Would you detect a place where you had to give everything back to the owner?

[Juice in the hole]

I have tons of places to hunt here on our farm (late 1700's home sites, tobacco barns, slave quarters) but still I'm drawn to some of the fantastic historic mansions in my area. Many are designated "National Historic Places" and were owned by large plantation owners. There are plenty to choose from and I'll bet at least some would be willing to let me give it a shot. The question is, do you even mention what you plan on doing with the finds up front? Do you give the owner the pick of the finds and keep the rest? What if the owner says okay, but they get to keep everything? Is it still worth detecting to you (time & energy) if you aren't allowed to keep a single item?

 

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[cudamark]

Hunting a place where I have to turn everything over to the owner or hunting a place where I can keep what I find? Seems like a no-brainer to me. Even though I like working on my cars, I wouldn't offer to repair someone else's for free.

 

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[Disfunctional]

I bought my old detector years ago to see if I could make some money using it. It didn't pay for itself that first season. So the MD sat in storage for several years.

Then I got back onto prospecting after a quarter century. I moved near to my new claim that's located near an old townsite from the gold rush days. Now I'll dig my MD back out. I plan to use it on my claim for profit.

But I'll also see if I can hunt the old townsite. And I would expect that I be allowed to profit from any finds I might make.

My view is that, I payed good money for my MD and my time is worth more than a thank you. More often than not, a property owner, historical society, or other antiquities group, would allow valuable pieces of history to lay in the ground and rot, corrode or decay, rather than get it out and let at least one person have the enjoyment of having it.

Here in British Columbia there are many places that are designated as historic sites, that have relics left laying around outside in the dirt. I know of one that I would like to hunt. Theres a place were garbage was dumped over an embankment. The old bottles and cans are in layers that get partly exposed to spring flooding each year, but its an historic site and they don't let anyone touch it.

 

[Disfunctional]

You may have checked out the laws but if you didn't make sure it is truly off-limits as it may not be or you may be able to get permission. Here is a forum link it might be helpful as it shows other activity in British Columbia and may lead you to more information.--http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/treasure-hunting-legal-issues/1prospecting-laws-bc-canada.html

Thanks for the link. That's actually the site I use now for my claim. Unfortunately when it comes to using a MD on a heritage site, its a different level of red tape. That particular site is near where I used to live, a couple hundred miles from here.

The townsite I'm thinking about is quite near, but there's a local heritage society watching it. Haven't contacted them yet. Thought I'd get in good with the locals first. It seems other prospectors have raised people's awareness to the potential for profit. Some locals are suspicious of prospectors since a few found out they had to allow prospectors access across their property.

Anyway, I'll stop in next week to see if there's a chance of working the townsite. Still have to dust off my old MD and do an upgrade on it. Ordered a rechargeable power pack for it thats rated at 50,000 mah. Also plan to install a tiny speaker option for my cellphone, so the phone can listen to the MD squawk and have the audio spectrum analyser app i installed, display the graphical image of what gold sounds like.

I guess that makes me an old geek.