txpathfinder
Full Member
2 Mercs in one hole! My md'ing journey to silver.
I got my very first detector (an Ace 250) about two months ago (having wanted one since I was a boy.) I've gradually gone from my backyard out to parks, house knock-downs, schools and churches culminating in my first old silver coin find. One particular place I identified early on and still like to hunt is a large tree-laden triangular patch between the local University and a row of frat houses. It was there I got my first strong coin signals one after another and honed my digging skills. No doubt drunk frat boys stumble over those hills on their way home and quarters are just as common as pennies! All the coins to date from that area have been clad however I do believe that I have found a wheatback or two so I will keep digging. My biggest inspiration when I started was watching ricardony1's posts on You Tube esp. "200 coin plus day" and while I am a little out of shape to go down 200 times for anything (just ask my wife) his video does show how how to focus on the hunt and be prepared. One day I was taking a short-cut driving through my neighborhood when I saw a large lot with an open fence. There was a dumpster, a bull dozer and, still standing, an old motor court home in the front corner. It looks like a large tree had been felled and there may have been another home at one time which had been demo'd as the lot is huge and had a walkway on the opposite side. Now I keep all my gear (my Ace, a hard plastic knee pad, pair of gardening gloves, my lesche and an apron) in my car so I was ready to go. There was no "No Trespass" sign just one advertising the company developing the lot. As I began sweeping and found several freshly buried coins. I started to think the guy on the tractor must have had a hole in his pocket as I made one new coin find after another! After sampling various parts of the lot I started to concentrate on the area which would have been the backyard of the motor court home. There I found a buried dog tag (canine) and whoa, my first buffalo nickel! a 1936 as well as several wheaties including one dated in the teens which proves the qualities of a good site: it has history, has been in the same configuration, it has been traversed and played on. If it is a residnece, I think it helps if it has not been a rental as it means that it is less likely that trash will have been thrown on the ground and not picked up. Well I have tried going back to build on my buffalo nickel and wheatback find figuring there must be some silver even doing the area anew in the jewelry mode but so far nothing. One area that still holds promise but wicch I have not been able to get to yet is the front walkway of the old home which is brick and flagstone set in sand. If the company ever carts away all the junk they've laid on top of it I will remove the bricks and I'm sure I'll find several old coins which have fallen through the cracks. I will keep on checking and report back. OK, onto my first silver finds which I wondered if would ever happen. The first silver a 1953 Rosie dime was found in a church yard but my Mercs came yesterday at the end of a five hour hunt spree. Here's the story. It was Sunday and I decided to visit a college campus that opened in 1926 and is slated to be demolished and turned into condos next year (!). The school has found a new site to relocate to after the bulldozers come thru and it is still active. I hope to hit it this site with abandon when school is out of session. I started to detect and found a couple of coins but was really timid because even though it was Sunday there were people walking around and I didn't want to be over a messy hole when people walked by. Then while digging a young man whose approach I only felt asked me if I found anything. While I answered I notice his black polo was printed "security." "Uh, just junk, mostly...I'm trying to be real neat. I don't want to mess up this nice lawn you have here. Uh, do you metal detect?" Well maybe he didn't want to explore the more authoritarian aspects of his position or maybe it was deference but he told me no but his grandfather did (thanks, kid) and pretty much just walked his own way. Well after digging a quarter and having some more students walk by I decided i couldn't take it anymore and made a bee-line out of there. When I got to my car, I saw that the church and school that I had thought about detecting for a while was finally bereft of souls so back to the power button I go. Well as usual when you are hunting elementary schools I was finding pennies and quarters (the ace is nothing if not a coinfinder) and the occasional odd bit (a matchbox car, the front of an old master lock, a desk key) I started making my way towards the church saying just one more every time full-on rain threatened. Finally, i was ready to head home when i passed a turn of the century seminary site where everytime I have gone and risked a dig all I find is buried junk. They are razing some old buildings to make way for larger ones and the campus is split by a creek that runs through it. Well this time I had access to a different part and to about two acres of freshly bulldozed earth and, even though that has not been the key to any kind of success for me, just the thought of that same area being paved over soon makes me sick so there I went scanning the mounds of dirt and the uprooted sod. By this time it's dark so I pretty much have to do it all blind. Well my first bit of excitement was finding a ring in a dug hole. The second was seeing some seminary student run out of her apartment in her skivies to the laundry room and into someone else's apartment ("Can I fold", I thought
) Well my best surprise was not to be found till I got home; two coins i pulled out a five inch hole were beautiful Mercs, a 1941 and a (?) 1918 out of one hole. The dirt just came off the whitish silver; Wow! Can't wait to find my first silver quarters..large cent, etc....
