Ethics Between Friends Dillema

[Tnmountains]

Just tell the truth and let the chips fall where they may.You might be surprised who your true friends are at that point. I see deer hunters wanting bigger and bigger deer. They become obsessed and forget what its all about.It is the hunt that matters and not always the finds. Finds are the icing on the cake

 

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[DigIron2]

I think most hunters have been guilty of stepping over a barbwire fence or two,or maybe three.Personally I don't care what someone else does,they can sneak on the whitehouse lawn and dig for all I care.Doesn't mean I have to agree with it.I think it is the trash and hole leaver's that give people in general a bad name.I would just tell them you don't want to come across any trouble and leave it at that.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

reply

I think the OP should mention the specific type of property that his buddies are visiting. Private property is a completely different animal than state/city/Federal owned. I hunt state parks several times a year....

Hmm, go back and re-read the O.P. post. It no where says "private" versus "public".

Yet anyhow, I agree that there is a difference between the two, in actual practice.

But question for you: How about "private" property, when it's nameless faceless coorpration land ? For example, where they're tearing out some old structures to make-way for the next K-mart being built in your city ? Or row-crop ag-land owned by some mega-company 2000 miles away? Those examples versus someone's personal yard. Each, yes, is "private property", yet with a distinct different flavor. Eh ?

 

[Argentium]

Tom in Ca , Not so fast , I in fact did exactly what you said no one would do on a public , family friendly forum -
in my response to McKinney on page one .( No I don't want a medal !) - I'm not proud of my "greed" driven behavior ,
I think McKinney raises an interesting and worthwhile discussion here . If through this thread even one person can
rethink a tempting but ethically /legally questionable act , or downright illegal act (my trespass) then this was a valuable
thread indeed !

 

[DigIron2]

Hmm, go back and re-read the O.P. post. It no where says "private" versus "public".

Yet anyhow, I agree that there is a difference between the two, in actual practice.

But question for you: How about "private" property, when it's nameless faceless coorpration land ? For example, where they're tearing out some old structures to make-way for the next K-mart being built in your city ? Or row-crop ag-land owned by some mega-company 2000 miles away? Those examples versus someone's personal yard. Each, yes, is "private property", yet with a distinct different flavor. Eh ?

Big difference until some turd comes along to tell someone they can't hunt there.Sometimes it is people that don't even have anything to do with the places,I wish I would have jumped at more places like that around here before they pretty much killed this town with development.

 

[DigIron2]

wouldn't that be something,you know the place is just loaded,lets have a march on Washington, hell, everyone else does

 

[McKinney_5900]

I'm still thinking about how I'm going to sneak in and detect the white house lawn, like mentioned a couple of posts up by DigIron2! I mean.....Can you imagine what's in there? Who's with me? We all own it!

I would like to detect the reflecting pool perimiter.

 

[TNGUNS]

OK.... I am actually amazed at some of this. Not trying to be condescending to anyone but just don't understand how doing the right thing is even a topic for discussion. If you don't own it, or have permission, you shouldn't be there. I AM NOT the land owner you want to meet if you are on my property without permission. Hope it all turns out well for you. HH

 

[T.C.]

What state are you in Jeremy, if you don't mind saying??

 

[McKinney_5900]

I see what Tom is saying here and the mention of forum issues are something I find hard to resist. I've had lots of experience discussing and trying to discuss what is legal and what is not. I've seen people ask "what should I do ?" in regards to whether or not to hunt a piece of property. Usually before the discussion could get very far into the legality issue the "holier than thous" show up condemning the people that are looking into the actual legal aspects. If a person can decide whether or not they can legally do something they can then decide factors such as if they should,when they should,how they should etc.

I see the basic logic about what you are saying, yet I've noticed a metamorphosis in action creeping in with both the old friend and the fairly new detectorist in lowering the bar on what warrants the decision to hunt, or not hunt a mystery house. Last hunt I went on before silently excusing myself and starting this thread, there were three houses in a row getting hit, without even two of the criteria I explained in the methodology. I just feel that is bad for the hobby and a bad trend overall. Sure, it's rare that we were ever made to leave by someone else but there were times when we noticed people looking, and electively left. THAT, to me says we are breaking the metal detecting rules of ethics.

