Newbee Ky. First digs

[Postalrevnant]

First off gotta say thank you to all of you for your advice. I plan to do my best to use all the tips I have gathered from reading your site over the last year.

Not gonna bore ya'll with long history on me but will say was soldier for 13 years, and have for a long time thought of metal detecting. Of course LOL I should have gotten a detector when I was in Hawaii and Germany but I can't say I didn't enjoy Scuba, Free-fall, tour of Europe, other hobbies .....Ummm and that whole army thing that kept me busy.

Three days of detecting for me and am starting to learn a few things, but much to learn have I. No coinage or anything yet, but working on researching places to look. I didn't expect to get anything though for a long while, and fully expect it to take years to start to get items of interest regularly. I do have a problem though that perhaps some of you can help me with.

I live in SE KY at a town called Pineville. Its very near where Ky, Tn, Va join. The ground here is extremely filled with rocks and of course trash. Until I get good enough at digging to actually ask a person with an old house and a decent yard I guess I will be doing roadside fields or other abandoned locations I know of. Here goes the questions:

If you know of abandoned old houses overgrown do you wait for winter or does it sometimes pay to drag the weedeater up the mountains (not too far to go about 1/8 mile off beaten path)?

Secondly I don't know if these abandoned shacks... long lost and gone home foundations would be considered worth the trouble. You see the peps that lived there probably would have began living there around early 1900's, however all were very poor moneywise that is (like me) and the yards have been buried in years of metal can trash etc. Oh sorry, I got a BH 505 as my first detector, should have mentioned that earlier. 2 coils 8" and 4". I would be very surprised to see gold, however would it be worth it to go to these places and dig up all signals to see if I see sound differences or get used to the pattern of sounds that I am seeing even if I don't find anything of interest?

By pattern I guess I am saying that I have been trying to formulate in my head what type of item..if buried horizontal could be giving me a signal say 2"...6" ..etc. or even feet in a detected path (I realize could be more than one object together), or an object that is ringing different tones at different depths but all in same hole. Is this type of thinking something that will help me? Am I on to something in areas that I know are filled with metal cans etc?

I guess thats many questions for now. Would love to hear from anyone in my area as far as what to do about this rocky mess of southern Ky. Also would greatly appreciate if anyone in this area would like to get together and have some detecting fun, ummm well LOL probably be you detecting and reaping fortunes and me "watching and learning", which is what all peps new to anything can greatly benefit from.

Thanks again all names Doug. Postalrevnant, Red (yep hair thing), hillbilly, Doug, doesn't matter to me what ya call me, am just happy that I am finally at a period in life where I can detect now and daughter is old enough to go along too. I thought I was going to have to gamble on the whole reincarnation thing to get all the hobbies in I wanted and this is the last of 7 major hobbies I wanted to do, and for sure the one that I have thought in passing the most about through the last few years. Its also the only one I will be doing besides fishing.

Oh yeah, sorry one other thing. What is this send in your secret code for give away when you register? Joke? I have been lookin on the site for awhile now but haven't seen any posts on that one before.

Guess Avatar will have to wait a bit until I find first interesting item.

 

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[allsmith]

welcome to the forum Postalrevnant sounds like your on the right track ,, but i dont think it will take a year before you find something cool ,you'll be surprised
those house foundations sound pretty good , never know!! just get out there and start diggin,, and research , try to find old maps online,, my best spot i found on a map was a church that was moved in the early 1900's,, now just a farm field,, found lots of old coins there!! good luck to ya

 

[PostFatal]

I live in SE KY at a town called Pineville. Its very near where Ky, Tn, Va join. The ground here is extremely filled with rocks and of course trash. Until I get good enough at digging to actually ask a person with an old house and a decent yard I guess I will be doing roadside fields or other abandoned locations I know of. Here goes the questions:

If you know of abandoned old houses overgrown do you wait for winter or does it sometimes pay to drag the weedeater up the mountains (not too far to go about 1/8 mile off beaten path)?

Secondly I don't know if these abandoned shacks... long lost and gone home foundations would be considered worth the trouble. You see the peps that lived there probably would have began living there around early 1900's, however all were very poor moneywise that is (like me) and the yards have been buried in years of metal can trash etc.

