43 SILVER Coins in ONE Hunt

[done dug it all up]

I organized a group of 10-15 experienced hunters and we are taking a year-long tour of parks in the U.S. where old coins are hiding. We will be flying to these parks as the year goes on and as we have time to hunt. We will be in several parks in most states in the eastern half of the U.S. We may even be in your home town.
Our goal is to recover 2,500 silver coins during that year and at this point now it looks like that will happen. We just got back from our trial trip to Indianapolis where we hunted the best parks. My buddy John did the research on those parks very well and now we have some finds to show. We only stayed one night and then got up and hunted all the next day. One or two people drove in for the hunt. There were only 10 people that could make the first trip but thats ok because we will have more. I told them that it was a trial hunt to see if we could break 2,000 silvers this year. We ended up with 43 silvers between us all. We got a few pieces of jewelry and I got a nice big silver ring. One of my buddies got the oldest silver which was a beat up blackened 1877 CC mintmark seated dime. He might take some baking soda and polish it up. I ended up with the most silvers, 9 silvers, but one of them was a nice condition 1914 D Barber with a case of acne. We got a lot of deep wheat pennies and some indians too mixed in. Not too many nickels because we did not want to waste time digging mid range targets and foil crap. We are going to keep hunting this year. If you have any parks you would like to share, please post youre ideas here in this post. If not then I will trust my friends research. He certainly did good this time. Been a long time since I have seen this many silvers dug in one day. I am sorry for the bad photos. We cleaned finds as fast as possible to take the photos and the guys were in a hurry to head out after the hunt was over. Here are the photos.

 

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[G-Money]

wow! that was awesome. great finds

 

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[RPG]

Done dug it all up, so you are hunting with 10 - 15 or 20 other people from different states...and you all are flying to meet at parks in other states across the country. That's quite an expensive trip, especially when you factor in your collective food costs, car rentals, hotels and laundromats. You must really be cleaning the states out of silver! Are you their designated speaker/leader? Why haven't any of them posted on here? Aren't any of them members? Why do you have all their finds? Don't any of them own computers? Can't they post their own? I'd like to hear some of them share their experiences and show their own finds. It's great that you can afford to do all this...on a military pension, you say? That is incredible.

I had an email exchange with done dugit, and from what I understand some of his hunting buddies are members on Tnet. I asked him who they were, and he said that they did not wish to be identified after the types of replies this post and the other one received.



Always interesting around here...






-Buckles

I don't blame the guys for not wanting to be identified after the way "done dug it" got mobbed.

Looking forward to the next post.

Randy

 

[john09]

COOL FIND

 

[redlined]

I really hope this post gets to stay, as I'm going to try to post according to terms. First off, congrats on what you guys found, 43 silvers in a public place in one day does look to be pretty impressive esp. since they weren't planted. I do see though where this could look bad if everyone just swarmed into one park. I did see where you said you guys divided up, if so kudos to you as it will make less of an impact. I'm also glad to see that you all are waiting until later in the year to avoid plug problems. I am not surprised by the backlash though, as already stated numerous times, a lot of the folks here are just average joes who hunt once, twice, or a few times a month. For a myriad of reasons they don't get out too far except to a local or public park. Could be money reasons, time constraints, job, everyone's lives are different and about anything could be included here. That being said, its a hobby, something meant to be enjoyed, relieve stress and be good for you. When you mentioned half of your guys were experienced Minelab users and you would hunt each park completely out, I think that quickly put plenty of folks on the defense sounding as if they were amateurs and or had inferior equipment. At the same time this was going on, you were asking if anyone had any parks in mind, somewhere in here you had a post on here saying you wouldn't show someone how the research was done because you had done all the work. Then you ask them to give you names of good parks so you and the guys can come run it dry? Isn't that pretty much the same thing? I certainly wouldn't go tell known felons if I were leaving on vacation my address and that I'd be gone for an extended period, but you would expect someone to freely tell you of a park that may have been kind to them or may be one of a handful of spots they have so you can come and run it completely dry? While what you're doing may be legal, it is far from ethical. Maybe it's just me, but I have principles, and down deep inside of me this whole thing(idea) just really turns my stomach. I was okay with most of it till I saw the posts about looking for parks to hunt near where anyone who disagreed with you lives, that did me in. FWIW, I don't hunt public places, save for taking my sons somewhere they can pop clad instead of fighting brush and briar's. I'll help you a little though, Louisville parks are already banned for detecting, and most of the other towns are so small or (too new) that they didn't even give the idea of a public park a thought until after the mid-20th century. I'm guessing you already figured this out though as that may be part of the reason for your "Treasure Tour" I'll stick with private ground for the old stuff, farmers are usually a lot more hospitable and cooperative anyhow. Whatever you do, good luck and please remember and remind your group that all of us are ambassadors to this hobby, even more so in a public place.

 

[Ronin9868]

Amazing and very cool!

HH Ronin

 

[NUKE345KV]

thats a very good day nice finds

 

[done dug it all up]

Done dug it all up, so you are hunting with 10 - 15 or 20 other people from different states...and you all are flying to meet at parks in other states across the country. That's quite an expensive trip, especially when you factor in your collective food costs, car rentals, hotels and laundromats. You must really be cleaning the states out of silver! Are you their designated speaker/leader? Why haven't any of them posted on here? Aren't any of them members? Why do you have all their finds? Don't any of them own computers? Can't they post their own? I'd like to hear some of them share their experiences and show their own finds. It's great that you can afford to do all this...on a military pension, you say? That is incredible.

