I give up on pennies,just not worth it.

[pa-dirt_nc-sand]

I think it depends on where you are hunting. If you are in the tot lots, newer parks, sport fields, beaches, zincoln signals are modern pennies 99% of the time on an ACE. If you are at an old site zincoln signals definitely should be dug, usually a cool flat buttons or colonial copper coins.

 

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[Tom_in_CA]

Go ahead, pass up pennies. Might not happen in your lifetime but A solid zinc penny signal in a park got me this:



I am quite sure others passed it up but will never know for certain. I don't pass any signals in most places. Sometimes diving I get sick of WW1 bullets and pass them up but I know I will be back to dig them because I am the only one that hunts there and that deep.

You will NEVER know what you are not digging unless you dig it all. One day someone you will never know or see will thank you for passing up a signal. I guarantee it.

Sure. Was it deep or shallow. Let's assume it was shallow : And sometimes someone wins the lottery too. There will ALWAYS be flukes.

As a person who's found 15 gold coins so far, I can tell you that the "recipe for finding gold coins" is NOT to go to blighted city parks and "dig zinc penny signals till your arms fall off". The recipe for finding gold coins is location location location.

 

[ScubaDetector]

Sure. Was it deep or shallow. Let's assume it was shallow : And sometimes someone wins the lottery too. There will ALWAYS be flukes.

As a person who's found 15 gold coins so far, I can tell you that the "recipe for finding gold coins" is NOT to go to blighted city parks and "dig zinc penny signals till your arms fall off". The recipe for finding gold coins is location location location.

Possibly. Mine was in the middle of Salt Lake City in a park. And it was shallow. What are the odds? Who knows. BUT you will never know unless you dig. Yes you have a lot more gold coins than I will ever find unless I find a pocket spill underwater.

As I said. Pass up anything and one day another detectorist will thank you, not having a clue as to who you were. I wish after I die, I would see the things I passed up so I could kick myself!!

 

[Nicksan]

My Whites M6 is spot on when it comes to zincolns, but I just cannot "NOT" dig them, I dig everyone just in case.

 

[bayhawk2]

"I wish after I die, I would see the things I passed up so I could kick myself!!"
Netfix has a two or 3 part series called "The Detectorist".Shows a guy finding a pull tab,then covering the hole back up.
While the camera zooms in a little deeper showing a cache of gold and silver coins.Made me want to turn it off.But
it's a good series to watch.Has a good story to it.

 

[Ogre1190]

I just turn my discrimination to "Find Gold Coins Only". No problem! 😂😂😂

 

[Honest Samuel]

A heap of different opinions and feelings on this site, none bad, just interesting. I've read in other threads how important it is to methodically clear a site of all trash, etc. in order to be able to hear more subtle, possibly killer targets. How these old knees feel on a particular day has a lot to do with how thorough I am. I wish I had taken up this hobby when I was 12.

I wish that I am 12 years old.

 

[TerryC]

I dig it all, especially if I am coming back there often. Why not "clean" the trash out, which includes the trash clad? An old park is a good example. After getting all the clad and zincolns out, the older coins will be there. I know they are there because the clad are still there ... being passed up by the cherry pickers. The main reason I dig all is now, after my back procedure, I CAN! Keeps my back loose and good practice. I've been digging since '70 or '71... BFO days, and still need the practice. Second reason..... none of the would da, could da, should da targets get away. ╦╦Ç

 

[WaterScoop]

..... The recipe for finding gold coins is location location location.

So this saying is not only for real estate..hmmm... Very Interesting..
You don’t say...you mean I will not find a gold coin in a new parks wood mulch?

 

[Loco-Digger]

My first season I was a clad hound. I disc'd out everything and sometimes notched nickels back in. I pulled over $500 face value but only 23 silvers and no gold in those 8 months. The only reason I dug one IHP was I was at a trashy lot that used to be a trailer park and my motto was I don't leave a site until I dug a coin. After digging plenty of aluminum and copper trash I reduced my disc and thought I was digging a zincoln and could leave the site. Out popped the crustiest IHP I ever dug. Once I got used the the F75LTD I started discing out iron and foil. At one old site, I reduced my disc to iron only and dug a 10k wedding band that rang in on the lower end of foil. I now only disc iron between 1-4 to 1-9 depending on the site.
For noobs just getting into the hobby (normally running lower end machines and hunting local public parks and schools) I do recommend they disc most trash signals so they can get hooked by pulling money. They will have a more positive experience and will get their investment back quicker. The more they hunt and possibly move up to a better machine it is time to disc less and seek permissions.

I am scheduled for a CW relic hint in the spring and will probably hunt in All Metal mode and will dig everything, especially deep iron signals.

 

[ScubaDetector]

So this saying is not only for real estate..hmmm... Very Interesting..
You don’t say...you mean I will not find a gold coin in a new parks wood mulch?

View attachment 1536323

THIS is part of the problem with new folks. In all likelihood you will NOT find a gold coin in a new parks wood mulch. HOWEVER, children steal from their parents. Gold rings, bracelets and even silver coins have been found in playground wood mulch. Is it common? Absolutely not. But why pass up even probabilities? Go ahead it is your detector, your time and your finds we are talking about. Many gold rings and chains are junk signals. Especially rings with broken shanks and small gold chains.

As I stated before. Please pass any signals you desire. No problem with me. I refuse to tell others how to detect. But you will make someone with a cheap detector happy one day when they don't pass a signal and find something wonderful.

I have found a gold ring in a playground wood chips.

So let me ask all of you a question. How many of you play the lottery?

You have a better chance to dig up a piece of gold than you have winning the lottery. AND it costs nothing but your time and batteries.

