Tough Love for Surface Collecting Wanna-bees.

[MAMucker]

You CAN find Artifacts. And, you WILL find them, if you put in the time and slowly walk a hundred miles.

-A few years back a couple of guys from Mason County West Virginia (Seneca Relics) put out a YouTube video, in which, they gave some excellent instruction on searching for and finding Artifacts.

They are mainly Creek Walkers, which doesn’t relate much to the conditions I search in. But, they are very successful, very insightful and very humorous. And I love their videos.

One thing they said that can help anyone from anywhere who might get the gumption to search the ground for artifacts, is that (once you’ve identified evidence that you’re looking in the right place) you should hunt with concentration & expectation.

I’m paraphrasing, but the great point they made was, -HUNT like you know your wife’s missing wedding ring is somewhere near (this is just an illustration guys, so no metal detector snipes please!).


Now, once you are in “the mode”, it may take years to train your eyes to see what others cannot readily identify. -By the way, it takes a ‘different’ kind of personality to want to put yourself through this process.

The hobby is lonely. It’s inexplicable to me how anyone would NOT get excited about spotting an artifact. But the reality is that of most of the people in our lives don’t really get it. They can’t fathom what conjures up the passion. It’s too much work and too little the prize. They just couldn’t be bothered.


But, (and here’s the big BUT) if you can discipline yourself to maybe go it alone (if you have to), and strive to learn everything thing that you can, buy great books on the subject (become a student of ancient sociology and typology) and research your area, and meet landowners, and sacrifice many precious hours scanning the ground, you WILL make discoveries.



But (again another but) most of the time, you will be disillusioned by -what experienced collectors call FAKERS —-(illustrated by the extremely talented ‘Mr. Faker’ that fooled me but-good -pictured here in these photos) -Stones, that make your heart race, and cause you to hold your breath. Stones that you will swear are artifacts, (that is) until the moment they are in your hand.



But (last but), if that doesn’t discourage you, this just might be the hobby for you.

Ha Ha!

 

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[arrow86]

Yep thats a good faker ..... can’t tell you how many times I’ve reached elbow deep into freezing cold water only to grab a leaf that looked like a killer point but all worth it for when you do get to be the first person in thousands of years to hold an artifact

 

[IAMZIM]

Yep thats a good faker ..... can’t tell you how many times I’ve reached elbow deep into freezing cold water only to grab a leaf that looked like a killer point but all worth it for when you do get to be the first person in thousands of years to hold an artifact

Ha! Ha! I do that ALL the time! We have leaves here that look almost exactly the same color as a jasper they used for points here, and I poke leaves I think are points at first all the time!!!

 

[Nitric]

As a kid I spent hours walking freshly plowed fields looking for them. I'm not an avid hunter now, but do keep my eyes open for them. And we have found them by "mistake". Walking trails that were made by ATV's, or just out wandering in the woods. A couple of my best finds were on days I wasn't even looking for them and happened to look down. We have an area on our land where I found a bunch of flint chips, and flint isn't known to that area. We plan on going back and digging around at some point. Your right though!! When I was a kid I'd walk miles of field looking and may only find a piece of one or a little tiny one. It was a lot of fun.

 

[unclemac]

hell, the walk is half the fun!

 

[Huzzah!]

A 'faker' thread would be fun.

 

[captain redbeard]

I got a sudden interest a few years ago and haven't looked back. I was curious about arrowheads so I googled it and one of first things I found was this site. I started seeing pictures of artifacts people were finding recently and got excited thinking about being able to find my own. I started searching about finding artifacts which got me more excited so I just got permission to walk some fields nearby close to water. I really didn't know what I was looking for and staring at the ground that's littered with rocks I naturally was focusing more on bigger stones.

Walked many hours and posted many rocks that "fit nice in my hand", but knew there had to be something around and my determination to find an -arrowhead- led me to my first hammer stone. Got permission for another and favorite field of mine and within the first 15 minutes walking the field Found a celt which was a black stone and well polished on really dry dusty dirt, though I didn't know what it was at the time, it really stuck out. Shortly after I started finding flakes of flint/chert and then pieces, chunks, tools and finally points. Once I knew what this material looked like on the ground I started focusing my eyes much better for the smaller stuff.

Have learned a lot and acquired a lot of knowledge since first starting out, there are a lot of helpful and knowledgeable members here that contributed a lot to that and my thirst for that knowledge hasn't slowed down, I learn something knew constantly and every bit of information just adds to the success of the hobby. This is such a good physically active,cheap and meditative hobby - very rewarding all the way around. I don't think I'll ever give this hobby up

 

[jamey]

yes the worst part is comming back out and in too the real world

 

[unclemac]

i am lucky in that all I have to do to hunt is walk out my front door....a 5 hour "walk" is pretty typical.