The addiction of pulling out a silver or two from past hunts seems to lower the moral bar about the self imposed limit credentials of what's huntable and what isn't. It's spiraled badly as I see it and not a good representation to the neighorhood at the time when as many as 5 tectors swarm a group of private properties. I'll lose out because I over stress the permissions issue. I've already brought it up to the junior hunter and ain't heard a peep from either friend since. It was cool finding a silver dime each hunt, but it just didn't feel comfortable. How far do you bend an ethic for a dime?

 

[mikeraydj]

This topic reminds me of an old joke. A man comes up to a beautiful woman and says "Would you have sex with me for a million dollars?" She thinks for a moment and says "Sure for a million dollars." he then says "Will you have sex with me for 5 dollars?" The woman is insulted and says " No, what kind of girl do you think I am?" He says " We have already established that, what we are doing now is haggling on a price." Some peoples ethics seem to have a price.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

... Some [md'rs] ethics seem to have a price.

Well yes and no. I mean, I guess that includes all of us md'rs. Depending on your definitions. Because I can gaurantee you, that if you asked long enough and hard enough, with the right combinations of words ("dig", "hole", "alter", "deface" "indian bone", etc...) that: You can find yourself a "no" at even the most inncuous of modern sandboxes . So would that mean it's allowed? Or dis-allowed? I suppose technically if you found 1 person in 100,000 who "didn't like it, then is it now "un-ethical" ? Or do you and I avoid such kill-joys and just go detecting ?

 

[mikeraydj]

Originally Posted by Tom in CA.
"Well yes and no. I mean, I guess that includes all of us md'rs. Depending on your definitions. Because I can gaurantee you, that if you asked long enough and hard enough, with the right combinations of words ("dig", "hole", "alter", "deface" "indian bone", etc...) that: You can find yourself a "no" at even the most inncuous of modern sandboxes . So would that mean it's allowed? Or dis-allowed? I suppose technically if you found 1 person in 100,000 who "didn't like it, then is it now "un-ethical" ? Or do you and I avoid such kill-joys and just go detecting ?"

There are some that will say, if they don't know it isn't hurting anyone. There are others that say I don't agree with the law, so I am not bound by it. Now I have had experience with this, I have asked bureaucrats and have been turned down. I also know as a detectorist that public land is much different than private. The laws and ordinances are published for public land and no permission is needed if there is not an ordinance or law. Easy to find if you do the research. Private land means you need permission. No exceptions. Now if you go beyond the public ordinance, you are in the wrong. If you trespass on private land you are wrong. Pretty simple. Most people don't like the word no. Myself included. But for me I do this as a hobby, I don't care if I make a banner, and I will sell my detector before I feel the need to make a find outweighs my need to do the right thing. You can spin it all you want, but right is right and wrong is wrong. Again what is your price?

 

[Jeremy S]

Hmm, go back and re-read the O.P. post. It no where says "private" versus "public".

Yet anyhow, I agree that there is a difference between the two, in actual practice.

But question for you: How about "private" property, when it's nameless faceless coorpration land ? For example, where they're tearing out some old structures to make-way for the next K-mart being built in your city ? Or row-crop ag-land owned by some mega-company 2000 miles away? Those examples versus someone's personal yard. Each, yes, is "private property", yet with a distinct different flavor. Eh ?

Owned by a faceless corporation or an individual, doesn't matter, I still get permission for all privately owned property.

For example: There is a large office building that dates back to the early 1910s in town. At one time it was a public school and later converted to an office building. It is abandoned looking, fenced in, and owned by a large 'faceless' commercial real estate/leasing company. I could have easily been like the other goons and climbed the fence to hunt it when no one was around. Could I have gotten away with it? Probably. But I am a better person than that, I respect property owned by others.

I found the local office for this company, which was close to work, and located the agent in charge of that property to ask him permission in person. He was hesitant at first but I offered to pick up the garbage in the grass around the building, to which he gladly gave me permission to hunt it at that point, and even his business card in case anyone questioned why I was there. It only took me 10 minutes to fill two large garbage bags and I got a good month worth of hunting and a found some really good stuff there. After hunting the property I sent him a quick email showing the cleaned up grass and thanking him.