I got my very first detector (an Ace 250) about two months ago (having wanted one since I was a boy.) I've gradually gone from my backyard out to parks, house knock-downs, schools and churches culminating in my first old silver coin find. One particular place I identified early on and still like to hunt is a large tree-laden triangular patch between the local University and a row of frat houses. It was there I got my first strong coin signals one after another and honed my digging skills. No doubt drunk frat boys stumble over those hills on their way home and quarters are just as common as pennies! All the coins to date from that area have been clad however I do believe that I have found a wheatback or two so I will keep digging. My biggest inspiration when I started was watching ricardony1's posts on You Tube esp. "200 coin plus day" and while I am a little out of shape to go down 200 times for anything (just ask my wife) his video does show how how to focus on the hunt and be prepared. One day I was taking a short-cut driving through my neighborhood when I saw a large lot with an open fence. There was a dumpster, a bull dozer and, still standing, an old motor court home in the front corner. It looks like a large tree had been felled and there may have been another home at one time which had been demo'd as the lot is huge and had a walkway on the opposite side. Now I keep all my gear (my Ace, a hard plastic knee pad, pair of gardening gloves, my lesche and an apron) in my car so I was ready to go. There was no "No Trespass" sign just one advertising the company developing the lot. As I began sweeping and found several freshly buried coins. I started to think the guy on the tractor must have had a hole in his pocket as I made one new coin find after another! After sampling various parts of the lot I started to concentrate on the area which would have been the backyard of the motor court home. There I found a buried dog tag (canine) and whoa, my first buffalo nickel! a 1936 as well as several wheaties including one dated in the teens which proves the qualities of a good site: it has history, has been in the same configuration, it has been traversed and played on. If it is a residnece, I think it helps if it has not been a rental as it means that it is less likely that trash will have been thrown on the ground and not picked up. Well I have tried going back to build on my buffalo nickel and wheatback find figuring there must be some silver even doing the area anew in the jewelry mode but so far nothing. One area that still holds promise but wicch I have not been able to get to yet is the front walkway of the old home which is brick and flagstone set in sand. If the company ever carts away all the junk they've laid on top of it I will remove the bricks and I'm sure I'll find several old coins which have fallen through the cracks. I will keep on checking and report back. OK, onto my first silver finds which I wondered if would ever happen. The first silver a 1953 Rosie dime was found in a church yard but my Mercs came yesterday at the end of a five hour hunt spree. Here's the story. It was Sunday and I decided to visit a college campus that opened in 1926 and is slated to be demolished and turned into condos next year (!). The school has found a new site to relocate to after the bulldozers come thru and it is still active. I hope to hit it this site with abandon when school is out of session. I started to detect and found a couple of coins but was really timid because even though it was Sunday there were people walking around and I didn't want to be over a messy hole when people walked by. Then while digging a young man whose approach I only felt asked me if I found anything. While I answered I notice his black polo was printed "security." "Uh, just junk, mostly...I'm trying to be real neat. I don't want to mess up this nice lawn you have here. Uh, do you metal detect?" Well maybe he didn't want to explore the more authoritarian aspects of his position or maybe it was deference but he told me no but his grandfather did (thanks, kid) and pretty much just walked his own way. Well after digging a quarter and having some more students walk by I decided i couldn't take it anymore and made a bee-line out of there. When I got to my car, I saw that the church and school that I had thought about detecting for a while was finally bereft of souls so back to the power button I go. Well as usual when you are hunting elementary schools I was finding pennies and quarters (the ace is nothing if not a coinfinder) and the occasional odd bit (a matchbox car, the front of an old master lock, a desk key) I started making my way towards the church saying just one more every time full-on rain threatened. Finally, i was ready to head home when i passed a turn of the century seminary site where everytime I have gone and risked a dig all I find is buried junk. They are razing some old buildings to make way for larger ones and the campus is split by a creek that runs through it. Well this time I had access to a different part and to about two acres of freshly bulldozed earth and, even though that has not been the key to any kind of success for me, just the thought of that same area being paved over soon makes me sick so there I went scanning the mounds of dirt and the uprooted sod. By this time it's dark so I pretty much have to do it all blind. Well my first bit of excitement was finding a ring in a dug hole. The second was seeing some seminary student run out of her apartment in her skivies to the laundry room and into someone else's apartment ("Can I fold", I thought
) Well my best surprise was not to be found till I got home; two coins i pulled out a five inch hole were beautiful Mercs, a 1941 and a (?) 1918 out of one hole. The dirt just came off the whitish silver; Wow! Can't wait to find my first silver quarters..large cent, etc....
