What are the odds?

[neuseman]

What are the odds of finding coins in just any ploughed field?

 

[cntrydncr1]

excellent but you might have to hunt a long time to get one in some fields!!!

 

[Frankn]

I would place it in the don't waist your time if it is coins you seek, unless it is a known cache.

 

[Scott (Mich)]

The odds may be good if you do your research. The coin finds from my dad's field from 1996 to 2005. About a two or three acre area. And to think of all those times I spent putting up hay or helping plant corn at the spot while growing up, never dreaming of what was just below the surface.

 

[Minrelica]

^^^ Very cool Scott.

 

[oldcoon]

A plowed field in itself doesn't mean diddler's squat, and it might be said you could spend a lot time in searching a plowed field for nothing or almost next to nothing unless something happened in that field that made it a good place to search. I can hardly make it any more crystal clear but I will try. If something happened in that plowed field you might be onto something because like here in the US of A maybe a circus set up in that field or maybe the fire company once held a carnival or three there so as you can clearly see it might pay to hunt there but if you are living in place like the United Kingdom almost anyplace you put your coil down might be a viable place to hunt unless it was the Queen's bedroom in which case she might offer you a cigarette while you wait for the Yeoman Warder to haul your azz out to the Tower. They don't allow metal detecting there. The ravens hate it. A ploughed field in the UK is a far different thing than in the US of A. In over 2000 years almost every inch of the Island was built over three or four or more times so what appears as a pasture for Welsh Cobs today was maybe a bustling town 1200 years ago. There are rivers over there that have silted up over the years and while it may be hard to comprehend but those river towns were once busy seaports. No more. Here in the US I know of a old gypsy campground that has yielded interesting finds. Back around 1920 the gypsies got run out by disgruntled farmers who lost too many pigs, sheep and chickens. I understand the gypsies left rather quickly and may have left some of their stuff laying about which I have found some of and I am not giving it back unless they can show receipts that they legally purchased such things.

Good luck and happy hunting.

 

[Daedalus]

One of the best items I every found was in a field that I was told nothing was in. You would be surprised at how many things are in the fields in the U.S .
Now I would say that the East coast area would be the best , but I found this in the Midwest .

 

[neuseman]

I live in Carteret county NC and have fields on three sides of my house. The farmers here use to raise potatoes on this land. Back then they picked these potatoes up mostly by hand. A truck would drive between the rows in the field and the farm help would load the truck. Just wondering if any of those people may have dropped any coins?

 

[Dano Sverige]

Rule of thumb...if people have ever been there, then they've lost/dropped/thrown away/buried stuff!

 

[Iron Patch]

The odds are either 100% or zero.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

old-coon's answer is right on spot. He says: "unless something happened in that field that made it a good place to search".

Like if you researched and found that that was the spot of an old camp-stop grounds, or a stage stop had been there, or any other such human activity in yester-year. But to simply go out to any old furroughed field, will not be productive. Oh sure, a field-worker might loose a coin now and then, but that's utterly random and doesn't make much sense. It's much more productive to go where something used to be (old homesteads, saloon, etc...)

Now in Europe this advice may not hold true. Over there, a lot of their cultivated fields have been continuously plowed and worked for 1k to 2k or more years. So do the math, and you'll see, that a random passerby or fieldworker loss adds up over time. So yes, over there, they can just walk into any random field, even if nothing except agriculture had ever gone on there, and yes, find things. But over here in the USA, especially on the west coast, our history is just too short. Where I'm at, for instance, we've had barely 100-ish yrs. of agriculture (before that was cattle). So if I walked into any random field, and worked for long enough, sure, I'd eventually find a wheatie or something. But it would be utterly pointless as the time spent would be better spent going to a park. However, if I researched and learned that there used to be a 1-room school house, or stage stop or something there, then the period targets would turn up perhaps.

 

[JOHUNT]

Funny this was brought up! Last year while having a BBQ on land that has been in my family for over 150 years I grabbed my detector and went to searching. I found some clad. All of a sudden my dad bent down in a freshly plowed field and scooped up a 1850's dime and jokingly said, "I don't need a MD to find em'"! This was always farmland and a barn used to be very close by. When I'm in plowed fields I usually dont carry a MD because my eyes are fixed to the ground searching for arrowheads, etc. but, you never know where you'll find somethin'. GOOD LUCK!

 

[Minrelica]

The odds are either 100% or zero.

Actually, they're 50/50.

You'll either find something, or you won't.

 

[Iron Patch]

The odds are either 100% or zero.

Actually, they're 50/50.

You'll either find something, or you won't.

Ahhh.... not exactly. All or nothing is 100% or zero.

 

[NaturalJWL]

Check the fields.

At the very least, you should find some arrowheads.

Don't forget all the military activity scattered around 150 years ago.

Fields are rough, tractors vibrate, things get lost, coins, knives, ect.

Never know until you try.

 

[watercolor]

Finding isolated coins in a farm field with no prior "intensive" human activity can be a possibility
but as Tom & "oldcoon" mentioned, rather slim.

But, there is still hope.

Farms for the most part, usually had barns, or some type of out-buildings that had to be cleaned on a
regular basis so a lot of time would be spent in these structures scraping up the manure, soiled hay,
(along with dropped coinage, knives, rings, etc). . . and then spread in the fields as fertilizer

 

[maipenrai]

I think hitting a random field every now and then is something interesting to do. For one thing, there shouldnt be a lot of junk, so you could do it pretty fast with no dis. I have hit a couple, and the results were not great, but it was better than nothing. The copper coins that I found were pretty well eaten, probably from the fertilizer, but there were some interesting pieces of bronze also. I wouldnt spend too much time on random fields, but you never know where your cache might come from. There isnt always an X marking the spot.

 

[CrazySlasher]

It depends on where you live too. Where I live, up until the 50's my area was 90% farms. So, just about any field you hit, you're gonna find something.

 

[liftloop]

all depends on the type of detector your hunted with.If the coin is 6 inches down and they plow a one foot wind roe over it now it 18 inches down and if you don't have a higher end detector you'll miss it. that's why in a field you use the biggest coil you can get your hands on.

 

[diggummup]

I live in Carteret county NC and have fields on three sides of my house. The farmers here use to raise potatoes on this land. Back then they picked these potatoes up mostly by hand. A truck would drive between the rows in the field and the farm help would load the truck. Just wondering if any of those people may have dropped any coins?

Personally, considering your location I would hunt the fields. But I wouldn't discriminate when hunting. There was a lot of CW activity in your area if i'm not mistaken so you don't want to search just for coins, dig all signals. Not to mention that your area has a rich Colonial history too. Get hunting and keep us updated!

all depends on the type of detector your hunted with.If the coin is 6 inches down and they plow a one foot wind roe over it now it 18 inches down and if you don't have a higher end detector you'll miss it. that's why in a field you use the biggest coil you can get your hands on.

That's the beauty of hunting fields, it works both ways. Things that were deep are also brought to the surface.