He could have just declined my request to detect this property. How would that have been any different than a home owner saying no to my request to hunt his property? If a property owner says no, you take note and move on to the next place to ask permission. Maybe ask again later on if the circumstances or owner changes.

I find it easier to get permission to hunt a property when you throw some incentive in there. If the place is overgrown, offer to knock the weeds down with a weedwacker. Not only will you do the owner a favor but you make swinging your coil much easier. Offer to pick up garbage, it doesn't take very long and nobody seems to object when I mention that. Even those 'faceless" owners will consider a deal like that.

Personally, I would never hunt with someone who trespasses. Eventually they will get busted or have a run in with the wrong pissed off land owner.

 

[Escape]

I think I will start issuing "007 Metal Detecting Permits." License to hunt anywhere. Not shure what I should charge for them.

 

[CoilyGirl]

Jeremy I like your style. I think bottom line you should stick to your own personal set of standards and can without alienating your friends. It's amazing what that elusive for" what's under the dirt" can do to people. We always ask permission before we hunt,it doesn't feel right to us to to sneak around. We got burnt by a guy we took detecting that was in our metal detecting club. We took him to a new place my husband had researched and got permission from a guy that was building new houses on top of a demo sight. We took the guy and his wife once to the site and we all found good relics there. The guy made huge holes in the heat of the Summer and we were frankly embarassed he had done that. And went back and planted some grass and took a ten gallon tub with water to water it with.Long story short,we told him we were cooling it on the site until we got some rain and he assured us he would not go back there unless we were with him. I busted him one Sunday afternoon when I happened to be driving by during a slight drizzle. Hubby met me there and we confronted him in a firm but not aggressive way and he had the nads to suggest WE were the ones ethically wrong by not letting him get his own permission from the builder( which he said he did) .he has since been back to the club for meetings. My moral here is be careful who you hunt with and if you find your morals are drastically different to go your own way unless there is a site where everyone understands the rules.

 

[Boatlode]

I prefer to treasure hunt alone. I can't understand why people want to have "treasure hunting partners". Once you put the headphones on you are alone anyway. Its not a social sport like golf or fishing where you can carry on a conversation while you are out there.

With that said, trespassing is trespassing. If I catch you on my property you will find yourself staring down the barrel of a rifle.

 

[ryaan21]

I managed to ask permission for the first time this season. It was easy because I had to email a corporate type entity and talk to the guy in charge of this particular section of land. It is about thousands of acres.

There is public land sandwiched in with the private land. We went out to this spot originally to go fishing this past fall to see if we could get some walleye. I took my detector just in case we saw a spot along the way.

The fishing was slow so I started detecting the public area. Turns out to be the best spot I have ever detected. 20+ silver between my uncle and myself from this one spot. 60-70 Wheaties, 4 different kinds of silver quarters, a silver half, a 1923 peace dollar...etc.

Right next to this place is the "headquarters" of the entity that owns the land. They are hardly ever up here and the only person who watches it is a caretaker. Now after doing some research, there was significant "goings on" in that entire area back in the day. Peering through the trees where we found all the good stuff is a huge field, old stone barn, old house.

Now to be honest I was tempted to just mosie on over there, but then I thought how scummy would it feel to dig coins I had not "earned"

I emailed the guy who is in charge and he gave me permission to hunt every/anywhere on the thousands of acres that I want to EXCEPT the above mentioned spot because they have a bunch of power lines, pipes, etc. buried there.

So rather than do something shady, I did it the right way and got access to thousands of acres I previously wouldnt have been able to hunt.


One other thing I have run into concerning "friends" and detecting is this.

2 older retired guys that I have hunted with in the past. One of them is a cool guy. Always friendly, helpful, excited to share in your finds. He hunts with a guy who I thought was cool. Well it came to my attention that the other guy, the one I thought was cool, would horde hunting spots to himself, tell the cool guy to not share a spot until they had a chance to clean it out. That is all well and good, I am not the type to vulture on someone elses work. But he (the guy I thought was cool) would try anything to sniff out where everyone else was hunting. Call people he barely knows to try and get it out of them where the are finding silver, IHs and what not.

If he hears someone is finding something, he will be there in a heartbeat,scavenging off of other peoples research. I pretty much have cut ties with the whole lot of them because they always have the mooch along with them.