Top Ten Things I Learned This Year…

[Iskuli]

The following are not necessarily in the order of importance.

1. Check the hole after finding a coin. Yep, nothing will put your underwear in a bunch more than having your metal detecting buddy find a quarter(s) in a hole you dug with your blood, sweat, and tears, because you were in a hurry to detect the rest of the area. Not that has ever happened to me personally….ehem…..

2. Trash is good. Yes, you read correctly, trash is good! Trash tells me that people have been in the area I am hunting. The amount tells me HOW many people go there. The KIND of trash has helped me date the area I am hunting (old pull tabs vs. new, old popbottles, etc). I especially like to see beer, or wine trash! Those folks don’t know how NOT to lose their money and jewelry at the beach. Twisted, I know, but it works for me!

3. I usually find more at the beginning of a hunt than at the end. I think I have an idea of why that is true for me. At the beginning of a hunt I swing slow and low. At the end of the hunt I am kind of making a happy face with my coil, know what I mean? At the beginning of the hunt I dig EVERYTHING. At the end, just the “good sounds.” I usually grid the area out in the beginning. At the end of the hunt, I just kind of willy-nilly it.

4. Speakinig of Gridding the area! I have proven it to myself time and again that I will find more coins and jewelry when I take the time to grid out the area I am going to hunt. When I grid, I miss less treasure. Notice I didn’t say I would get ALL treasure! Which brings me to number 5....

5. No place is ever hunted out. I tried to hunt out an area, and what I found was that nature can cover, and uncover treasure. An area that has 2 or 3 inches of sand or soil removed WILL equal more coins and treasure. People will also continue to lose things in a hunted out area. Case and point: I found my 2nd gold ring this year in an area I would have bet $$$ you wouldn't be able to find coins, or jewelry becuase I hunt it once a week. I have pulled cans, tabs, tokens, coins and silver; and yet, this week, there it was under a rock I had been avoiding with my coil. Which brings me to six...

6. There is treasure by trees, bushes, and big rocks. I have found many a coin and ring by, and under this stuff. If I am in a good area (one that is producing coins) I will move these things if I can. If not, I swing all around them and listen for tone or whisper.

7. Finding lots of quarters means I have found an area that is not hunted much by other detectorists! They will miss dimes, and nickels; but, they don't consitently miss quarters. Has anyone else surmised this as well? I have also found that when I find a lot of quarters in a hunting area that I find jewelry too.

8. Treasure is in the eye of the beholder! I love to find rings! Little works of art. This year I have found over 72 rings. Two of these rings I have had the pleasure of returning to their owners! Having said that, I also enjoy finding coins, toy cars, thing-a-ma-bobs, keys and more. I never, and I mean NEVER have a bad hunt. I have hunts where I find more, or better than others; however, just being outdoors in the fresh air is wonderful. I like the physical activity, and the joy of the hunt. The anticipation of the dig. That's what keeps me interested in the MDing.

9. Turn down the discrimination. I remember how excited I was to have a machine that would cancel out/discriminate trash. Woo-hoo! I would only find coins and treasure. Not true....I have an older whites classic. When I use high discrimination, I lose depth. Plus, trash will mask the good stuff. PERIOD! The only time I use discrimination is when I have less than an hour to hunt, or I am feeling discouraged from digging to much trash. I flip over to discriminate, find a few coins or whatever, and back to no discrimination I go! I will also put the detector on discriminate to case out a new hunting area. If I find clad and/or silver, I turn down the discrimination and start digging trash.

10. Gold sounds and looks like foil or a nickel! Did I mention to turn down the discrimination and dig everything? Enough said!

I hope this is helpful for the newbies out there! My dad showed me the ropes with my metal detector a year ago this Christmas. Now that he has moved to another state, I take the sage advise and wisdom of the seasoned MDiers on treasurenet.

