Tips for Hunting in Southern New York

[Joe1944]

I'm more of a metal detectorist but I'm becoming increasingly interested in looking for native artifacts.

I live right on the border between NY and NJ (Rockland/Bergen counties), and I do know there are some small streams that snake around my area, and I know those are good places to look, but never really checked them out. I've been finding fossils in the woods behind my house, but I'm craving more.

Anyone have any tips for a newbie? Or are from my general region and have found stuff that can boost my spirit?

 

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[gunsil]

Hey Joe, where are you located? I am in Valley Cottage and have been MD in Rockland since 1970 and bottle and artifact hunting since around 1959. Indian relics are hard to come by around here, I've seen few found, and only found a couple myself when I looked hard back in the 60s. To find Indian stuff you need to figure out where they camped, but so much land here is private or state owned and/or overdeveloped it is hard to find any remnants of such camps.

 

[Joe1944]

Hey Joe, where are you located? I am in Valley Cottage and have been MD in Rockland since 1970 and bottle and artifact hunting since around 1959. Indian relics are hard to come by around here, I've seen few found, and only found a couple myself when I looked hard back in the 60s. To find Indian stuff you need to figure out where they camped, but so much land here is private or state owned and/or overdeveloped it is hard to find any remnants of such camps.

Hi Gunsil, nice to meet a fellow Rockland-er. I'm in Ramapo. You're right, alot of land around here is developed. May I ask what you found back in the 60's? I've never seen anyone metal detecting around here before, but then I guess that's good for us!

 

[gunsil]

Hi Joe, I'm sorry to say that most of Rockland has been metal detector hunted hard for forty years. I don't believe there are any virgin schools or parks left. It is not allowed to hunt in Harriman or other state parks here, getting permission for private property is now the only way to hunt virgin sites. There may be a few un-hunted churches but the really old ones have all been hit and it still requires permission to hunt any of them. I dug a lot of bottles back in the early sixties, made more money than most kids then by selling to all the antique shops that used to be around. Found a few bone and stone Indian tools and a couple of arrowheads, but I looked around a lot and found few. There is a camp site in Ramapo but the archies are trying to keep it's location secret. Some good stuff was found there. I lived in Pomona for forty years, and have looked for Indian stuff in Harriman for many years with no luck, but that doesn't mean nothing is there, but you can't legally dig in there. As to MDing back in the early seventies, all sites were virgin, and a few friends and myself found lots of silver coins and some nice jewelry, but our machines had no discrimination, so we dug every target. I'm a lousy typist, I'll PM you with my number if you'd like to discuss hunting around here further. By the way, I've met four other Rockland MDers here on Tnet, three with little experience, so their are six of us on here, and a bunch who aren't.

 

[Amll28]

Hi Joe, I'm sorry to say that most of Rockland has been metal detector hunted hard for forty years. I don't believe there are any virgin schools or parks left. It is not allowed to hunt in Harriman or other state parks here, getting permission for private property is now the only way to hunt virgin sites. There may be a few un-hunted churches but the really old ones have all been hit and it still requires permission to hunt any of them. I dug a lot of bottles back in the early sixties, made more money than most kids then by selling to all the antique shops that used to be around. Found a few bone and stone Indian tools and a couple of arrowheads, but I looked around a lot and found few. There is a camp site in Ramapo but the archies are trying to keep it's location secret. Some good stuff was found there. I lived in Pomona for forty years, and have looked for Indian stuff in Harriman for many years with no luck, but that doesn't mean nothing is there, but you can't legally dig in there. As to MDing back in the early seventies, all sites were virgin, and a few friends and myself found lots of silver coins and some nice jewelry, but our machines had no discrimination, so we dug every target. I'm a lousy typist, I'll PM you with my number if you'd like to discuss hunting around here further. By the way, I've met four other Rockland MDers here on Tnet, three with little experience, so their are six of us on here, and a bunch who aren't.

I hunt in rockland and yes very hard to find Virgin ground but some are still there.

 

[antmike915]

Not familiar with your area but those streams would be worth checking out, especially if and where they connect. Any plowed up land around the area close to those streams (especially high ground) are worth checking out as well, got to get land owners permission first of course.