detecting for a living?

[bergie]

Is there anyone here who makes a living detecting or knows of anyone who does? I don't mean creating events or owning a related shop or anything but actually detecting as the full time means of income. Also would limit my definition to an individual, not part of a company searching for major treasure, etc. Curious to know. Thanks.

 

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[MistaCotta]

With the stuff I've found, I'd be living on Ramen noodles. I've thought about doing it myself...which would probably be easier for me than someone who has a family, and a secure job, etc. I'm just a single college student, who loves adventure and metal detecting! Hey, why not? Maybe I'll try it for a while...

michael

P.S.--I don't know anyone who fits your description right now.

 

[bergie]

Thanks. I'm curious if it's feasible. It's not something I'm considering however. My full time job is flexible and secure enough to give me time I need to hunt for fun. I gather someone who did this would have to travel somewhat extensively at least within a region and perhaps travel to specific locations based on research to find enough stuff. They might need to go after gold nuggets, etc. and "think big" in terms of some of the things we've read about dredging where you could find hundreds of dollars or more at a time and perhaps withing that find more valuable items.

 

[nedigger]

Simply put, I wish I could find a way to make it profitable enough to be a primary source of income. I think a person would have to find a substantial gold cache or have exclusive access to a well used upscale private beach. I have heard stories of people who water detect tourist beaches and are able to live on the coin and jewelry findings but have never met anyone who fit the bill. It certainly would be a dream come true, wouldn't it? HH.

 

[Earl]

Bergie, ?My wife and I took 2 years off in 1981 to 1983 and went to northern California. ?We had a whites 6000D metal detector and a 5 inch keene tripple sluice gold dredge. ?We went down by a little town called Colfax just about 35 miles north of the town of Auburn California which is about 40 miles north of Sacramento. ?We went to a place called the Iowa hill bridge which was located close to an old ghost town named Iowa hill. ?We were on the north fork of the american river. ?We dredged there for 2 years. ?It was a lot of fun and we made enough to buy beans and bacon. ?Had good times and hard times. ?Sometimes we would go for days and not find any gold. ?I finally packed the dredge down stream 4 miles and we hit an area that was not worked very much by dredges. ?The first day we recovered over an ounce of gold. ?We ended up taking out over 30 ounces of gold. ?It was hard work but fun. ?Too old to do it now or I would be down in that place we called the pinch as the way the river was formed. ?We took the summer off in 1985, went back to the pinch and in 2 months took out about 40 ounces of gold. ?The area seems to replenish itself after the big storms of the winter. ?I bet I could go there next summer in July after the water level and speed drops, hit the same spot in the pinch and come out with another 40 or 50 ounces of gold. ?But like I said, I'm now too old and don't have the energy or the will to do it. ?I'll leave that to the young guys.

 

[Lowbatts]

Hey bergie, it would be a challenge to do this and not be a real treasure hunting success at least on a sometime basis if you were to succeed at making a living. I've heard of one guy from Racine, Wis. who was on some tv show claiming he detected almost 80k a year. I can't call him a liar but I've metal detected full time in the past and it's difficult to consider it a living wage. You can only do this if you have several factors met, a large urban/suburbnan location helps, develop a park/playground routine, once a week make sure you hit every site to keep current coinage coming in. Work every target of opportunity especially construction sites, sidewalk and roadwork sites as available. Carry enough gear so that when you hit sites with ancillary gains such as old books, bottles, whatever you can carry them out.

I've gained a lot of knick-knacks, thousands of bottles, hundreds of very old books and other things but cost is an issue. Today gas is the big road trip killer, especially if you're driving something big enough to carry all your needs and finds. I hunt carnivals, festivals, playgrounds and old sites whenever I can justify the travel time and cost. For local events this should be no problem, how far will you go for clad and is there enough to justify it? If I ever did sell everything I've found at fair market value, I'd have to go hunting again to stay in batteries and gas. Despite having little room left to stack anymore, haven't hit the big tickets yet, the gold cache, the most rare bottles, sought after old books or other high end oldies.

MD'ing can become routine, but I still enjoy it immensely and like the little things I find even more reward in those I can return to the person who lost it. Not to start that fight again, just one of my few good points!

 

[mavrick03]

hey bergie
i know of a fellow who could if he wanted to over the years he and his father have amassed a collection of civil war relics that would boggle your mind.
instead of selling all of there stuff off they opened a museum everything in it they found with there metal detectors in one stack of bullets they have on display there is 64000 bullets if you sell each bullet on the average of 3 dollars that would equal more then
192,000 dollars just in one stack of bullets there are countless numbers of buttons, buckles and bullits sort of made me sick when i went in there wishing i was the one who found all of it but thats my luck one buckle that he has there which is an extremely rare vss buckle will fetch over 24k alone

so i think its possible that it could be done


mav

 

[bergie]

Very interesting discussion. Thanks for the feedback. One good point coming from all this is "would you enjoy it as much if your life depended on it and you had to do it all the time?" I think it would take lots of the fun and relaxation of it out, like if you had to go to Vegas and win to survive vs. just having a good time.

 

[chuckered]

I think the most important question you have to ask is how well you want to live. Because in these days most can work all week and bearly do what is called living. If you don,t need steak couple times a week or a case of beer or two a week. it can be done. But the most important thing brought out is one of the most important thing is research research and more research areal good metal detector can only do so much, but research will help you find the better finds in the long like many have brought out. Hope I don't break off my soap box when i get off of it.