Hello there. I'm a newvbie myself but seeing that you haven't had much of a response to your questions I figured I'd give it a shot.
A weedeater and fuel might be a bit of a chore to drag up a mountain so maybe you might try something like this.
http://www.acehardware.com/family/index.jsp?categoryId=1260267&cp=1254884.1255108

as for your second question, the people that lived in those abandoned shacks may have been poor but some had a tendency to hide what they did manage to pull together, sometimes it was a long way to the nearest banks and many people didn't trust banks in the first place. so I would say by all means, check out those old foundations. even if you don't find a lot of money, you may find some worthwhile relics. good hunting, hope my oppinion was helpful. I love that part of the country, I should say goodbye to michigan and join you

 

[Southcacalaky]

Welcome to the forum, Get diggin, Art...

 

[Gypsy Heart]

Welcome to Treasurenet. Looking forward to seeing your posts and finds soon!

 

[Silverseeker]

Welcome to a great hobby:

Just thought I'd let you know that abandoned homesites can be the source of many great finds, and some can be very unproductive. The only way to truly know is to swing that coil and dig. You are definately on the right track hitting the older sites.

For personal training with your machine, you may want to spend a hunt or two in a city park or a modern area with lots of coin potential. This is a good way to get used to your machine.

 

[gossunc]

Postalrevnant,

I'm a Newbie too...got a Garrett ACE 250 for Father's Day, but have already pulled a '42 merc out of the recess area of my kids elementary school and a '46 quarter out of my backyard, not to mention several $$ worth of clad coins and a few interesting old items (medallions, makeup compacts, etc)--don't think you'll have to wait too long before you start to dig up something interesting. I got lucky...lived in an old house, kids went to an old school, lived across the street from a big park, etc. Sounds like you've got some good ideas...I'm in the process of moving to a new town and will look for any abandoned places out in the countryside. Will also visit the local library once I get settled in--they've got county maps dating back to the 18th and 19th centuries that I'm hoping might reveal some settlements that no longer exist. Also got on the school district's web site and found dates for when the schools were built...may try to hit the older ones. Good luck!

Goose

 

[coolcash2004]

Welcome to the forum. You should definatly go detecting at those old home cites. Even though the people there were poor they could have dropped a wheat penny or a buffalo nickle at some time or another. You never know.

-CC

 

[romeo-1]

Welcome aboard.

 

[Ole Mole]

For personal training with your machine, you may want to spend a hunt or two in a city park or a modern area with lots of coin potential. This is a good way to get used to your machine.

I agree with Silver on this one.
As well I am a Newb to MD'ing although I had done some detecting back 26 years ago. I just bought an Ace 250 and started where I went to back those years ago and started to get a bit flustered digging all of the Lawn Mower shrapnel and junk. I decided to hit the local parks and schools around the playground equipment, and have been hitting coinage quite regularly. I am starting to learn the habits of my new machine and it has been talking to me sweet enough to make it somewhat worth my time. It seems that mulch is becoming the new medium to put around the playground equipment and it doesn't take much digging.
I to have to daughters and take them with me to the playgrounds. I tell them that they can keep everything I find unless it is some old coins. This makes it enjoyable to them as they can pull the money an/or play on the equipment and not get bored.

Happy hunting and your machine will talk in a language that you will be able to understand soon enough.

 

[SHERMANVILLE ILLINOIS]

Post,

wow, that's a lot of questions.

One answere, dig.

Those locations sound very interesting.

Poor folks, never know what you could find.

You did not mention why you got into metal
detecting. Did you purchase a detector to
to only search for certain items, or did you purchase
it to use as a tool when needed?

What are your interest? Is it historical,
or just spending time shooting for coins?

If your following history, searching for artifacts,
your locations sound like just the right spots.

Only doing coins and jewelry, try spots that saw
more traffic; older coins, older spots, (research).

Welcome to the board.

Thanks for serving, welcome home.

have a good un..............

 

[relicreb]

WOW

It sounds like you are in a great area to look for Civil War relics. I have found a lot of good older coins in the camps. Go to the library and ask about battles and camps in your area.
Have Fun and Good Diggin
relicreb

 

[silverswede]

Hi Doug;
I'm sure in the time you've spent reading this site, you've come to see that each one of us special detecting interests. Some coin hunt parks and yards, some lumber camps, some civil or revoultionary war artifacs, etc. Most starting out with dreams of caches of money and most of us settle for much less. You have the main ingredients. Time, interest, a possible great young partner, and an old house site. Just take the following as an idea and develope your own style and pursuit. If you live near a county court house ask to see a plat map of the old house site. you can find who lived there at a certain time, but It'll just be a name. Now if there's no trespass problems, go with whatever tools it will take to do a thourough search of the "old ------Place" . Keep and build a collection of all the artifacts you can find. Things that will help you date it are of course, coins, but also cartriges, bottles, cans, farm tools, horse drawn machinery parts, door knobs, keys, pocket knives, jewelry, tokens, the list goes on. Then post pictures and all of us will have a blast trying to figure out what it is and how old it is. As they said on "The Stepford Wives" "You are now one of us" . I'll be watchin for you. Oh and even the poorest of us had pennies and holes in our pockets.

