To The Frustrated...We All Dig Trash.

[Jarl]

Hello everyone,

While I shutter to think of myself as seasoned enough to give advice, I think that it is appropriate regardless. Detecting is solace, exercise and learning for me. It's one of the most rewarding hobbies I have ever had. But I read and contemplate the doubts, frustration and disillusionment of fellow detectorists and it rather breaks my heart. To all of you who are struggling in some way, don't give up. Your finds are out there. It takes work...yes...I said WORK.

The reality is that hardly anything sought after that is perceived as 'good' or in our case, 'treasure,' is handed to us. Not much of this hobby is 'easy'. Think about this. What good would it be if every time you swung your coil you found gold, silver or something of great archeological significance? Of course it would be awesome, but it just won't happen all the time. It isn't safe to set your standards too high because a simple fall is agonizing and then we become angry, lose focus and strategy...and hope. If everything you found was valuable treasure, how could you learn appreciate it? It would be too easy. There would be no mystery and no thrill of the hunt. We don't learn to appreciate much by always having it handed to us. It is human nature. It's within the contrast of two opposing extremes (garbage vs. treasure) that we can learn to endure the worse a little more in hopes of gaining the good. Then when we find the treasure, it's gleaming and glorious. All the previous work dims behind you. It isn't forgotten but your sparkling find justifies it.

When you consistently find trash though...you are doing exactly what a 'treasure seeker' does...in fact...to BE a treasure seeker and therefore a treasure FINDER...you HAVE to dig garbage. The human experience upon this earth has left us to deal with the reality of LOTS of garbage. It's sad, but it's the truth(and I care not what machine you boast). But that does not mean your desired finds aren't out there for you...you just have not found them YET. Simply put, there are hundreds of years of crap to sift through. You're going to work.

But if you give up...you will only ensure that you will NEVER EVER find what you are after. Stay focused. Try everything, and then...try everything again...and again...and again. Don't believe the 'pro' naysayers until you have worked hard enough to prove them wrong...and by that time, you'll be giving them advice. It takes a lot of work to achieve the discipline of treasure hunting. I can't even say that I am on the top of that statement as of this writing...I am still in formation as a treasure seeker and finder. But what I refuse to let die...is my LOVE for it. If that dies, then all else according to the hobby is for nothing. I still get discouraged, I still have bad hunts and I am sure more will come, but the seeker in me is stubborn and ever seeking. How about yours?

Learn to love digging garbage as much as you might treasure. Come to terms with it...you're going to have to anyway.

Learn from the seasoned diggers. Try different machines. Know your machine(s). Research history until you pass out. Go off the beaten path. Visualize the past. Listen to your instincts. Invite challenges. Love all of what is involved in what you do. The only machine that doesn't find treasure is the one that isn't turned on and swinging. The only person that doesn't find treasure is the one who doesn't try and try and try.

Now get up, get out and go get it.

 

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[justdon]

Well said jarl.I think too many want instant gratfication.Practice/patience and perserverance works..Anything worth attaining is never easy.To everyone.HH

 

[Lores]

I was on the beach Sunday morning. Was frustrated that I had only found 16 cents. Was about to call it a day when I found a pocket dump. I only recovered about $2.00 in clad but it was fun to keep finding and finding in the same hole. I have never found anything great but in my field or work I need solace to reflect on the previous weeks work and that which follows. Thanks for the inspiration.

 

[BC1969]

Great post, thanks for taking the time to type all that! Now me I'm a strange type like that, I actually like digging trash, if for no other reason, than having learned since I started detecting in the 70's is that often trash is masking better targets below.
So if I find a old park and find I'm digging tons of early trash that's been down there 40-50 years, I know I'm on a honey hole, and will be rewarded, since most detectorists will have given up in frustration.
Now like you said above what good would it be if you found silver and gold all the time, and sure it would be nice...well let me say it once upon a time was like that, aka the late 70's through the early 80's....man those were the days!! I'd find so much silver in a day, often we would have to go empty our pockets for they were full of mercs and other goodies, it rained buffalos!

Now you just need two key elements to succeed in detecting, thoroughly knowing the machine you are using, and a ton of patience.

Mike

 

[Escape]

At my local trashy park, I hunt with high discriminaton and pick up the clad and silver. Average about $1.50 an hour. An occasional silver ring, mercury dime and dollar coins. Find 3 or 4 Wheaties all with a low trash to good target ratio. I go to the beach for gold. Physically I can only get up of the ground so many times digging holes. Dont want to spend it digging trash.

 

[bigfoot1]

yup...if its trashy the good stuff is still there.I hunt old mining camps alot,those were REALLY trashy times.once I get through the trash I have a shot at the goodies.my sig.below says it all

 

[DDancer]

Well said.

I wont say I like digging junk however I do pay attention to that junk. The trash has more than once given me clues about a modern site that I am detecting and driven me to be a bit more methodical on those sites. With good results at times. That same junk has also kept others out of sites that with a little patience became most enjoyable not just for the finds but for the solace of having the whole thing to myself. Hahh
I do get discouraged from time to time when I'm having dry runs however I know that the junk is keeping me in fighting form. It is work and practice all in one. Something to keep a philosophical opinion on but not to allow myself to develop a bad attitude towards. Its just junk. It proves someone was there once and hopefully they had holes in their pockets.

 

[Doug H]

Now this is a great thread. I usually just glance at the "Today's Finds" and if that's all you look at then it would make you feel like everybody else out there is rolling in the goods and you aren't doing anything. I almost feel a little bad in saying that I'm glad to see I'm not alone in trash digging. Good luck out there.

