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Question?.....Any One Else Do Urban Treasure Hunting? :shrug:

John-Edmonton

John-Edmonton

Moderator
Staff member
I have several places that I regularly hunt down town Edmonton. Now Edmonton isn't a small city. Our population is over 3/4 of a million people. It's history goes back to the late 1800's, a stopping place for supplies for the Yukon gold rush. So, we don't get too many coins in the 1800's, but on the plus side, dinosaur finds have been found minutes from downtown, and we have flour gold in the North Saskatchewan River, which meanders through the heart of Edmonton.

But, I have hunted right downtown, beside those tall buildings when some sidewalks were torn out several years ago, and I also hunt parks so close to downtown that thousands of people in office towers can see me.

I know many people like to hunt old areas, for the older stuff, however, it is becoming scarce. I personally have been focusing more and more on modern coins and jewellery, especially of the gold variety. In my area, the Scorpion has been a real magnet for coins and rings for a lot of reason, the least being depth. Probably 99% of my land finds such as rings and coins were found in the top 3-4 inches, and I have saved so much time NOT digging deep targets. Most of my deep targets have been pieces of rusty iron, which gave good sounding no matter which detector I used. So, I have focused on good discrimination on my machines to get my preferred finds. The GTP & GTI machines have given me the ability to size smaller targets, and the Scorpion just bangs harder on round, holed targets such as rings and the older beaver tail pull tabs. Now when relic hunting, which I can also do downtown, requires a totally different strategy. Here's where I NEED my extra depth, and switch to my GTI 2500 using various coils.

I am just wondering if you too are hunting similar places? I have long given up the embarrassing feeling of metal detecting around people.
 
All I hunt is urban. I go to the sanborn maps and find all the schools, churches and parks that were here before 1940. Write down the addresses and then use Bing maps to do a close up look at each of the addresses from the early 1900's.

Most of them still exist. Some have grown. Some are now vacant lots or other businesses, but the ones that still have grass are productive for silver coins. I don't particularly like schools, but I do hunt the ones that were here around 1920 and earlier. Find some coins. Churches are the best, if you can get permission. I generally hunt the small ones that no one shows up at except on church days.

Businesses that have sidewalks with grass on the street side are good. These must also be where they were are something else existed before.

Hope this is helpful......Coach
 
I am outside of Cleveland in suburb grew up in Cleveland and would like to try that but probably would get robbed or thrown in jail here.No understanding of what your doing here. There are some clubs here but don't here much about them.
 
Well-I certainly don't, there's not many towns around here with a population of over 2,000, I wouldn't know what to do in a place like that, we bout like the Ma n Pa Kettle famlys and towns around here :sadwalk:
 
I haven't done much in the way of urban hunting but I have my sights set on some city parks this year and some older sections of the city. I guess I got to get that place where It dosen't bother me what people say or do as we a recieved by most as wierdo's in the city.:garrett:
 
From the land of the Bluenose.....dig and they will come. I have felt uncomfortable at times hunting around heavily populated places but that goes away with the first penny dug. Interesting topic.
 
I live in Huntington and lately I've been researching places to go when the weather gets warmer. I look for older sites downtown especially empty lots, I found a couple sites that I'm excited about hunting, Anyway, there are wide streets in Huntington with grass areas in between that I have not hit yet, other than that ...waiting for spring!!
 
Im near Pittsburgh Pa and I do most
of my hunting in my home town area.
ive found most of my coins and trinkets,
tokens and Religious medals in the area
Im trying to find more local older places to hunt
as well as trying to get permission from peopel to hunt
on their property a lot of which was farm land when i
was a kid... a LONG:lol: time ago ...
As far as safety Im not too concerned , but then again
I always hunt with Ruger close by .....

Have safe happy fun hunts
Ron
Rangers Lead The Way
 
Oh yeah, we'll hit places along on our travels.:twodetecting:usually just stick to the tot lots in the parks. Most of our hunting is not urban, but we do some. More people=better chance to find gold jewelry, but mostly find:pulltab::biggrin:Happy Hunting!:)
 
Maybe you should check out the clubs? Can be of great assistance in metal detecting. they probably have a lot of nfo you could use. HH Jack in Austin
 
Re: The "Weirdo" image. When you are out MD'ing and people stop to talk to you, spend a bit of time talking to them. You can start to change that image. Sometimes I talk with several people a day. I miss some hunting time but I also am promoting the hobby. Just a suggestion. You can also get good leads this way. HH Jack in Austin
 
I live in a fairly large city in Texas. If yu are carryng and using a long skinny blade screwdriver or blunt pointed ice pick for retieval of coins, they don't bother you. I also carry one of those small pepper spray (not mace, pepper spray, a lot stronger) containers in my pants pocket when I am out hunting. No problems. HH Jack in Austin
 
On weekends try the immediate area around parking meters. Gold Mines! Tons of coins and occasional ring. If you have a sniper coil they work great around metal meter posts. On weekends there are fewer people in downtown areas and usually parking id free on weekends. I can sometimes get as much as $20 in change in one day working these areas. HH Jack in Austin
 
About a third or more of my yearly hunting is in the downtown area. I have left several replys to other posts on this topic that might be worth reading. There are numerous MD'ers here and I have never seen any sign that any of them have been in the downtown area. I alway do good there. HH Jack in Austin
 
It's funny you should ask that. I hunt in the downtown parks where there is alot of homeless people that occupy the grassy areas. They come up to ask me what I'm doing and I tell them that I am finding lost coins or jewelry. I give them my change (common clad) that I just found sans the good stuff which is hidden in another pouch. They are really elated about that!

I also hunt old city lots too. Haven't had anybody try to mug me, though I always watch my back!

When you think about it, they panhandle for money, take a snooze at the park, drop their change, I come up a couple weeks later and find it and give it back to them in a matter of a week or two. Of course downtown has the oldest parks where you can still find the good stuff. In the better neighborhoods, the parks are newer, the people are middle income, and the finds are as common as if you lost it within a year.

TC-NM
 
I have thought about it but to date not tried it.
I picked up a very well written book on Urban Metal Detecting
at Barns And Noble Book Sellers awhile back that deals extensively
with "the how to" and various other things. It has some good tips and tips on how to make
field equipment as well. Its a must read in my opinion.
Katz
 
I rarely detect downtown because of the high number of addicts in the inner core. Usually, one look at my Hori Hori digging knife makes the staggering ones in parks, take a divergent route after they get closer. This year I am focusing on turn of the century one room school house yards and a few fur trade posts. I have no interest in clad other than cleaning up school yards during the between period, were the snow is melting but the ground still frozen. I might try to pick up a few more Mounted Police buttons/relics also, as the site is on the edge of town.
 
Most of our parks are over hunted, I would like some older properties. Alot of our state parks restrict us from hunting, even some local ones, to many people not filling their holes. Street construction is a good way to locate old coins.
 
Matter of fact, I have never hunted off post mainly because there are so many parks and houses on post. It seems that these parks aren't hunted by anyone other than me or my Dad. They are gold mines when it comes to clad. There is, of course, the occassional jewelry and early 1900s coin. There are also many house front yards to search when the military gets ready to tear them down. Right now there are probably over 100 seperate yards in the subdivision that the military is getting ready to tear down. If it would stop snowing and raining we might be able to get out before March!!!!!!:rant:

As for laws... there are no laws in effect that would effect us. I've never seen anyone else detecting on post, but have seen 2 people hunting off post. I'm fine with that as long as they don't mess up the laws in the city.
 
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