 

[Postalrevnant]

Thank you all for the warm reception. WoW I am very much impressed by the traffic at this site. I noticed the high volume of views on the topics, but never put 2 and 2 together to see that you had a rather large volume traffic in such a short time.

SO much the better! Can't beat so many voices of wisdom.

Excellent advice from many of you. Will try to reply some of the questions/comments. Hopefully I won't miss any of them in reply.

Guess I will start with why I started. Well its been in my mind for many years. After having a great number of very expensive thrill hobbies I finally convinced my wife to give me a shot at another hobby I always wanted to do. I know full and well that this hobby isn't easy and actually a selling point for me and the family was exercise going deep into the wood following old trails. I also have a small advantage of speaking of many older people in my youth and learning a few small area tips that perhaps are lost to many now.

Also as far as why I was a shell collector as a scuba diver, and have found through the years that I am a collector of sorts and one who enjoys a gamble. I think this could be a great fit. I am so used to massive repitition (military so many years LoL) and the thrill of what can be under the ground giving me signal will hopefully turn this into a lifetime hobby that I can enjoy and continue to do.

As far as what I am going after... ummm I guess that still remains to be found out. I am currently running my detector wide open not descriminating and digging up all signals. Partly to attempt to learn how to dig in so many rocky areas without doing too much damage, plus there is lots of historical artifacts waiting in the grounds around me. Only current problem is how deep so many places were built over, but then again I guess that is trouble for all of you out there.

I wanted to wait to see if my digging would improve before hitting the parks, however I do agree that I should hit them earlier to begin to gather skills. Besides they may be some of the only places that aren't so rocky. I cannot however dig the historical federal and state parks as I believe without permission they bring fines, perhaps lifetime ban (got to check to be for sure). I do know from friends that cumberland gap national park will not allow anyone to dig unless you are part of a large research project and most likely a noted archeologists or his or her flunky of sorts.

I do have a few different types of reap hook grass cutters, and have decided not to lug the weedeater after checking sites today. However, they will have to wait till winter or early spring due to large crab grass and lots of Cudzo - Honeysuckle vine cover.

You guys did hit the nail on the head about many old folks buring most all they had. In fact many old homes that were destroyed due to redoing US-25E I found out today were burgled and burned before many of the families had a good chance to clean out all their things before construction. Unfortunately all of the places I heard of are long since buried under the road or under the build of for the road. Also, as a youth many older folks I visited in senior citizen homes told me about how their grandparents hid things when the soldiers came around after the civil war. So there is great potential here.

I thank you all once again for the great advice. I will be hitting the libraries and walking the mountains over the next few years unless my job leads me away from here. One bonus with this hobby is my entire family shows interest in artifacts and most do extensive research already on family histories. Perhaps I can psych them for "old site" research now. Couldn't convince any of them to scuba, bungie, repel, skydive with me....LoL wonder why?

Thanks again for the reception, hope find some great relics to show you all.

Oh, no one really answered the question about the give away and send in your secret code. I saw a post today for someone thanking the group for winning a prize in the give away so I guess I had better send in the code. That is if its the code given to me at registration.

Good luck all,
Postalrevnant

 

[birdman]

Welcome!! Kentucky should be a coin hunters dream. My parrents live in the Glasgow area and the farm land is full of old home places.The only problem is finding the owners. It will not take you long to have a good find! Stick with it. I am in Germany and the hunting is a lot of fun. Tons of history.

 

[RonO]

Welcome to the forum, Doug. First let me thank you for your service to our country.
We have all been there.....new to the hobby, and there is a definite learning curve to any machine. I would suggest running your discrimination high at first and really go over the area. You probably will find coins and not be totally worn out from all of the digging of everything. Then go back over the same area several times using more and more discrimination to see what good relics are there. Hunting old homesites is where I have found some really nice coins that date back to the 1840's. At first hearing all of the sounds that your detector makes is a little overwhelming, but within a few weeks (of regular use) you will be able to decipher a lot of target information. Speaking of sounds....get a good set of headphones!

Keep swinging and digging and at those old house sites and you will be amazed. You will also be a detector addict like most of the rest of us.

Take photos and good luck!

Ron

 

[trk5capt]

Welcome To The Forum, Best Of Luck & Good Hunting. trk5capt...

 

[Michigan Badger]

Welcome to Treasurenet Postalrevnant!

Badger