 

[RustyGold]

Excellent post! Thank you for the inspiration!

 

[Msbeepbeep]

Well said all of you! I find Treasure hunting is a fluid in the moment kind of thing, we have to be creative, & patient adapting to the challenge while we are learning and finding "stuff". I find some of my trash interesting, it tells me things, like how old the site may be, has it been used lately (modern trash)?

As for seeing all the finds others make, I like it. It reminds me of just how much stuff is out there waiting to be found. Yes we all wish we could find goodies like those. Those goodies were in the ground and an MD'er came long and found them! It could be you! Lots of stuff is lost or hidden daily, and remains there until someone finds it. There is more treasure in the ground than people think, lots more!

All the treasure that ever was is still here, (except what they shoot off into space) it just may be in a different place or form put there by different people. GL. HH. To all!

 

[Dave Rishar]

Well said.

I wont say I like digging junk however I do pay attention to that junk. The trash has more than once given me clues about a modern site that I am detecting and driven me to be a bit more methodical on those sites. With good results at times. That same junk has also kept others out of sites that with a little patience became most enjoyable not just for the finds but for the solace of having the whole thing to myself. Hahh
I do get discouraged from time to time when I'm having dry runs however I know that the junk is keeping me in fighting form. It is work and practice all in one. Something to keep a philosophical opinion on but not to allow myself to develop a bad attitude towards. Its just junk. It proves someone was there once and hopefully they had holes in their pockets.

Quoted for truth. When one keeps track of what type of trash is being recovered, how old it is, how deep it is, and how it's distributed, that garbage can literally tell you not only how the site has been used, but also how it's been hunted. Garbage is informative. In that sense, I do like digging trash. (Admittedly I pass on the deep aluminum cans; it's enough to simply know that they're there.)

I know that everyone here already knows this but it bears repeating: a lot of the gold lives in the trash range. If you're not digging trash, you may be walking over some nice stuff. The trash will tell you whether or not the site's been cherry picked, and when. Some people get disheartened when they try out a site that's obviously been high-graded. Me? I thank my lucky stars that the detectorists who came before me were so darned picky. It's only when the site has no trash that I start to get worried.

 

[luvsdux]

Good responses by all. I always start out with the thought that each hunt has potential. Of course, over time, sometimes pickings are pretty slim, but the next time may be the one you dream about.
luvsdux

 

[Limitool]

Jarl... well worded post guy. And it is nice to hear that others dig "trash" also though we all know it happens. It just somehow seems "different" when your the one digging it. I live high on a TN. ridge top in a heavily wooded area. So I do a lot of MDing here on an old, old road running behind my home and the surrounding woods. When I first started out up here detecting I found an old musket ball and got excited about finding more cool stuff. From there I moved on to real old shotgun headstamps, oxen shoes, horseshoes, old wagon parts, and pieces of old chain. My buddy Frank did find an old bone handled pocket knife in horrible shape this spring. And there seems to be no end to it either. And I haven't found even 1 old coin with my MD yet upon this ridge. It's all just JUNK, JUNK, JUNK!!!!!! But I'm still holding out because with all this JUNK being found on this old historic road there just has to be a nugget of gold SOMEWHERE....? But it does help to know I'm not alone though.

 

[Boatlode]

See below.

 

[bill from lachine]

Jarl,

Well said....funny thing is I started detecting strictly urban green spaces in my area about 20 years ago and a few guys who started about 10 years before me pretty much cleaned out most of the silver and older coins.

I was mostly coin shooting until 5 or 6 years ago and finding mostly clad an the occassional silver coin or large cent......as my regular sites were giving up less and less I was forced to keep dropping my discrimination until I only knock out iron....since them my keeper finds have increased and the gold rings in my avatar attest to the fact there's still keepers out there if you're prepared to sift through the junk.

Regards + HH

Bill

 

[kingwilly84]

yep i started relic hunting about a year ago within the first 20 min found a 1903 indian head and thought man this is gonna be easy i was wrong it took weeks and miles of walking before i found anything else worth while but i was hooked and I've had days from sun up to sundown with nothing to show but a bunch of aluminum cans and shotgun shells but i keep thinking i gotta go back again maybe i just missed a 1700s coin by a few feet you never know

 

[Dave Rishar]

Yesterday, the plan for the day's hunt fell apart and we wound up hitting an out-of-the-way playfield that I'd always wondered about. Signals were sparse and shallow, so I dug some stuff that I normally would have passed on. I got a few aluminum cans and some bottlecaps for my troubles, but I also got a Leatherman Micra (in very useable condition) and a 1976 Henry Griffith and Sons silver bracelet. I might have dug the bracelet under other circumstances as it was a very unusual yet interesting signal, but I only pulled the Leatherman because I was digging iffy tones. As it was only a two hour hunt, I just about made wages on this one. How often does that happen?

I like silver as much as the next guy, but it doesn't have to be coin-shaped to make me happy, and it's not only silver that I enjoy digging up. There's other good stuff in there. How permissive my hunting protocol is depends on the site. If there's not much to dig, I'll dig just about everything. It pays off sometimes. It makes me wonder about what's still in the sites that I was more cautious on.

 

[Jarl]

Thank you all for such great responses. I have enjoyed reading all of your perspectives. Thanks again!

 

[cw0909]

just think, there are 83k+ members here, take 10%=8k that have been
Md for at least 30yr, and all the trash we have dug, would prob fill about
5k of these, dont feel so bad or frustrated, there is still plenty of trash to
fill another 5k of those in 30yr, we didnt get it all LOL