BTW (by the way) Just so you know the lingo:
HH = Happy hunting
IH = Indian head

Iskui

 

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[Blackjack77]

your top ten resonates with Me!!
Excellant post-- thanks for the advice.
HH

 

[gregl01]

Very nice list!!! The only thing I could add would be to "think outside the box" when looking for hunting spots. There are some very good places that people just don't hunt or think they are hunted out. WRONG Sometimes coin finds are slim but they were still there to be found.
Greg

 

[TheDetectorist]

Those are all good advice. I wish I had someone to tell me these things when I started out. I had to come by them on my own.

As for rule #3. I decided years ago that when I start walking past targets (becuase it's probably just another bit of junk) It's time to leave. It means that I am tired/sore/distracted or whatever and I'm not really concentrating on hunting. Thankfully, there's a lot of MD'ers that start at every site with that "only the good signals" attitude.

TD

 

[Night Stalker]

Good list and great tips - thanks for sharing with everyone.


HH/NS

 

[RON (PA)]

Great list. Thanks for posting.

 

[ClonedSIM]

I have an addendum for #8, one I'm sure is familiar to most if not all here:
My worst day hunting is still better than my best day at work!

 

[dahut]

Good stuff we should all have given to us before we take uo this hobby.

1. SOP in my book and a natural... greed alone makes us go looking for something else in the same hole.
2. Ive said this for years. I dont like it but I just blank out to trash.
3&4. Gridding is good and is another SOP. I have gridding stakes that I use.
5. Some places are just poor producers though, and inefficient vs time spent.
6. Shrubbery grows over where once it didnt exist. I head there first, in fact. Ditto for trees.
7. The Quarter Effect - I like it!
8. Yep
9.&10. Set it at the nick below nickel and then practice "beep and dig."

 

[Mainedigger]

Excellent advice and post!!!!! Gridding is a MUST, grid in one direction, then grid perpendicular to your original direction and then grid in angles to those grids...and as you stated...NO area is hunted out, especially where there is frost....the ground on its own is moving and pushing things up and down and the frost moves them even more.
Detectorist also posted excellent advice..when you start walking past signals and not digging them...its time to head home for you are too tired and/or not concentrating enough...head home and come back when your mind is clear and you are patient enough to dig ALL signals.

Item #1 is a MUST ...always recheck a hole...many times there are more than one coin, if one was lost, why not more?? Also if I hadn;t followed this advice, then after digging out an old large cent..if I hadn;t re-checked the hole again, I would have lost my wedding ring...it must have got caught on a root and got pulled off without me knowing it, and explaining to my wife that I lost my wedding band while metal detecting is definitely not a situation I want to put myself into... . I've also found MANY holes with multiple coins in them...my best thus far is one hole with 8 Indian heads..so good advice...scan over the hole and plug more than once.

I also like your "quarter effect"...a very good indication you've found virgin ground if alot of quarters show, especially silver ones.

Best advice is to take your time and enjoy yourself, because, as stated, a bad day of detecting still beats a good day of work everytime...

 

[TreasureTales]

Excellent post! Good info for newbies and oldies alike. Sometimes we forget the basics and a reminder like this one is welcome.

 

[Iskuli]

Thanks for more additions to the list!

I have thought of 2 others:

Extra batteries! I don't know why it is, but it is a fact, the first time you run out of juice you will have chosen THAT day to hunt 30 minutes or more away from your car. I've done it, and you will too.

If it looks like a snake, and crawls like a snake, its a snake! Some of the areas I like to hunt are rural. There is wildlife. My dad and I came upon a HUGE snake! Thankfully we didn't step on him. Hey, did you know they can climb trees, and FAST? I am very mindful of my surrounding. Anyone else have any wildlife stories?

 

[dahut]

Another item

..This ties in to the battery thing.
Many folks like to consider themselves "minimalists," and pride themselves on carrying little more than a screwdriver, belt knife and sandwich when they go detecting. I can tell you, having done this now for almost 20 years - that doesn't work.

