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Best finds from my first year of detecting

B

born2hunt

New member
Next week will be one complete year of detecting for me so here are my best finds.

26-90% silver coins including one walker half, two SLQ's, one Barber dime (1905-my oldest silver) and six mercs
Two sterling silver rings, One 10K gold ring
One wartime nickel and one buffalo nickel

Not included in the pic are a small handful of wheats and about thirty bucks in clad.

This may pale in comparison to the first year finds of others but I consider myself very fortunate to have found so many keepers with so little knowledge of detectors. I owe most of my success to three things.

1) Luck
2) Using detectors that are easy to operate
3) The fine folks right here on this forum

I would like to thank everyone here for all of the sound advice, encouragement and support.

Sincerely,
Steve in PA
 
If you found that many silver and only 30 bucks in clad you are finding a LOT of silver. I'm lucky to get one silver coin in 50 bucks of clad. A very impressive collection.

What are your sites of choise? Parks, schools, homes? I'll bet on homes.

Chris
 
Chris,

You post some of the most impressive counts on this forum and I applaud you for it but I'm not really in this for the clad. I like targeting areas that have good silver potential. All but three of those coins came from older homes. Two came from an old church picnic grove and the one I found today came from a field behind an older school in town.

I must say that after finding that gold ring (also found at a homestead) I can appreciate the opportunities that Park hunting can offer, in fact I just got permission today to hunt in the Boro Park where I live. I know for a fact that it's been pounded before but it's a big park and stuff gets lost every day.
 
When I started detecting with a Bounty Hunter Tracker 4, I found a lot more silver coins and they were (and remain) a favorite of mine. I had only 3 sites I rotated to, and when I met an interested bystander I usually asked if I could hunt their home if it was older. Many said yes, many said no. I was at one guys house and had found a nice pocket full of keepers and when he came out to see what I had found I showed him. I asked if he wanted to pick out a coin or two and he said what do you mean, it's all mine. After we discussed it, and I saw that I couldn't change his mind, I gave it all to him including a few Barber dimes, 3 or 4 Mercs, and a bunch of wheats. I basically wasted 5 hours of my time. I got one Barber dime that I had left in my truck during a break but I was still pretty ticked off. I then started running into a lot of homeowners who thought my reward was going to be the privilege of hunting their land and theirs would be all the good loot. Not everybody but a lot folks seemed to have these thoughts. I started looking for greener, easier, pastures when this fella came into my bar who was grounds keeper at a park 10 miles down the road. He added four sites to my rotation. There I found a few silver coins along with 3 gold rings and I've never really looked back. I started hunting parks around the county and decided I liked gold rings better than old coins. Oddly, at that point in my career I wasn't finding all that much silver jewelry. After I figured out how to do that I started really hitting silver rings and I have over a hundred that contain at least as much silver as a US silver dime. Not exactly the same but in my mind it's just as good. I think now that I'm a better hunter I should explore the type of hunting you do. I still come across a silver coin or two, enough to keep me satisfied. I think exactly 60 of those 25,000 coins I've found are silver along with a few IH cents, two large cents and a pile of wheats.

I'm going to start knocking on doors again soon, I suppose.

Chris
 
Chris,

Since I've only been at it for a short while I've been hitting the homes of family and friends so I haven't had that problem but eventually that well is going to run dry. I've already begun thinking of ways to present myself to private home owners to try and gain access. I've read a few articles on getting access but none on the etiquette of getting turned away. My take has always been to take no for an answer, thank them for their time and walk away with your ears up and your nose to the wind for the next potential spot.

Yesterday I was denied access to and old church picnic grove but this morning I was granted permission to three separate locations, one is a fairgrounds that has held consecutive fairs since the late 1800's. I'm sure it's been pummeled many times but nobody ever walks away with it all.

As to the greedy guy who helped himself to your fist full of silver............left pocket, right pocket, but I'm sure you've figured that out by now.
 
I was naive back then and very proud of my best hunt ever up to that point. I thought offering a few coins was appropriate. I had the owner of a large old house (a mansion almost) in town make me the same offer. He said he had turned away many detectors but would let me hunt providing I turned it all over to him. He was convinced he was offering me the hunt of a lifetime and I recall clearly answering why would I detect someplace where I was gauranteed to go home empty handed when I had at least a dozen sites where I could clean up. He smiled and said I'd eventually show up on his doorstep. Not in this lifetime.

I also hate being told no. Of the public places I hunt, I've been told no twice and one guy wasn't authorized to do so. The other guy later changed his mind. I have 75 plus sites in my rotation now. Some are pretty slim pickings lately. Many are still loaded.

Good thread. Got me thinking.

Chris
 
that's an impressive pile of loot for your first year :surprised: some detectorists never find that many silver coins in a life time of hunting so i"d say your doing very well :thumbup:
lazyaussie
 
That's a very nice collection of silver Steve.:clapping: I'd be pretty stoked if I found that much silver in a year.
Well done.
Mick Evans.
 
Very nice silver and rings . Congrats on these finds !.
 
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