 

[Cladius]

You take any hobby and turn it into a business and the fun goes out the window! Too much stress defeats the purpose of the hobby! I personally don't know of anyone that can honestly say they mak their sole income from MDing. Cladius.

 

[Gribnitz]

You take any hobby and turn it into a business and the fun goes out the window! Cladius.

Gotta agree with this 100%. Once it feels like a job, the stress takes the fun out of it. I can never bring myself to sell anything anyway. I may never find another like it again.

 

[findmor]

A Toyota Corolla and a sleeping bag would go a long way towards bringing it about. If you wanted luxery you could throw in a small tent. Two shirts, pair of shorts, pair of jeans, sandels, boots, man you would beeee prepared. Go for it!!! ? ?Oh yah I forgot the toothbrush.

 

[Bob B.]

Knew one guy who is doing it still. But he is doing it on a boat, he follows the coast line of Florida in shallow waters and around marinas, he finds enough lost anchors (resells at marinas) to pay expenses. He's in his 50's single and loves every minute of it. His boat is a piece of junk just barely stays afloat but like I said he is making
a living, if you want to it that, who knows one day I might read about him in the paper hitting the big one.
I think that kind of md'ing can pay off.

 

[Ocean7]

makes a living detecting - nope! Nice dream though!

 

[Darren in NC]

I guess if you had the time to research, make good finds and write articles for travel/treasure mags...maybe you could add corned beef to the ramen noodles

 

[swimmer]

Wow, nice thought...but thats an awful lot of digging for coins! The jewelry simply wouldn't pay enough by the time you clean it & sell it (all takes time & effort).

We all dream about it though!

 

[bakergeol]

Yes a dream every new guy has thought about.

I remember back in the golden years pre-1970 I used to take detecting vacations and live off the land with my detector. I would just take off and spend weeks in the field mainly traveling country roads looking for virgin sites to detect. Absolutely incredible coin finds particularly in the east- eg. Virginia and Pa. When I needed money for food and gas I would stop at a town and detect around the parking meters for quick cash. You could do this because gas was 29 cents a gallon 35 years ago. In that golden era? of detecting by working virgin sites you could make minium wage working common locations- parks, ect but no one was quitting their day job to detect.

Today I imagine to make a modest living today you would need to find a couple of gold? or? rare high value silver coins every week which is not going to happen.

Nice Dream
George

 

[lab rat]

You forgot about the competition: Just look at all the new members this site generates every day. Everyone wants to find 'the big one', and every day brings more lookers.

I have found a few high-dollar items ($1000-$3000) over the last 10 years, but the sum total of all my finds, jewelry, pocket change, returned-item rewards, etc. divided by the number of hours hunted earns me about $1 an hour. Couldn't live on that, and that's BEFORE subtracting out batteries, gas, parking meters, detector repairs and equipment costs.

Maybe I could do it for a living in Haiti...

 

[Diane L.]

Yepper! Your right! I on the other hand I do not look at it that way....It's the challenge of finding that one item that makes anything you could find look like small fries, It's that smile you receive for finding that lost item for someone you don't or do know,It's the sound of the ring on the detector and the question of what is it,It's the feeling of being a detective and not being a real detective per-say,It's your body keeping healthy and getting what fresh air you can get,the surprise,Nature,wildlife,like when you bump into a squirrel next to you and digging like you,what more can I say.Oh yes and bumpimg into someone else doing the same thing and the challenge of should you leave or the talking about your adventures metal detecting and what kind they have ect...ect....It's like heaven to me. I do not care of the money..It's just the hobby and getting out but with knowing the law too!When you work 40 hours a week and your paycheck goes as soon as you get it in your hand it is a real joy to do something you really love!The small things in life are the best! and of course your family.Think of how much a Packer game ,Car racing costs or hunting costs.But the same thing applies when you love that hobby. Right?There I said it all in one clump, now I can breath again.

 

[True_Metal]

This does not really apply to detecting, but goes along with the thread topic in respect to making a living on treasure hunting. It is about Diamond hunting. When i was young my mothers parents lived in east Texas. Every summer we would travel from the north down there to visit for two weeks out of every year. My mother has four brothers and all detect and treasure hunt as did their father, my grandfather. In 1975 we went to Murfreesboro Arkansas to the Crater of Diamonds State Park, it was the first time there for all of us. There were many oldtimers that camped and lived there and ran sluice boxes on the creek. They were very friendly and gladly showed us their diamond finds. These oldtimers had pill bottles absolutly stuffed with smaller carat diamonds of all shapes and colors that they would sell a few stones at a time to keep them going and live off of. We are talking about hundreds to thousands of Diamonds. Many of them had different pill bottles for the different colors of stones. I remember they favored the canary yellow stones the most and held that color in high regard, relating that those were the most valuable. Later that day while walking with my Grandfather he picked a stone out of the soil that turned out to be a 16.5 carat diamond that he named? "The Amarillo Starlight".? It also turned out to be the second largest Diamond found in a North American Diamond mine. His record still stands and the Diamond sold in New York in the late 70's for around $100,000. The money greatly helped his retirement funds and carried him till his death in the early 80's and partly helped my Grandmother along til her death in the late 90's. I would say with hard work, the right equipment and judging by all the diamonds i have personaly seen and held that were taken from there, that it is entirely possible to make a living at it.?