Three Keeper Day

[GB_Amateur]

Got out to my (lately) best producing site for 2 1/2 hours last week -- a permission which I still have only covered less than half the area.  I thought I had hit the garden spots initially but that has turned out not to be the case.  One of the reasons I wasn't high on my current spot is that it had been backfilled with gravel.  When?  I don't know but based upon aerial photos I was thinking in the 1960's.  I've been pulling up keepers the last half dozen times and in that time I've only covered an area about four swings wide by 30 m long.  "Low and slow" is paying off.  The area is moderatly trashy with both iron (mostly nails and screws) and aluminum (all kinds, especially foil but some square tabs and the always present can slaw).

I was running the Eqx 800 in Park 1, ground balanced, custom 5 tones, gain of 22 (high for me since I usually suffer from EMI in my town), recovery = 4, and iron bias = 0.  For iffy targets I had programmed the profile channel with Park 2, 50 tones, recovery speed = 6, iron bias = 0.   I can't seem to get my brain to hunt in 50 tones, but using that to verify good/bad targets works pretty well.  If I get repeatable tones and TID's which match the 5-tone signals then I dig.  Sometimes I get completely different TID's in 50 tones, other times I can't lock on a tight tone range from any direction.  When I've dug those they are some kind of iron.

Ok, back to the hunt.  I mentioned above the gravel backfill, which is in the neighborhood of 2-3 inches in thickness.  There is a soil (sod) layer above that which varies in depth from about 2 to 5 inches.  When I get down to gravel and haven't recovered I start to feel more positive.  Most of my good finds in this area have either been at the top of the gravel layer, in the gravel layer, or below it.  Recovery is a bit tricky since it's not so easy to dig in gravel.  (BTW, this is true rounded river gravel, not sharp limestone chunks which some people call 'gravel' and which is even more difficult to dig in.)  I was using the standard Lesche hand tool (well, my toothless modded one) which does pretty well in gravel and stone.  The key is to hand pinpoint (TRX great for that), keep the blade away from the find and try to leverage it out with soil/gravel as an insulating buffer.  I do this when in regular soft ground as well but it's even more critical in gravel or stone.  I always have a plastic scoop to remove the loose ground (hopefully also containing the target).

The dime hit in the penny/dime zone.  I'm not one of those detectorists who can tell the difference betweeen copper penny, clad dime, and silver dime.  All, under the right conditions, will ring up anywere in the 24-29 TID range for me, and I've even seen pennies hit 30 (but not staying there).  Interestingly I didn't find a single Wheat penny on this hunt, but I've found quite a few in this area.  Both nickels rang up where nickels typically do -- 12-13 with possible slides to 11 and/or 14.  The Buffie in particular was not a clean 12-13 but good enough!  The deeper the coin, the more likely it will be bothered by nearby iron.  And, no, I still haven't found a Warnick with a high TID.  So far I can't tell them from regular nickels (nor some evil size&shape aluminum).  This one is in the best condition of any Warnick I've found.  Unfortunately it's overexposed in the picture.  1942-P.  The Merc is a 1937 plain.  The Buffie is 1936-D.  None of these is scarce but I'm always glad to get silver and Buffies with dates.

 

[Happa54]

You had a successful hunt GB.... congrats on the buff and merc.

I have a similar site to yours. I've covered about 1/4 of it and it just keeps producing great coins and relics. Since I've had my Nox, I only run in 50 tones due to my last machine (Safari) which is basically a tone machine. 

My site is where homes were torn down in the 50's and it seems none of the trash was hauled out of there cuz I'm digging it all up. I don't mind though it's a great learning process for tones/targets and I look forward to each and every target no matter the tone or VDI. 

Thanks for posting your detailed report.