Tin foil, worse than pulltabs?

[deepskyal]

Over the last couple years, seems the county parks have become blanketed with tin foil. Darn near everything a person takes to a park is wrapped in foil or they use it to cook their burgers, the wind does it's job and scatters it everywhere.
Then the park guy comes along and finely shreads it everywhere with his mower. (along with pop cans)

I wish I only had to contend with pulltabs and bottle caps. I don't mind digging them....but

Just think of every little thing that has tin foil that people toss on the ground after rolling it up into unseeing little balls.

Gum wrappers, hearshey kisses, that first strip of foil when you open your cigarettes, other types of candies, drink pouches...and on and on and on.....

This is the biggest reason I have for staying away from the bigger county parks, even though they have history. You have to ramp up your disc and in the process, lose depth. And I know these parks have been hit hard over the years, before they became so polluted with trash, so you need that extra depth to find the real goodies.

I was out Sunday and swear, I couldn't move my detector 2 feet in any direction without hitting foil, and that seemed to be a HUGE area around the shelters. I tried other shelters and same thing.

I left that park and went to another park...same thing. It's gotten rediculous.

I know i could probably buy a smaller coil, but I still think it would drive the detector nuts constantly nulling out and "boinging" back....gives me a headache.

I played with several settings on the DFX...didn't help a whole lot.

And what's worse...foil takes on so many shapes and sizes, i get all kinds of false reads on it. I am simply not going to spend my time digging countless hundreds of pieces of foil to find a coin or clear out an area to hunt. I'd have a bazillion holes in a 4 square foot area.

If the government wants to stop us from detecting, just let everyone continue dumping their microtrash everywhere and it'll just drive us away.

So...if you detect sites like this...well hunted in the past but still suspect some deep goodies, but it is ankle deep in foil....how long before the frustration drives you away, or do you try anyhow?

Al

 

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[Cynangyl]

I totally understand your frustration there and for about a month after all those lil foil wrapped Easter candies come out it is unbearable anywhere kids hunted easter eggs too! lol

 

[deepskyal]

Lol...yea...try unwrapping one and get it off in one piece...itsy-bitsy flakes everywhere...and still drives a detector nuts.
Al

 

[stanjam]

My ACE loves foil, and will detect even the smallest piece of it. WHen in the parrk I hate to tey and discriminate against it, because I will miss something good, but really, how many times I get hits that are just tiny pieces of foil (and I mean TINY, the ACE will pick out minute pieces of foil!)

 

[Cynangyl]

believe me....I really DO understand! We got the Gold Bug 2 right after Easter last year and I swore it was a foil detector instead of a normal metal detector...even a tiny shred of foil would set it off! Shame so many folks leave foil stuff laying around!

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Oh No! Say it isn't so! You can't pass ANY of that foil with your discriminator. You MUST dig it all "lest you miss a little gold ring or chain". Tsk Tsk.

Seriously now. I either bring up my disc. at a place like that, and just go for deepies. Time and neatness constraints just simply don't allow strip-mining in some parks like that. Either that, or I just to to places with less or no aluminum: old town urban demo's, cleaner upscale parks, beaches after storms wash away the light stuff, remote ruins type places, etc....

 

[greydigger]

Does foil eventually go away?
Or is it like alimony payments and taxes?

 

[Cynangyl]

pretty much like taxes....unless someone else detects it and picks it up and throws it away it appears be there til death

 

[EZrider]

Instead of useing discrim why not notch it out? I can and do get coins at 9 or better without ever haveing to hear foil.

 

[Silver Fox]

Over the last couple years, seems the county parks have become blanketed with tin foil. Darn near everything a person takes to a park is wrapped in foil or they use it to cook their burgers, the wind does it's job and scatters it everywhere.
<snip>
If the government wants to stop us from detecting, just let everyone continue dumping their microtrash everywhere and it'll just drive us away.

Al

I don't take issue with your frustration but I'm curious as to why you said "If the government wants to stop us from detecting,..." Where did you get the idea that the gov't is involved in any way, shape, or form with the hobby of metal detecting? Do you know something that some of us don't know?

Silver Fox

 

[deepskyal]

No Silverfox, but there is that slow, creeping onslaught of local rules, regs and laws that is slowly eroding our metal detecting hobby. Here in Pa you can't do State Gamelands...that's a big chunk of land we're not allowed to detect and some with old ghost towns, foundations, lost lumbercamps, etc.
So...yea...like taxes in Pa...so are their silly laws about detecting.

There are those that claim we're disturbing the past and destroying archeological sites, but in another breath say they'd never know it was there if WE didnt do the research.