 

[Slingshot]

I have found several gold rings in the chips, occasional wheats and a silver Rosie, they still circulate you know, and since the digging is easy when I hit the chips I always turn my discriminate down to low foil.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

.... you will never know unless you dig. ...

...... Why not "clean" the trash out, which includes the trash clad? ....

... but if a person is detecting in a park that he thinks has been hammered by others he might want to dig those " zinc " signals. He may have a better chance of finding a good target than he would if he notched them out......

.... I dig everyone just in case.

Hey gang, good discussion. What you guys are basically saying (let's be honest) is: Flukes happen. Yes, it's *possible* to find a $5 or a $10 gold in a modern sandbox, or shallow in a blighted junky ghetto park, right ? Hence: dig it all "lest you miss a goodie" , right ?

But at what point does it border on the ridiculous ? A true story in the next post :

 

[Tom_in_CA]

In 2006, the city of San Francisco went to install an artificial turf soccer field @ one of their old parks . Park dated to the 1880s. The tractors needed to peel off the top 6 or 8" to prepare for the incoming synthetic turf. You can imagine it was "Christmas come early" for those of us md'rs who were on top of this Old coins everywhere (story got in Western and Eastern Treasure mag.)

HOWEVER: By the 3rd day, the tractors were folding back in some of the surface modern soil. I guess to get the right grade, depth, compaction, etc.... But since it was all just jumbled up soil, we still had the liberty of "digging all" . Since holes was not an issue in a demolition site.

For an entire week I kept every single target I found. I had buckets for the junk, another pile for clad, and of course my old coins in a 3rd pile. My intention was to do a study of the ratios, #'s, etc... At the end of the week, I DID INDEED have a few gold rings, a gold charm, a gold pocket watch part, etc... But the junk ratio was something on the order of 150+ to each gold item I had found. This was a park nestled in a blighted bad area of SF. So you see: it would simply have been unfeasible, had it not been for the demolition, to have gone into a turfed park with the notion of angling for gold rings . My time would have been better spent simply going to the beach, if gold rings were my agenda.

Oh, and of 10 or 12 hunters in on that event: No gold coins were found. Also: the soil was KILLING nickels. They came out horrible orange/brown cruddy and you could barely read dates on buffalos & V's. One hunter, on one of the nights, wised up and started passing low conductors . That's a no-no in demolition hunting , RIGHT ?? And he ended up with the most barbers and seateds of any hunter that night . Considering that most all the silver was better S mints (go figure, we're right in SF), you can see he actually had the wisest strategy. Eh?

Also be aware: A $5 gold (the most common) is actually not a "low" conductor. It reads at about the beefy square tab (not the flimsy square tab range). Ie.: about 49 to 50-ish on the old Whites scale (Eagle, XLT, etc...). So you could actually pass foil, round tabs, etc... and STILL not miss a $5 gold Needless to say, $10 and $20 read even higher than that.

Thus ... sometimes, like in blackjack in Las Vegas, you are wiser to "hold" if you have 20 in your hand. Despite that the next card *might* be a one card. Sometimes you can't have the best of both worlds.

 

[Professor of Engineering]

Awesome thread!

When I go to school yards, old parks, soccer fields...etc I use the Tesoro Outlaw. Why you, may say? Because it is a beep an dig machine with excellent discrimination if you need it! Over the years, I've used many machines at these places, but for shear volume of nice jewelry found (lots of junk too) this machine does it. Why, because I set the discriminator just above foil and dig everything. There are no numbers, depth gauge or tones other than fluctuations (very helpful) in the one tone. Nothing to talk me out of digging! Now, I'm not a fan boy of any detector company, I use what works in the environment I'm working. I also had an ACE 250, fun machine to hunt the areas written above. My only difference is I would dig every Solid-Repeatable Signal! What do I do differently now...nothing I dig every Solid-Repeatable Signal. If you read my profile, I'm a relic hunter, so digging everything is part of the game. As a side note, there may be a time when I'm not physically able to dig every signal, but hope it's many years down the rode.

Like many have said in different ways, enjoy the hobby and do what you feel is right!

GL & HH

 

[SeabeeRon]

Great gold coin, and you REALLY had to work for it. Really good video RoughingIt, with the live dig like that, it was a thrill on my end here seeing the gold as you did. You seem to be a couple of fella's one would enjoy detecting with. Hunting a field like that would of killed my legs after awhile. So glad it paid off, and of course, a Welcome to this Treasure Net Forum. And back to the thread, I do grow tired of digging the pennies, but I have had surprises along the way, just the same as having a hard time passing up on pull tabs.

I don't think RoughingIt was the OP of that video?!? I could be wrong.

 

[TerryC]

THIS is part of the problem with new folks. In all likelihood you will NOT find a gold coin in a new parks wood mulch. HOWEVER, children steal from their parents. Gold rings, bracelets and even silver coins have been found in playground wood mulch. Is it common? Absolutely not. But why pass up even probabilities? Go ahead it is your detector, your time and your finds we are talking about. Many gold rings and chains are junk signals. Especially rings with broken shanks and small gold chains.

As I stated before. Please pass any signals you desire. No problem with me. I refuse to tell others how to detect. But you will make someone with a cheap detector happy one day when they don't pass a signal and find something wonderful.

I have found a gold ring in a playground wood chips.

So let me ask all of you a question. How many of you play the lottery?

You have a better chance to dig up a piece of gold than you have winning the lottery. AND it costs nothing but your time and batteries.

I hunted South Beach for years. The kids would wear Momma and Daddy's finest bling when there. On the dry sand AND the shallows. Very hard to recover your ring or bracelet in the surf. It is then mine... or another detectorist's. ╦╦Ç