silver coin flopped out of the hole!
It was an 1814 half real in great shape! Nothing like 200 year old silver to break the drought! Feeling satisfied, I turned around to head home and save the hot spot for our next hunt. Immediately I dug two nice musketballs and a heel plate piece. Then I got a signal that read nicely in the 50s, which is usually a button. I was surprised when yet another silver was visible in the dirt! This was a worn, holed, New Orleans minted half dime!
Here's a nice green cupboard key I dug, along with a closeup of the initial on the spoon handle. Anyone able to identify the initial(s)?
The half dime had some awful fertilizer corrosion on the face of it, but I was able to get most of it off without harming the coin, using the aluminum foil and baking soda "weak electrolysis" method to bind the silver sulfide and remove it from the coin.
And here's the 1814 half real and a photo of all the finds with the straightened coin silver spoon. The half real is exactly 200 years old.
Great to get another Spanish/Mexican Silver for the totals for 2014!
Happy Hunting All!
Best Wishes,
Buck
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