And the sadder part....out in nowhere, where I like to hunt...there isn't that huge accumulation of trash. Maybe some isolated pulltabs or what-nots....but generally free and clear detecting.

I hit local parks when I'm limited to time and distance. But I'd love to hit State game lands....IF they let me.
Al

 

[Silver Fox]

No Silverfox, but there is that slow, creeping onslaught of local rules, regs and laws that is slowly eroding our metal detecting hobby. Here in Pa you can't do State Gamelands...that's a big chunk of land we're not allowed to detect and some with old ghost towns, foundations, lost lumbercamps, etc.
So...yea...like taxes in Pa...so are their silly laws about detecting.

There are those that claim we're disturbing the past and destroying archeological sites, but in another breath say they'd never know it was there if WE didnt do the research.

And the sadder part....out in nowhere, where I like to hunt...there isn't that huge accumulation of trash. Maybe some isolated pulltabs or what-nots....but generally free and clear detecting.

I hit local parks when I'm limited to time and distance. But I'd love to hit State game lands....IF they let me.
Al

Oh, yeah, State Parks. You're right about Gov't interference re: State Parks. I'm a city boy and so I forget that there's more than city Parks. I've seen TV documentaries highlighting the plight of farmers whose lands adjoin state parks and how they cannot do anything about the trespassing predators that kill their stock. It looks like the overzealous rules and regulations affecting state parks is due mostly to lobbyists.

So if you are near state parks and know good metal detecting sites you're dealing with bureacracy with little chance of overcoming the powers that be.

Our city parks while maintained by the Parks Department are really under the control of Parks Conservancy groups made up of rich folk who dictate policy for certain parks since detecting is allowed on quite a few city parks and beaches.

I wanted to detect a location upstate where Washington had a headquarters and I told the person I wrote to that I would turn over to the responsible person all of the finds I would make on the property. But, like you say, they would rather leave it in the ground for no one to see and appreciate rather than allow harmless retrieval in which they benefit 'cause now they have something to display for visitors' enjoyment. But nooh!

 

[greydigger]

Son and I went to a big park yesterday and hunting the dirt trail to the river, someone must have carried a Christmas tree down because there were bits of tinsel every few feet. And I thought that was made of plastic these days. Hate giving up.

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

. . . the plight of farmers whose lands adjoin state parks and how they cannot do anything about the trespassing predators that kill their stock.

Try me.

What happens on my land stays on my land, or slightly below.

Say "hello" to my little 0.223" friend.

 

[Silver Fox]

. . . the plight of farmers whose lands adjoin state parks and how they cannot do anything about the trespassing predators that kill their stock.

Try me.

What happens on my land stays on my land, or slightly below.

Say "hello" to my little 0.223" friend.

I'd like to introduce your little friend to a few of those "revenoers" that pull their authority on private lands when they find out certain "herbs" are being grown. Maybe you can say that you thought a "revenoer" was a predating wolf!

 

[deepskyal]

I'll tell ya Charlie, I had a house and property that was abutted on 3 sides by a county park. It was situated between a main highway, if you want to call it a highway, and the county swimming pool. There was a well worn path right through my woods that went from the highway to the pool.

That never bothered me until I had 6, 40 foot sections of aluminum gutter disappear from behind my shed, which couldnt be seen from any road, unless you were trespassing either in my yard or the neighbors.
We're not talking something small here.....40 feet long! They drug it down that trail, through the woods, probably a good mile plus, out to the highway down the ways some. The local cops wouldnt do a thing but they suspected a junkie that just happened to live where the path came out at one point.

I fenced my yard after that with the exception of the far back 40 where there was nothing but deer trails and the occasional golfer hunter for balls. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do!

But...I still was forever picking up trash along my property that was blowing from the shelters. That really ticked me off. It wasnt exactly an upscale park and people from some bad areas would use the shelters with no respect for the people living around them. Loud boom-boxes, leaving huge piles of trash, defacing the park, noise after 11 pm....summer time sucked!

I was walking my dog back there one day and a small gust of wind blew paper plates and newspapers off of one table. The people there made NO attempt what-so-ever to retrieve their trash. Serious scumbags!

I had no qualms about calling the local sherriff and complaining to them or the head of the park. We had them on speed dial and we got more than a few idiots busted and sited and barred from the park.

I sorta considered the entire park part of my back yard and expected respect of anyone using it.

I don't expect, from seeing what a rural County park is like after living inside one for so many years, that the county parks near large urban areas would be any cleaner. Much worse I would have to assume.

Al