Just as with the batteries, there are times when the genuine need for something arises. If You don't have it, it could spell the difference between success or failure.
Then there are the other less serious needs which we all face; those moments when something left behind makes itself felt, forcing you into a compromise. A compromise brought on by ignorance or a lack of preparedness.

Both of these conditions, fortunately, are easy to remedy with a simple "possibles bag," a phrase coined by the old Mountain Men of the American frontier.

As the name implies, a "possibles bag" or "kit bag" is simply a bag into which you place the items you need for a particular task. For the early explorers, that meant everything they would need to live in the wilderness. For you, the modern "detectin' explorer" it is full of those things which suit the task at hand - detecting in whatever fashion you like. Here is a pic of my own "possibles bag" :

In it you can see those items which I have found suitable to my style of hunting. Most everything has a backup and everything is suited to it's intended task.
There is one item which wont fit inside the bag and that is a 24" relic shovel. That stays in the truck until I need it for woods and field recoveries. However, the rest of this stuff is packed into a heavy duty duffle bag, which in this case is simply a rugged carry on bag I got at the thrift store for $2.

There have been some minor additions to the bag which were prompted by the suggestions of others and are nice to have items. Since they take up little space I added them...it is something of a "work-in-process." The added items are as follows
1. Toilet paper
2. Duct tape
3. Super glue
4. Waterproof matches
5. Flask of brandy
I keep the bag ready, in my truck and just carry it when I am off to the next site. Putting it all in a small backpack might also help if you hike alot - well, you get the idea. I just grab my detector and bag and Im set!

Many look at this bag of tricks and ask,
"C'mon David, do you really NEED all that stuff?"
"Not all at once, no," I say. "But everything in there has been needed at one time or another and on a recurring basis. Each thing is there because I went without it more than once and needed it when I did."

SO I suggest you create you own "possibles bag," and you won't find yourself without the things you need, whether around the corner or miles from your vehicle.

 

[TreasureTales]

dahut, that's a great Possibles Bag. Now that I have a digital camera, I'm going to take it with me into the field as well. AND I have a whistle that I wear around my neck and then tucked inside my shirt so that I can contact my hunting partner if he is out of sight. We tried yelling to each other when one of us got something good, but then anybody else in the area knew we got something good and that can be bad. LOL So the whistle is loud enough to be heard for some distance, but no one knows WHY we might whistle to each other. And just for those times when I get over zealous in my digging and slice my finger, I have a very small first aid kit that I carry in my bag. Some plastic tiewraps are also handy on occasion. It might seem like lots of stuff to haul around, but I assure you that my own Possible Bag is actually light weight and everything fits nicely...I use a book pack.

Plastic Tiewraps
Small First Aid Kit
Whistle
Bottles of Water

 

[dahut]

First aid kit is a gooder, too. Ditto the whistle.

For tie wraps, tear thin strip of duct tape off the roll and then roll THAT lengthwise - instant tie wrap.

 

[Iskuli]

What are the tie wraps for?

 

[SHERMANVILLE ILLINOIS]

What are the tie wraps for?

When your in an open area, and the urge hits
you. Aids in putting it off for a few hours



have a good un...............

 

[dahut]

Besides "stoppering the flow," tie wraps come in handy for several things, not the least of which is strapping your cable.

If youre not doing it already, you should strap your cable to the lower rod so it isnt flopping around within the detection field of the coil. When you do this, make sure you leave some strain relief, so it doesnt bind where it enters the coil body. The coil flexes as you hunt and there needs to be some allowance for this.

I also use tie wraps to secure gear, make occasional repairs and yes stopper the drain tube.

 

[Iskuli]

SI - If you are talking about....what I think you're talking about, it won't help me in that way, being as I am a lady!

 

[TreasureTales]

Tie Wrap - Cable Tie http://www.electerm.com/gfx/tysgfx/ty30.gif

 

[dahut]

Okay, the "drain tube" part was funning you. As in joshing, having fun and/or being lighthearted. Remember, at all times to keep your tongue firmly in your cheek.