Beach trash...

I hit the beach at first light this morning, excited to get back in the swing of detecting as I haven't been out in several months.  My first sight sadly was of the beach renourishment efforts. It looks like three to four feet of sand has been dumped at Seagate beach, one of my favorites. I get that the renourishment  projects are to help maintain local tourism dollars, but as a detectorist all I can think of is all the gold that is now out of reach until the next major storm.  But beach renourishment isn't my main topic today, it is our old nemesis, beach trash. This morning I found handfuls of it, in particular bottle caps. It is amazing to me that some people still litter. I guess if they are willing to take glass bottles to the beach, which is prohibited, flicking the bottle caps into the sand is about par for their course. I suppose I should be glad they are not smashing the bottles as well.  But I digress.  Now as much as we dislike wasting time digging it, trash at the beach also tells a story. Is the trash shallow but old? If so recent wave action likely uncovered a layer you need to work thoroughly.  Is the trash new but deep? Wave action has deposited new sand over a modern layer, time to move to another spot! Is there a lot of trash, shallow new trash and deep old trash? You may have found an undetected beach! Or at least one that has not been methodically hunted. Remember also, every piece of trash you discriminate out or decide not to dig may be masking that once in a lifetime find. Years ago I was detecting a beach littered with chunks of old iron. By methodically removing the iron I made several nice finds that were completely hidden by the iron. In another instance I was water detecting off Sanibel Island, a booming signal, obviously a can, hid a gold and diamond crucifix that came up in the same scoop. Sometimes it really pays to make the effort and clean out the trash. 

Good days and bad...

I haven't gone "woods" detecting in a long time.  Today my nephew and I detected a wooded lot my brother owns, the lot is densely wooded except for a few trails cut by a lot clearing company to get access to the interior.  Although I could find no history on the property I wanted to detect it because you just never know... Perhaps there was a 1920's hunting camp on it at some time in the past, maybe a troop of soldiers from the Seminole Indian Wars camped there, perhaps a 2 reale coin was dropped by a Spanish missionary in the 1600's... As it turned out we found nothing but trash, relatively new trash, and a surprising amount considering it is a lot no one has built on.  Lots of buried beer cans, rusty bits of rebar, a few nails (not old), large wads of tinfoil buried under the dropped pine needles, a few old golf balls, and a small handful of memorial pennies I found near the road (not in the woods).  We will go back when once he gets the lot cleared, this will open up the property and we can get in there to give it another go.  A few inches of topsoil off will help if there is anything old on the site. 

So was today a good or bad day? No decent finds, lot of junk, eaten alive by swarms of skeeters, sweated out about a half gallon...  In my view it was a good day!  It was great detecting with my nephew, plenty of fresh air, birds were singing, exercise, I was using my MXT which I haven't swung in a long time, life is good - overall a great detecting trip.

Books!

I love a good book. These days I mostly listen to audiobooks on the way to and from work, but I also will pick up any books on metal detecting, piracy and Florida history that I take a shine to.  My latest detector purchase of a Minelab Excalibur prompted me to buy a set of books on the Excalibur by Clive Clynick. I have most of Clive's books on beach/water hunting, PI detectors and now the Excalibur, all excellent reference books on how to get the most performance from those machines. For the metal detecting enthusiasts living in South West Florida, "Florida's Last Frontier - The History of Collier County" by Charlton W. Tebeau is a great guide for historical locations in Collier County (If you do pin point a site you want to hunt, as always, make sure you get permission from the landowner!).  For the military relic hunters out there, a great reference is the "Encyclopedia of Historic Forts" by Robert B. Roberts, this is large volume that covers all 50 states, it is out of print but you should be able to find a copy on Amazon or Ebay. For for the Florida hunters, "Forts, Camps & Batteries of Florida" by Harry H. Ranier Jr. is a pretty thorough guide.  Although you can likely find most the research material you need online, there is nothing quite like finding the information you need from an old dusty book, maybe the same way finding an old coin means so much more than buying a shiny one from a coin dealer.  I mention it on my website, but when looking for information on local history always start at your local library.  They typically have books written by local historians, and only a few copies may have ever been printed!  Finally wanted to mention a must have set of books for the folks interested in Civil War relics is "The War of the Rebellion: a Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies", the original set published 1880-1901, is an enormous reference.  It is available on DVD from various vendors on Amazon and Ebay.  That's all for tonight. Thanks for reading!

Introduction - First Post!

I should have started a floridadetecting blog years ago but for one reason or another just did not get it added to my old website (now defunct).  The nice thing about using a blog is that I do not have to edit HTML and bother with FTP uploading when I want to add a quick note.  This blog will simply be a different version of my old website, but with the latest information of my detecting trips, maybe a product review now and again once I have used it in the field, or if I find resources that may be useful to you.