Corn/farm field in illinois

[gerryk]

I have never taken a md out into a farm field. My sister has so,e property in central illinois that was never built on only farmed. The property has a couple pomds on it, a creek and a few farm plots interspersed in trees. Wuld something like this be worth giving a try with the detector? Deer hunting has been done on the prperty for years.

 

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[Tom_in_CA]

The rule of thumb for places to metal detect, is anywhere people gathered in significant #'s, and frolicked, lived, played, ate, slept, etc... Thus if it was only for agriculture (but no habitations, or purposed gathering spots), I'd say no.

Now if you were in Europe (England, etc...) where the fields have been continually cultivated for 2000 yrs, then perhaps just random field worker fumble fingers losses are worth random roaming. But here in the USA, I'd say no. There needs to have been some sort of structure, camp site, park, or ......... whatever, for people to have even been there (in significant enough #'s) to make it worthwhile.

 

[gerryk]

The rule of thumb for places to metal detect, is anywhere people gathered in significant #'s, and frolicked, lived, played, ate, slept, etc... Thus if it was only for agriculture (but no habitations, or purposed gathering spots), I'd say no.

Now if you were in Europe (England, etc...) where the fields have been continually cultivated for 2000 yrs, then perhaps just random field worker fumble fingers losses are worth random roaming. But here in the USA, I'd say no. There needs to have been some sort of structure, camp site, park, or ......... whatever, for people to have even been there (in significant enough #'s) to make it worthwhile.

Thanks. I had the same thoughts but since someone has gone down the same trails for years to hunt and ride atv's, i was thinking possibly try that trail. I didmt think the fields would hold anything.

 

[Minrelica]

I just think of how old the earth is and figure that someone at some point in time may have lost something in any given place so no place seems like a total waste of time to me.. If nothing else, you satisfy your curiosity

 

[Tom_in_CA]

reply

there's a particular agriculture field, outside a town near me, that had a contact era indian rancheria from the 1790s to the 1820's. After that, history records that the remaining indians dispersed, and the little rancheria was no-more. We have hunted the sn*t out of this field, and have found reales, buttons, etc... there from the time-period of the rancheria.

After the late 1700s/early 1800s little burg ended, the spot was nothing more than cattle lands. Ie.: no people there anymore. Just cattle land. Then starting in about the 1910s or '20s, the land became row crops (leaf vegetables, sugar beats, etc....). Thus you might think that starting in the 1910's or '20s, there might be reason for occasional fumble fingers losses from fieldworkers, right? And yes, occasionally a buffalo nickel, or a wheatie or a silver washington has turned up. TOTALLY not what we're looking for (we could care less about those "new" coins). But the point has occurred to me, that if I was there for that purpose (random field worker losses) that would be a very lousy place to be coin-hunting. I mean, for any one wheatie or mercury, we'd have put in 50 hrs. or whatever.

So sure, if you just turn on your detector, and randomly walk into the forests, fields, desert, mountains, etc.... sure you'll eventually "find something". But no, unless you were in Europe where fields had continuous cultivation for 1000 to 2000 or more years, (of which all of that prior to 1900 was by hand, as there was no tractors, hence more "hand work"), then no, you'd be wasting your time in most of the USA. You're much better off to spend your time where there was something going on. Preferably a place where coins changed hands, like for retail purposes (saloon, stage stop, etc...), or where people slept and camped (thus taking clothes on and off, getting in and out of bed-rolls, etc...), or where people recreated and frolicked.