I had an email exchange with done dugit, and from what I understand some of his hunting buddies are members on Tnet. I asked him who they were, and he said that they did not wish to be identified after the types of replies this post and the other one received.



Always interesting around here...






-Buckles

no they dont want to be identified because of all the crap that was posted on this topic before. I still am proud of my finds and we are still making good finds. We took a break from the parks project this summer because of the heat but it will start up in fall and we will be back pulling out lots of silvers again.


done dugit

 

[silvercop]

wow. any plans to come to alabama?

 

[Tank69]

sweet coins , nice find

 

[mlayers]

I really don't know what to think about this. But when 15 or 20 guys pulls into a town park and gets out their detectors and start digging up the park this is going to start the city and town people to start talking. It is illegal to detect in Kentucky parks. So in my eyes this is going to get all state to make it illegal to detect. So the ones that does this for relaxation and pleasure will no longer be able to do this unless we find someone to let up detect their land. If these people are pros at detecting why don't stay in there on area and detect the land by them. It must be nice to have this kind of money to fly all over and stay in motels and eat out all the time. Some of us is on a limit income and have to work for a living. I sure hope I don't read about another state that has banned detecting after all of these detectist have been to their state. If this happen we will know who to blame.

 

[snyper77]

Yes, the finds are beautiful, no doubt. I agree with several others though, it's highly unethical to get 15 buds and go to a park hundreds of miles away, and clean it out. I think that we all would rather see a grandfather take his grandson to that local park, spending some valuable time with his grandson, teaching him the MD hobby, and together, they find a 1918 quarter.

Excuse me for going one step further, but I'm fighting a similar problem with a local fishing lake. In my area, we only have 1 good bass lake. The lake is narrow and only 8' deep. Over the past few years, many anglers have been taking up to 25 bass per day out of the lake. The state limit is 10. Also, wildlife biologists recommend selective harvesting of fish where only 3 pounders and under are taken from the lake. Obviously the rednecks around here don't care about that. They are keeping two 5 pounders, two 6 pounders, and two 7 pounders, plus all the smaller fish, in a single day. This "outlook" will hurt the fishery and kids won't catch anything there in the next few years.

Overall, it's about people who don't mind swinging their elbows in your face so they can finish in 1st place (so to speak) at the end of the day. I love this hobby. But I'd rather find 1 silver coin with my 2 young sons present than find 20 silver coins accompanied by 15 buds. I don't care to be a "Viking", I'd rather a "dad".

 

[eathabs]

Nicely stated snyper

Some people just don't get it............

habs

 

[Yucon Cornelius]

i am a retired/disabled sailor. after 20 yrs i retired and was diagnosed with parkinsons disease. i have been detecting for 3 yrs now.
i was detecting my hometown city park when the town cop ran me off. come to find out a few ppl with detectors had torn up the park n left it a mess.
i love this hobby and really hope others greed dont ruin it for us.

good luck on your journey. i hope you avoid my little area of wv. i dont get to go too far, i enjoy my lil park.
HH
Yucon Cornielus

 

[MUD(S.W.A.T)]

I'm going to be blunt ! Stay out of my parks, hunt your own darn parks..... If I see 15 people with metal detectors in one of my parks, I'm getting the dogs. My area parks have been hunted to death the only parks left are State Parks and that's against the law.


-MUD

 

[Born2Dtect]

Another perspective. I belong to a metal detecting club. We go once a month, as a group, metal detecting. Anywhere between 12 -30 people. We hunt where we get permission, parks, schools, historical places, and many private grounds. As a group we strive to promote and educate the public about detecting. While we are generally good at detecting not even our largest group can completely hunt out an area. It is not unethical to hunt any area as long as you play by the rules and get permission. By being polite, treating every property with respect, filling holes and removing trash are a must, we do not dishonor the hobby. We also offer "Free" finding services.

The bottom line is group detecting can and is good for the hobby.

Ed Donovan, V.P. Shore Seekers Artifact & Recovery Club "Doing it right for over 20 years!"

 

[MRBeyer]

There are several good points here.

Con
1 Perception means everything. If the locals see a large group digging, even if done properly, they will assume severe damage is occuring.
2 I would hate to work my tail off researching an area then find out someone used my research or came on from out of town just to work over my area, limiting the finds I as a local would be able to find.

Pro
1 I can see where getting a group getting together would allow people to learn from each other, compare various detectors, learn about interence issues, and build a good network system.
2 I can see where i would want a group to assist at a specific site where I need help, say, at one of my properties.
3 I can see where a group outing can be publicized in order to promote md'ing to the public
4 I can see where a group outing can be used to prepare a site for study by a high school history/geology lab or a local history/archeology group. It would be interesting to see what the pattern and age of finds would relate within an area. Maybe we can all learn from it.


What would I do
1 Point out areas (as I have already done in past posts) where I know of sites to be detected that will likely never be detected any other way.
2 Suggest TNet set up a gross total board for annual tracking of everyone's finds. It would be interesting to see all of the finds found by hobbyists.
3 Look into setting up a group hunt in areas normally off limits as this would not impact other md'ers in the local area. I think if we did this more we would be promoting cleaning up swimming and play areas of nails, fishing hooks, glass, and trash which would be a benefit to the area. I know of one heavily used swimming area that is off limits. Think how much safer it would be to have 20 md'ers sweep it with magnets, eyeballs, and detectors.

I'll post more thoughts on this as I think thee is alot of good and understanding that can come from this discussion. I might repost as a separate topic so I can get inputs.
Lets play nice together on here and out there. Good luck all.