Any Bottle Hunters in Bay Area?

[sodetraveler]

I've mostly been posting in Bottles & Glass, but I'm hoping that there are some local bottlers that check here too....

The Hawaii Forum is pretty much all bottlers and Hawaii is where I used to do all my digging. However, I live in the San Francisco Bay Area now and have started digging test holes around my house just to see what pops up.

It'd be nice to talk to some local bottle diggers to see what they're up to - and if they want to go digging!

 

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[treasurechest]

How do you even know where to dig for bottles?

 

[sodetraveler]

How do you even know where to dig for bottles?

That's a really good question! Unfortunately, it's very hard to know where the bottles are that are buried underground. I've been digging test holes for the past month and have found nothing but a few handfuls of broken glass.

I did a bit better the previous month and found about a dozen bottles - including one really good one from the 1860's

Many bottlers like to walk construction sites because all of the digging can expose old trash pits and outhouses. This is generally somewhat illegal though

Other folks will review old maps and try to figure out where houses may have had their privies (aka outhouses) and trash pits. If the lot is currently unoccupied they'll use probes (long steel rods) to poke around for soft spots that may indicate old holes.

People also used to throw their trash down river banks, into bushes and/or ravines. I've been digging test holes on the river banks behind and old town hoping to tap into some of this. Hit and miss at best......

 

[treasurechest]

well good luck. I'd like to find an old bottle that turned blue and purple eventually. Someday, I'll stumble across one.

 

[kuger]

well good luck. I'd like to find an old bottle that turned blue and purple eventually. Someday, I'll stumble across one.

I have never seen one turn BlueMagnesium causes some to turn Purple when subjected to sunlight

To the OP,as I am sure you know SF had some of the most famous diggin in the world in the 60's-70's!!

 

[treasurechest]

My grandpa has one that's half blue one one side, and the other side is still that old frosty white color. He told me the blue side was the side in the sun. I wish he didn't live so far away, I'd take a picture of it.

 

[kuger]

My grandpa has one that's half blue one one side, and the other side is still that old frosty white color. He told me the blue side was the side in the sun. I wish he didn't live so far away, I'd take a picture of it.

I'll be darned,never seen or heard that.Cool!!

 

[riverdiver]

You could look/post on antique-bottles.net, they have a large group of diggers in the bay area that would love to share their knowledge with you.

 

[Greg407]

I know this is an old post, but are you still diggin bottles? I pretty much like the same areas as you do and have a site in the Saratoga area that is going to require a lot more exploration. Let me know if you're interested in swapping stories/sites. I'm mostly into detecting but I've done a bit of bottle digging as well.

 

[gonecountry]

Well Tell ya what in the 70's me and my friend used to comb the the east bay shoreline where the old Hayward dumps used to be. We found a lot of old bottles. Always went at low tide and put something on your feet so you dont sink into the mud. Still a lot out there. I don't think you can do that anymore.