Beach hunting question

[Hag730]

I've been land hunting for a few years but have just recently began beach hunting. I've done some reading on the subject but was wondering something. Yesterday, I hit a beach in front of hotel at low tide. I hunted the low tide mark for a while and did not get hardly any targets. I switched gears and went to the high tide mark where all the sea weed had been deposited. I started getting targets every 4-5 feet. I stayed in the area for over an hour and came away with a ton of trash....a couple of cheap bracelets and a fake diamond earing. I guess my question is.....is it better to stay where the trash is? I think it was bordom that drove me away from the water line to the high tide mark. Just wondering if there is any logic to this or no?

 

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[U.K. Brian]

The problem is that thousands now read the same books and forum posts on where is best to detect and that in turn means those places are over detected so they are no longer the most productive spots.

If a beach is not producing I head to the parts your not supposed to and put up with digging the rubbish. I also will often use a pulse machine at the top of the beach in amongst the rubbish for the depth gain over other detectors (though not if the sand has been building) and at the other extreme use a combination of XLT and Bigfoot coil (18 x 3) as the crowds leave at the end of the day to cover the maximum ground. The limited depth of this narrow coil doesn't matter as I'm just after the losses made that day and need to cover as much ground as possible.

 

[G.I.B.]

The good stuff is there with the bad. You just hafta keep digging and digging. The trash and good stuff all acts the same in the surf. Where one goes, so goes the other.

When you find the 'gathering line' where the surf has placed it... dig the trash. And with your PI Sand Shark, you will did lots and lots of trash, and deep too. But, down there somewhere...

 

[Beach Hunter]

I run in to the same problems, seems like the trash ( on my beach) is closer to the high tide line where people sit. Have to wade through the garbage to get to the good stuff.

 

[Can Slaw]

Brian is 100% right on. There are so many hunters now, there is no more easy hunting and it is going to continue to get harder and harder. This has been a record breaking year for detector sales and now that the water is warming up, guess where those new detectors will be headed? It will now be, can I be the first one there, or what can I do that others have not done?

 

[Hag730]

Thanks for the responses guys.......my thought process was on line with what GIB was saying. There was literally a 10-15 foot target zone right down the high tide mark. If I was outside of that zone, the number of targets decreased by a lot.

And where do all the dam nails come from on the beach......I dont see anybody building anything in the sand

 

[dewcon4414]

Most beaches dont allow fire..... but they used to. So i get a lot of nails. CS..... i read another post you made and found it interesting you said maybe it was coming a time when information and trying to get new people in the hobby isnt a good idea. We saw that in a club i was in. It began to get big..... the main reason was to find out where to hunt. Did work most club hunter were clickie and didnt share well. There was even discussion of not accepting more hunters because it was almost impossible to find places for a hunt as a club.

Dew

 

[Sandman]

I've been land hunting for a few years but have just recently began beach hunting. I've done some reading on the subject but was wondering something. Yesterday, I hit a beach in front of hotel at low tide. I hunted the low tide mark for a while and did not get hardly any targets. I switched gears and went to the high tide mark where all the sea weed had been deposited. I started getting targets every 4-5 feet. I stayed in the area for over an hour and came away with a ton of trash....a couple of cheap bracelets and a fake diamond earing. I guess my question is.....is it better to stay where the trash is? I think it was bordom that drove me away from the water line to the high tide mark. Just wondering if there is any logic to this or no?

Items of like weight and shape seem to gather near each other. Most hunters are slobs and want to steal other hunters locations and will even go back to hunt an area in which they were invited to hunt with someone. As for beach hunting, learn from the Master.....no not me.
http://web.archive.org/web/20080202045558/http://thegoldenolde.com/

 

[Hag730]

Thanks for the info...

 

[Beach Hunter]

Thanks for the responses guys.......my thought process was on line with what GIB was saying. There was literally a 10-15 foot target zone right down the high tide mark. If I was outside of that zone, the number of targets decreased by a lot.

And where do all the dam nails come from on the beach......I dont see anybody building anything in the sand

People burn wooden pallets on my beach and I find a ton of nails

 

[bigscoop]

Coastal beaches are constantly undergoing change. In the face of all this increased competition, I think "awareness of these changes" is now the bigger key to achieving greater consistency. Recent drops are being plucked up much sooner now so there is less items on the beach to be found these days. On the other hand, the beaches are still crowded and items are still being lost everyday just as always. The easy pickings are few and far between now, however, those less accessible locations on these same beaches can be real gold mines when they do become accessible. Being able to read a beach is vital these days, even the sudden development of a small but deep hole in an otherwise over-hunted trough can expose several quality finds that were out of reach prior to the hole's sudden development. Likewise, a small change in current/surf direction or force can have the same effect. Think of it this way, if we removed just 6 inches of sand from the surface of the beach this small change might now allow us to get a signal on that gold ring that was sitting at 18" prior to our removing of the top six inches. Items can sink very, very quickly in soft wet sand when that sand is being constantly shifted about, one change of the tide can easily bury that item under a foot or more of soft sand, just as one tide change can also expose it just as easily. In this era of increased competition it's important to be able to find unhunted ground and whenever sand is removed that's exactly what you end up with....."unhunted ground". Coastal beaches are always undergoing change that few hunters ever realize or take notice of, yet these changes, even the very subtle changes, can make all the difference in the world. So learn to read your beaches and start taking advantage of these changes whenever they occur. And last, learn to be methodical in your searches because in this era of increased competition you have to be better with your coverage then the other guys. It's not like it use to be, the competition is much higher now.